WSOP Main Event Final Table deferred until November

[McG]

Haven't seen any mention of this until tonight. Initial reaction not favourable, in my humble opinion.

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Final Nine Players Will Square-Off This November on ESPN
LAS VEGAS – May 1, 2008 – The World Series of Poker® (WSOP) Presented by Milwaukee’s Best Light today announced a groundbreaking change that will more closely align the televised presentation of the world’s largest, richest and most prestigious poker tournament with other premier sports broadcasts.
The last nine players of the $10,000 World Championship of No-Limit Texas Hold’em, known as the Main Event, will compete on November 9-10 instead of the originally scheduled date of July 16.
“Our intent is to provide an even bigger stage for our players,” said Jeffrey Pollack, Commissioner of the World Series of Poker. “Now fans and viewers will ask ‘who will win’ our coveted championship bracelet instead of ‘who won.’ The excitement and interest surrounding our final nine players will be unprecedented.”
This change in how the Main Event final table is staged will bring the excitement and drama of high-stakes WSOP tournament play closer to millions of fans around the globe.
All other 2008 WSOP tournament structures and schedules remain unchanged. This announcement affects only the final nine players of Event #54, the Main Event World Championship.
Continuing the trailblazing efforts that have made the WSOP the industry standard, this move is being made in close collaboration with ESPN, the television rightsholder of the WSOP, and the WSOP Players Advisory Council (PAC), the commissioner-appointed committee of professional and amateur poker players who provide guidance and perspective to the WSOP leadership team.

"It's an exciting time for the World Series of Poker and ESPN," said Jamie Horowitz, senior producer, ESPN Content Development. "This adjustment will add a new element to a very successful and popular event. We look forward to documenting all of the exciting stories that make the WSOP Main Event the seminal competition in all of poker."

“This is a huge step forward for poker and more specifically poker on television because it will help create more buzz around the final table and that is good for all of us,” said Daniel Negreanu, a WSOP PAC member, three-time World Series of Poker bracelet winner and one of today’s most successful and popular poker professionals. “Not only will this innovative step create more buzz for the final table, the added time prior to the final table will help get poker mainstream media attention. I’m very excited about this decision and can’t wait to see it all unfold, hopefully from a seat at the final table!”

The 39th annual World Series of Poker will take place from May 30th to July 14th at the Rio® All-Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. The Main Event will begin on July 3rd, with the Final Table being determined on July 14th. The nine players who advance to the Final Table will return to the Rio on November 9th to play down to just two players. The final two, will go head-to-head late in the evening on November 10th to determine the champion and winner of poker’s ultimate prize.
The winner of the Main Event is expected to be crowned in the early hours of November 11. ESPN will edit the two-day Final Table action and televise it in a two-hour program from 9:00-11:00 PM ET on Tuesday, November 11 just hours after the winner is crowned. This is akin to television coverage of the Olympic Games, where because of time zone differences, the telecaster schedules programs “same day” in primetime to provide the largest possible audience a convenient viewing time.
ESPN will begin its coverage of the 2008 World Series of Poker on Tuesday, July 22. Viewers will see two hours of original poker programming every Tuesday through November 11 (except November 4 when a special preview of the Final Table will be aired at 10 p.m.). Telecasts will be aired at 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. July 22 through September 30 and at 9 p.m. and 10 p.m. from October 7 through November 11.
Each of the players who make it to the WSOP Main Event Final Table will receive ninth place prize money on July 14, when the finalists are determined. Harrah’s will then provide each of those players with an all expense paid trip for two for their return to Las Vegas in November to play the final portion of the tournament.
From July 14 to November 9, a span of 117 days, players will have an opportunity to line up sponsorships, coaches, review the play of all their competitors, participate in other tournaments, and take advantage of the new publicity and promotional opportunities that will be available.

[morlspin]

Was put in general chat mate but should be in here really, ill merge the two over.

http://www.punterslounge.com/forum/f...ollocks-66760/

[GotaFancy?]

In McG's defence - the title of the other thread isn't really particularly informative, so easy to not know what it's about - compared to McG's that cannot be misunderstood

EDIT: My pet hate on PL - uninformative titles!!

[morlspin]

yep very true!

[morlspin]

What the pros have to say about the WSOP FT MOVE

Roland de Wolfe

Quote:

Hi All, Is this really going ahead? It takes away so much from the integrity of the event. In three months players ability and mentality can be totally changed. It would almost like be playing different players. It is also dangerous for the players, leaving them vulnerable to corruption and threats. When tens of millions are on the line the wrong types are attracted to try to influence proceedings. This time window could be a serious opportunity for them. It may also discourage people, especially those travelling cross continent to not enter the event, if they do not want to travel twice or have commitments in November And what if a player dies in the meantime? This is a poorly thought out idea in my opinion. There are some positives that are far outweighed by the negatives here.I really think for the good of the game it should be overturned. This is a very player unfriendly idea and I sincerely hope we can voice our disenchantment with this. I feel our greatest event is being taken away from us. Is my position supported? Roland

[morlspin]

Max Pescatori

Quote:

Is today April's Fool? I thought it's 1st of May. Roland says "What if a player dies?". If I'm chip leader I would be afraid to get murdered... There is so many reasons why this is madness, Roland already pointed out the main ones. Question: are the "wsop players advisers" going to do anything about this? If u don't get heard, you should all quit !!! And If u agree with this change/proposal, u should also quit, since u are not smart enough. Sincerely, Max Pescatori ps. I'm generally out in the first 5 h of the main, but I feel I should still express my opinion

[morlspin]

Howard Lederer

Quote:

Hi All, First of all, I would like to say that this discussion reminds of one the poker community had about 6 years ago: "We can't show hole cards! It will ruin the game and we'll all lose our edge." That opinion proved wrong and many of the most vocal opponents of hole-card cams have profited greatly by poker's staggering growth. We can all sit back and see poker's TV ratings erode, or we can stand up and take a chance that this could turn things around. The mainstream media attention will be huge, resulting in media exposure to the 5th place finisher this year, that will dwarf last year's second place finisher. -- Roland says-- In three months players ability and mentality can be totally changed. It would almost like be playing different players. The fact that the players might get better, is fair to all players as it's the rules before the event starts. The delay will benefit pros and amateurs in fair but different ways. If you're a pro, you may not get the benefit of getting much better, but the media value to you as an established pro during this 3 months of attention will be huge. Also as a pro, you may actually get to see an amateur's play on TV before facing him, unheard of these days. Other pros being hired as coaches will also be a neat story. Of course, amateurs will get the opportunity to get much better and become media stars over night. If you have a cool story to tell combined with the fact that MIGHT win the world championship, that sells. That same story combined with the fact that you finished 5th three months ago, doesn't sell. --Roland says-- It is also dangerous for the players, leaving them vulnerable to corruption and threats. When tens of millions are on the line the wrong types are attracted to try to influence proceedings. This time window could be a serious opportunity for them. The bright light of the media attention will discourage cheating. Harrah's will also make sure every player knows the dire consequences of getting caught cheating (forfeiture of the money and life-time ban). The paranoid fantasy of death threats is absurd. Every week there are huge numbers of pro athletes who could be killed, with huge money being won and lost by dishonest gamblers who knew about the hit ahead of time. But there is no evidence any athlete has ever been killed for gambling profit. Also, every hand can be reviewed to make sure there was no clear pattern of collusion. Also, what is to stop two players from making a deal to collude overnight between the last two days of the main event in its former format? If they get caught, it will cost them big money, a life-time ban and their reputations. I suspect those deterrents will be effective here. --Roland says-- It may also discourage people, especially those traveling cross continent to not enter the event, if they do not want to travel twice or have commitments in November I somehow suspect that traveling a second time to Vegas to play for millions will not be a deterrent. --Roland says-- And what if a player dies in the meantime? Highly unlikely (probably <1%), but I'm sure Harrah's will do the right think if that happened. -- Max says-- Question: are the "wsop players advisers" going to do anything about this? If u don't get heard, you should all quit !!! And If u agree with this change/proposal, u should also quit, since u are not smart enough. We are definitely heard. If you know the line-up of Player's Advisory Council members, we aren't ones who would stick around if we aren't being heard. Does that mean that what we want we always get? Of course not. All of our opinions are heard, and most of our strong suggestions are implemented. I think you will see a much better schedule and vastly improved structures this year, for example. I can also say that, according to you, just about every member of the PAC should resign due to stupidity. Though this idea was generated between Harrah's and ESPN, it received near unanimous support among the PAC members. I have no plans to resign just yet. In my opinion this is an ambitious attempt to put some "buzz" back into the Main Event. All sports have to evolve to compete in an ever more competitive sports entertainment landscape. If we don't do something, we could be off ESPN before you know it. That would not be good. This may be radical, but is was done with due deliberation. We can't let long shot worst-case scenarios stop us from moving forward. If this gets poker to cross over to the media mainstream, it will benefit us all, not just Harrah's and ESPN. I think it's a great idea. Howard

[morlspin]

Scott Fischman

Quote:

hey all, I am generally completely against new rules and formats that greatly affect the outcome of the game and take skill out of the hands of the players. There have been more then a few of these type of changes made over the past few years. One of the more horrific format changes that comes to mind is the "5 levels per day then redraw" that has been implemented in most of our main events these days. This particular rule takes so much of the skill and advantage right out of our hands and with no real upside that i know of. The biggest downside that i see with this "future final table" format is that you are just going to be playing a completely different tournament when it resumes. I am sure we are all familiar with how different the game can be from day to day let alone 4 months. The novice players will surely have ample time to acquire coaching, and everyone will be able to do some homework on the known players at the table, which i don't feel is that big of a deal anyhow because players can do this from day to day anyhow. The main issue in my mind is the fact that everybody is now a different player under a new set of factors that will be determining their decisions. For example, there is a time and a place where laying down KK and other big starting hands is very easy pre-flop. And playing for 10 million would seem like the right place to be able to get off a big hand but if you sit me down at a "new" table this just isn't going to be the case. I agree with a lot of Howard's points. I have to admit, I have certainly been a part of the public that has stopped watching ESPN poker. I think it has more to do with all the screaming, the "shark" and side story crap not to mention how many players got broke during the commercial break. The milwaukee's best light ad ends and you hear Norman Chad saying, "We are rejoining the action and Joe Blow is allin with J-7 against Tommy's Q-2... the board reads 4-3-8-K..... and Joe will need to catch a J or a 7 on the river or he will be eliminated in 7th place." I mean this kid might have been waiting his whole life to make a wsop final table, he has been telling everyone that will listen about this sick hand and told them to watch him on TV but then the entire hand gets cutoff so they have extra time to tell us all about Timmy's family and a poker game he played in second grade when doyle was in his home town. I think something needs to be done but maybe just not this, it would change the outcome too dramatically. I would be willing to bet that had this format been in place over the past 5 years of ESPN poker we could very likely be seen with 5 comletely diff champions then we currently hold. I suggest a look at the producers of the shows for a start. I also think that doubling the starting stacks and changing the structure of the tourney has been the biggest reason for the decline of viewership. Less pros make the FT, which leads to less interest from the public. I think Harrah's is trying to appeal more to the amateurs and get big numbers of players to vegas every year for 2 months. You can't have 10,000 people in a tourney, give them 20k starting stack and horrible playing conditions and then expect there to be a star studded final table. scott

[morlspin]

Vicky Coren

So Howard is basically saying that it's worth the hassle, the many potential dangers, the loss of momentum, the further break with tradition, the removal of the opportunity for people who played the main event to stay and watch the final, etc., because it means more media attention?! There's not enough media attention on poker already?! The WSOP isn't already making enough mistakes by changing itself to suit television rather than inviting television just to cover what it is (eg. incredible delays during the hand-for-hand when everyone has to wait for the cameras) ?
You have to bear in mind, Howard is coming at it from the point of view of being one of those people who has chosen heavy self-promotion and a big TV push - nothing wrong with that, but for a lot of people the media spotlight is actually a down side of modern poker, and many would argue that it's in some ways better to come 2nd or 3rd in the WSOP than win it, because you still get a few million but you don't have to be recognized everywhere you go!
Personally I think it's an annoying and stupid change, breaking the essential nature of what a poker tournament IS. It's like the Olympic Committee deciding that, in order to maximize coverage, they were going to run the first three legs of the 4 x 100m relay and then stop, put marks on the track, and the final runners would come back and sprint the last 100m six months later after everyone else had gone home.

[morlspin]

Doyle Brunson

Harrahs is in the business to make money, and we can't blame them. They
don't have to do anything. The poker players are a pawn in their chess game. This
tournament has gotten so big that while we all bitch about what they do, we
break our neck to play in as many events as we can. I think delaying the
final table helps the amateurs and hurts the pros. Lets face facts though, there
won't be many pros at the final table, maybe none. So even though I don't
personally like it, the benefits to poker overall will be positive.

Doyle B

[nessy0005]

just read all your comments i agree it sounds silly but iam on holiday in vegas over those dates so i think its a good idea now, dont think mrs ness will!!!!!!!