Voting for the 2010 World Series of Poker (WSOP) Tournament of Champions, which will take on an All-Star Game format, has been open for 24 hours. A handsome total of 40,722 votes have been cast.
WSOP officials have published the top 50 vote-getters and the list appears randomly to prevent ballot-stuffing. The top three bracelet winners of all-time are already in the hunt. UB.com pro Phil Hellmuth is among the chosen few with voting having been open for 24 hours. Hellmuth is the all-time WSOP bracelet leader at 11, one more than DoylesRoom namesake Doyle Brunson and popular pro Johnny Chan. All three are currently in line for a Tournament of Champions birth.
The current top 50 is chock full of young talent, including two-time bracelet winner Jeff Madsen and Italian poker sensation Dario Minieri. Both of Madsen’s bracelets came in 2006, when the youngster took down a $2,000 No Limit Hold’em event and a $5,000 No Limit Hold’em Six-Max tournament at the WSOP for a combined $1.3 million. Minieri, who went broke on Sunday’s episode of the GSN cash game series “High Stakes Poker,” took down a $2,500 No Limit Hold’em Six-Handed event in 2008. Other young guns currently in contention for the All-Star Game include Jason Mercier, Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond, and Peter Eastgate.
2009 WSOP Europe Main Event champion Barry Shulman is an automatic qualifier for the Tournament of Champions. The 2008 and 2007 WSOP Europe Main Event winners, however, have raised eyebrows and appear among the top vote-getters. Betfair pro Annette “Annette_15” Obrestad won the prestigious London tournament in 2007 to become the youngest bracelet winner ever. Full Tilt Poker’s John Juanda followed one year later. The man who made the final table of the WSOP Europe Main Event in 2008 and 2009, Daniel Negreanu, is also in line for an All-Star Game bid as one of the most popular players in the game.
Out of the 50 top vote-getters, only two are women: Jennifer Harman and Obrestad. Top female bracelet winners who do not yet appear include Poker News Daily Guest Columnist Linda Johnson, dual bracelet holder Susie Isaacs, and actress Jennifer Tilly. Only former WSOP bracelet winners are eligible and voting will remain open until June 15th at Midnight ET. The 2010 WSOP Tournament of Champions will play out on June 27th and July 4th at the Rio All-Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas and air on ESPN on August 3rd.
The general public can submit one ballot per e-mail address and a total of 20 spots are up for grabs out of the 27-player field. Five spots go to automatic qualifiers: the three previous Tournament of Champions winners (Annie Duke, Mike Matusow, and Mike Sexton) as well as the reigning WSOP and WSOP Europe Main Event champs (Joe Cada and Shulman). Two sponsor exemptions also exist. Here are the top 50 vote-getters in random order:
Jeff Madsen
Peter Eastgate
Kenny Tran
Phil Hellmuth
Barry Greenstein
Howard Lederer
John Juanda
Erik Seidel
Scotty Nguyen
Ted Forrest
Chris Ferguson
Carlos Mortensen
Layne Flack
Tom McEvoy
David Sklansky
David Benyamine
Jennifer Harman
Chris Moneymaker
Allen Cunningham
Freddy Deeb
Greg Raymer
Men “The Master” Nguyen
Doyle Brunson
Humberto Brenes
Daniel Negreanu
Huck Seed
Jamie Gold
Dan Harrington
Jeffrey Lisandro
Annette “Annette_15” Obrestad
Antonio Esfandiari
David Williams
Hoyt Corkins
Marc Naalden
J.C. Tran
Daniel Alaei
Joe Hachem
Johnny Chan
Prahlad Friedman
Rob Hollink
Sam Farha
T.J. Cloutier
Phil Ivey
Bobby Baldwin
Eli Elezra
Erick Lindgren
Amarillo Slim
Dario Minieri
Jason Mercier
Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond
On Twitter, poker players have feverishly been campaigning for votes. Obrestad Tweeted on Tuesday morning, “Keep it up… sorry if I’m spamming, but would mean the world to me to play. Keep voting!” Madsen, a former WSOP Player of the Year, chimed in, “Hey friends, vote for me to be a part of this year’s WSOP Tournament of Champions!” Not partaking was Terrence “Unassigned” Chan, who Tweeted, “Boo to the WSOP all-star TOC. Idea of these so-called ‘pros’ being given incentive to further flagrantly self-promote makes me wanna barf.”