With the 2011 World Series of Poker (WSOP) now a mere three months away, the poker community is gearing up for the slate of 58 bracelet events. A brand new $25,000 No Limit Hold’em Heads-Up contest is on deck as Event #2 in order to fire up our readers, “The Showdown with Jon Friedberg” welcomes Jack Effel, the WSOP’s Tournament Director. Check out Part 1 and Part 2. To support the show, download and deposit on UB.com using the code UBPND.
Before getting to the interview, Friedberg touched on the recent departure of 2004 WSOP Main Event champion Greg Raymer from PokerStars. “I honestly don’t think Raymer is even that much of an asset to PokerStars anymore,” Friedberg contended. “He certainly was back in 2004, 2005, and 2006, but now with Joe Cada and Jonathan Duhamel and all of these new champions, I just don’t feel like Raymer can compete with those guys by providing any level of similar exposure to PokerStars anymore.”
Effel came on to trumpet the 58-bracelet schedule of the 2011 WSOP, which begins on May 31st and stretches for six weeks. Effel explained, “As always, there is a great schedule in order this year. There’s something in there for everyone. You pretty much have what you had last year with some spice. There are a few small changes in terms of the mix of events.” The $10,000 Main Event will begin on July 7th with the first of four starting days and determine its November Nine on July 19th.
On poker forums like PocketFives.com and TwoPlusTwo, the timing of events this year has drawn a small degree of criticism. Effel explained how Caesars Entertainment staff determines the order of events: “It’s not a perfect science. I try to offer the highly attended events as Noon starts and then the smaller fields as the later starts… I try to spread the Mixed Events out to where you can play the $1,500 and then the $10,000. If you want to play HORSE, you can play the $1,500 and $10,000 and so on and so forth.”
A 10-Game Event features Badugi this year, the first time that the poker genre will make an appearance at the WSOP. The highest buy-in tournament is the $50,000 Poker Player’s Championship, which will kick off on July 2nd. Last year, Full Tilt Poker pro Michael Mizrachi won its inaugural edition for $1.6 million before going on to final table the Main Event for another $2.3 million.
With bigger buy-in events becoming the norm, Effel addressed how high the WSOP views tournament price tags: “I think that every buy-in is meaningful, whether it’s a $1,000 buy-in or a $50,000 buy-in. At any buy-in level, there is going to be a certain level of competition, skill, and players. It’s not just going to be a crapshoot… A field of 200 playing in a $10,000 Omaha event is probably a little tougher than an open $1,500 event, but they both have their level of skills and strategies to be successful.”
Effel added, “There’s always a possibility for more buy-ins. We always try to find great events that are exciting to players that are new to the schedule.” The 2011 WSOP schedule has over $200,000 in total buy-ins. Look for ten $10,000 buy-in tournaments.
Check out the rest of this week’s episode of “The Showdown with Jon Friedberg.” New installments are released every Tuesday exclusively here on Poker News Daily.