GuardiansWorlds.com - Gambling Guide

The WSOP logo.

The World Series of Poker is the most prestigious set of poker tournaments in the world.

Origins

The original World Series of Poker was started by Tom Morehead of the Riverside casino in Reno and was an invitational event. The set of tournaments the World Series of Poker (WSOP) would evolve to was the brainchild of Las Vegas legend, casino owner, and poker player Benny Binion as well as his two sons Jack and Ted.

Johnny Moss, Becky Binion, and Puggy Pearson at the 1974 World Series of Poker

The Binion family not only nurtured the WSOP, but poker in general. Prior to the 1970s, poker was not found at many casinos because of the difficulty of keeping cheaters out. Through better security techniques as well as the Binion's tireless promotion through events like the WSOP, poker became a very popular game.

In 1970 the first WSOP at Binion's Horseshoe took place with seven players. The winner, Johnny Moss was elected by his peers as the first World Champion of Poker and received a silver cup as a prize.

Evolution

From 1971 on, all WSOP events have been tournaments with cash prizes. In 1973 a new event, Five-card stud, was added to the main event of no limit Texas Hold 'em. Since then new events have been added and removed. In 2006 there will be 42 events at the WSOP, covering the majority of poker variants. Currently, Texas Hold 'Em, Omaha hold 'em and Seven-card stud and their lowball variants (if any) are played. H.O.R.S.E has been played in the past and is returning in 2006. Also, S.H.O.E (Stud, Hold'em, Omaha and Eight or Better) has been played in the past along with Chinese poker, Five card stud and many others. Event winners get, in addition to their prize money, a coveted gold bracelet.

Doyle "Texas Dolly" Brunson and Johnny "Oriental Express" Chan have each won ten bracelets, while Phil Hellmuth has nine. Doyle's son, Todd Brunson, won a bracelet in a pot limit Omaha event in 2005, making them the first and only father/son combo to win at least one event at the WSOP. Also, celebrities Patrick Bruel, Jan Sørensen and Jennifer Tilly have won WSOP bracelets in 1998, 2002 and 2005 respectively.

The 2002 World Series of Poker in progress

The number of participants in the WSOP has grown every year, and in recent years the growth has exploded. In 2000 there were 4,780 entrants in the various events, but in 2005, the number rose to over 23,000 players. In the main event alone, participants grew from 839 in 2003, to 2,576 in 2004, to 5,619 in 2005. For the 2006 main event there are accommodations for at least 9,000 players.[1] Much of this growth can be attributed to the WSOP airing on ESPN and the World Poker Tour being shown on the Travel Channel, along with other televised series, as well as the boom of online poker.

Like most tournaments, the sponsoring casino takes a "rake" (a percentage between 6%-10%, depending on the buy-in) and distributes the rest, hence the prize money increases with more players. In the 2005 main event $52,818,610 (US) in prize money was distributed, including a $7.5 million first prize. Subtracting the $10,000 buy-ins, over $47 million was won by 560 players in the event.

Harrah's Takes The Pot

In 2004, Harrah's Entertainment purchased Binion's Horseshoe, renaming it just "Binion's" and announced that the 2005 Series events would be held at the Harrah's-owned Rio Hotel and Casino, located just off the Las Vegas Strip, with the final two days of the main event held downtown at Binion's in celebration of the centennial of the founding of Las Vegas. It also added a made-for-television $2 million "freeroll" invitational "Tournament of Champions" (TOC) event won by Annie Duke as a "winner-take-all" event.

Starting in 2005, the WSOP began a tournament "circuit" at Harrah's-owned properties in the United States where in addition to the $10,000 buy-in tournament at each site, qualifying players became eligible for a revamped Tournament of Champions. The 2005 TOC, made up of the top twenty qualifying players at each circuit event, along with the final table from the 2005 Main Event and the winners of nine or more bracelets (Hellmuth, Chan and Doyle Brunson) would participate in the revamped TOC at Caesar's Palace. Mike "The Mouth" Matusow won the first prize of $1 million (US), and all the players at the final table were guaranteed a minimum of $25,000 for the eighth and ninth place finishers. During a break in the final table of the 2005 Main Event on July 16, Harrah's announced that eleven properties — including the recently added Bally's and Caesar's properties — would host 2005-06 WSOP Circuit events that started on August 11 in Tunica, Mississippi. One event, that was scheduled for Biloxi, Mississippi was cancelled after the Grand Casino Biloxi, which was scheduled to host the event, suffered major damage from Hurricane Katrina.

The Rio will again host all 2006 WSOP major events, beginning on June 25 with satellite events and formally start the next day with the annual Casino Employee tournament, and will feature the TOC on June 28 and 29, 2006, along with the various events leading up to the main event, which will be held from July 28 until August 10. If the limit of 8,000 players buying in for $10,000 each is reached, the first prize is estimated to be $10 million as well as a special bracelet different from the others.

The Marketing of the WSOP

Like any event or sports league, the WSOP also has corporate sponsors and licensed products, which like any leagues or events, pay fees to market themselves as an official sponsor and/or licensee and exclusively use the WSOP insignia and cross-promote with their events. Besides the Harrah's properties and ESPN, major sponsors have included Miller Brewing's "Milwaukee's Best" brand of beers, Pepsi's SoBe Adrenaline Rush energy drink (sponsors of the 2005 TOC), Helene Curtis' Degree brand of anti-perspirant/deodorant, Card Player magazine, and GlaxoSmithKline/Bayer's Levitra erectile dysfunction medicine are all official corporate sponsors. Licensees include Activision (video games for different platforms such as Nintendo's GameCube, Microsoft's Xbox, Sony's PlayStation 2 and PC featuring computer generated versions of stars like Ferguson among others), and products made by different companies ranging from chip sets, playing cards, hand held games and clothing like caps and shirts. The fees and licences bring in over a million dollars to Harrah's.

Film coverage of the WSOP

The earliest filming of the World Series was a special produced by Binion's Horseshoe in 1973 and narrated by Jimmy "The Greek" Snyder. CBS began covering the World Series in the late 1970s. In the early 1980s, the event was again filmed as specials. In the late 1980s, the World Series returned to television as ESPN took over broadcasting. Initially, coverage consisted of just a single one hour taped delay broadcast of the main event. ESPN Classic currently airs many of the old broadcasts, especially from the mid 1990s and beyond. The most striking thing about the early coverage is how little was actually shown, since no "pocket cam" existed. Generally, ESPN used poker playing actors such as Dick Van Patten, Vince Van Patten and Gabe Kaplan with either the tournament director (usually Jim Albrecht) or a poker pro like Phil Hellmuth joining the team. Early coverage was relatively primitive compared to what ESPN does now, with no pre-taped interviews or profiles on the players. The commentators were actually on the casino floor itself. The 2002 WSOP was the first with the "sneak peek" (later called the pocket cam). 2003 was the first year that the broadcast covered action preceeding the final table.

Since then, ESPN has greatly expanded its coverage to include many of the preliminary events of the WSOP, especially Texas Hold 'Em. Also, their coverage of the main event now typically includes at least one hour program on each day. Since 2005, ESPN has been broadcasting one hour programs of the "circuit" events that the WSOP has at various Harrah's-owned casinos. Additionally, ESPN's coverage now includes many of the trappings of sports coverage, such as lighter segments (called "The Nuts") and interviews.

In 2000 and 2001, the World Series of Poker was broadcast by The Discovery Channel. These hour long programs presented more of an overview or recap of the WSOP as opposed to broadcasting an actual live event with play-by-play analysis and color commentary. The Discovery Channel's broadcast also featured final table players interviews interlaced throughout the show. ESPN would resume coverage the following year.

ESPN's coverage in 2002 would be typical of their coverage in the 1990s (recorded in video, little or no post-production commentary or player profiles, no card cams). However, the final table broadcast was expanded over two one-hour episodes.

ESPN has expanded poker to all-new levels, especially with their coverage of the 2006 WSOP. It was announced that poker fans would be able to view the entire final table of the 2006 Main Event via pay-per-view. This would cost $24.95 per order. Nonetheless, this is huge indicator of the popularity "boom" of poker in the United States.

WSOP broadcasters

1973 (special) - Jimmy "The Greek" Snyder
1978 (CBS) - Brent Musburger and Jimmy "The Greek" Snyder
1979 (CBS) - Frank Glieber and Jimmy "The Greek" Snyder
1981 (special) - Curt Gowdy
1983 (special) - Curt Gowdy and Bobby Baldwin
1987 (special) - Ted Robinson
1988 (ESPN) - Chris Marlowe
1989 (ESPN) - Chris Marlowe
1990 (ESPN) - Chris Marlowe
1991 (ESPN) - Chris Marlowe
1993 (ESPN) - Dick Van Patten and Jim Albrecht
1994 (ESPN) - Dick Van Patten and Jim Albrecht
1995 (ESPN) - Dick Van Patten and Jim Albrecht
1997 (ESPN) - Gabe Kaplan and Jim Albrecht
1998 (ESPN) - Vince Van Patten and Jim Albrecht
2002 (ESPN) - Lon McEachern and Gabe Kaplan
2003 (ESPN) - Lon McEachern and Norman Chad
2004 (ESPN) - Lon McEachern and Norman Chad
2005 (ESPN) - Lon McEachern and Norman Chad

The main event

The main event of the WSOP is the $10,000 buy-in no-limit Texas Hold 'Em tournament since 1972. (In 1971, the buy-in was $5,000.) Winners of the event not only get the largest prize of the tournament and a gold bracelet, but additionally their picture is placed into the Gallery of Champions at Binion's.

The Gallery of Champions in 1979 The Gallery of Champions in 1979

There have been many memorable moments during the main events, including Jack Straus's 1982 comeback win after discovering he had one $500 chip left when he thought he was out of the tournament.

Four players have won the main event multiple times: Johnny Moss (1970, 1971 and 1974), Doyle Brunson (1976 and 1977), Stu Ungar (1980, 1981 and 1997) and Johnny Chan (1987 and 1988.)

The end of the 1988 main event was featured in the movie Rounders.

Chris Moneymaker and Greg Raymer, the winners in 2003 and 2004 both qualified for the main event through satellite tournaments at the PokerStars online cardroom.

Several living poker legends have tried unsuccessfully for years to win the main event, including T. J. Cloutier, the 1985 and 2000 runner-up.

As of 2006, a cap of 8,000 players is now an official stipulation of the Main Event. With the exception of winners of the World Series Of Poker Main Event satellite tournaments (who automatically win a spot in the main event), all remaining players (including former champions, celebrities, and professional poker players) must supply the $10,000 buy-in, in order to participate.

Gambling Guide

World Series of Poker

Contents