I have always gotten a kick out of the single-minded degeneracy inherent to professional poker players. It’s fodder for a million entertaining stories. But I also find it really depressing at times. I would much rather read about Barry Greenstein giving his tournament winnings to charities that aid poor children than about Erick Lindgren pocketing $340,000 for winning a golf bet (though admittedly I still think his winning that bet was really cool, one of the greatest prop bet wins of all-time).

I have only hung out with Annie Duke once. We chatted for a bit and tested each other’s trivia knowledge. She knows a ton of arcane facts. I thought she was cool then. Now I think she’s one of the coolest people on the planet. Organizing one of these events can’t be easy. Calling countless p.r. people and personal assistants to make sure that some actor can make it to Vegas for a night is a full-time job, and she’s already got one of those. In fact, she’s got two—she’s also a mom. Why would she subject herself to this? Because it’s IMPORTANT. Poker is many things: cool, fun, entertaining. But in the grand scheme of things it’s not important. Annie Duke recognizes that, and she understands what is, and I give her all the credit in the world. On this day, more than any other I can remember, I am proud to be a poker player.

Freddy Deeb pulled off an astonishing comeback this morning
This morning I overheard a conversation between Chau Giang and Melissa Hayden, both of whom were glad Freddy won. "I know he was gonna win.  Freddy play a lot of hands, more than anybody at table.  I play with Freddy for twenty years.  He deserve to win," said Chau.  Melissa agreed with Chau that Freddy winning was good for the game.  They felt like he was the best player at the final table because, "It all comes down to Razz," declared Melissa.  "You have to know when they pair and when they are counterfeited.  John Hanson is a very good player, but Freddy's been playing forever." Bruno Fitoussi had 10.5m of the 14.8m chips in play when they were three-handed. But in the end, I think Freddy had to stand on a chair to be seen over the pile of money he won ($2.28m). I'm glad ESPN stayed until 4 AM so I didn't have to.

Eugene Todd loves Phil Hellmuth, bro
I heard some obnoxious railbird yelling, "Let's go, Phil!  GO GET 'EM, PHIL!" The voice sounded familiar and when I turned around I saw none other than Eugene Todd, bro, cheering on Hellmuth as he was deep in the $5K six-handed event.  "I got money on him, bro.  Phil's amazing.  You can't say nuthin' 'bout him, bro.  The guy's got concentration....like nobody in the game, bro.  He's got the three D's: drive, determination, and devotion."  My mouth may have dropped open a bit because I didn't quite know what to make of Gene whipping out an alliteration to describe someone's poker game.

Eugene Todd has been strutting around the Rio
I was going to try to fit this in the previous Eugene Todd reference, but it really deserves it's own heading.  LA Mike ran into Gene strutting like a peacock down the hallway yesterday as he was fresh off his first major win.  When you look at Gene's results you'll see a solid string of cashes with several second and third places (including one vs. Phil Hellmuth at the $5k final table last summer). Although it's not his biggest cash, winning 1st place in a $2,500 Bellagio cup event prompted Gene to tell Mike, "The monkey's finally off the back, bro!"

There's some great poker being played in the $5,000 six-handed event
Dutch Boyd has been leading the field since halfway through yesterday, and doesn't seem like he's ready to look back.  However, he's not lacking for competition in the event.  Bill Gazes, Erik Friberg, Danny Noam, Gioi Long, Tony G, Keith Lehr, Nick Schulman, Dustin Woolf, Mike Guttman, Ram Vaswani, John Racener, Mark Vos, Lance Allred, and Alex Bolotin are still in the running as 29 players remain.  Unfortunately for Gene Todd (you didn't think I would make it through this thought with mentioning Gene, did you?), Phil Hellmuth took a bad beat when he got it all in with a set versus an overpair only to have his opponent river a higher set. 

Oh, and don't forget about everybody's favorite Wild Bill Edler.  Actually, Bill's not that wild.  At least not that I've seen.  But I've been dying to refer to him as "Wild Bill" for sooooo long...Bill's "sophisticated" approach to the game is perfect for this event; with 340k and blinds at 4k-8k Bill is the guy to watch in my opinion.  I hope we'll be seeing him at the final table tomorrow.

9:59 Amnon folded that hand to Bruno, and now finds himself all in versus John Hanson in Stud 8.  He’s ahead with A high and drawing at an 8 low…no shame here…come on river card…Snap!  Amnon just doubled up by scooping the pot with A high and the low with 86.  Hanson tried mucking his river card although Amnon was all in.  The dealer grabbed his cards from the muck and turned it over. 

10:00 Hanson does not have long, flowing blonde hair.

10:03 Hanson does have experience in the big game.  He’s a wall street guy who plays poker recreationally, but obviously does it quite well. 

10:05 Amnon is all-in in a 3-way pot in Stud 8.  He has a four-flush and two pair versus a nine-high flush of Bruno.  Any Q or 6 will give him a full house, any spade will give him an A high flush….

10:07 The river was just dealt, and Amnon bricked out on a huge sweat with the 10.  He was eliminated in 4th place.  He made $586,080.  I doubt he’ll be in the mood to report for us tonight, but PokerWire has been more than impressed by his run through the most talented field a poker tournament can throw at you.  Kirk Morrison, JC Tran, Steve Sung, and Greg FBT Mueller are just a few of the respected pros who have been here today to cheer on Amnon. 

10:11 Since Amnon is out, I’m pretty much just cheering for Sam to announce that the event is over.  And that’s a great example of unbiased journalism, ladies and gentlemen.  

10:15  In summary, Bruno has 11m of the just under 15m chips in play.  Barring an incredible turn of events, he will win.  I can honestly say it all came down to him getting the right cards when the limits got huge.  With 4m between them, Hanson and Deeb have their work cut out for them.

10:19 I'll leave you with the immortal words of my Chuck Norris widget, "Behind every succesful man is a woman.  Behind every dead man is Chuck Norris."

9:22 I might be responsible for Bruno Fityourtossi’s chip lead because I disrespected his country of origin by not eating my fries today. He's clearly angered by this.

9:23 My buddy Jeremy just stopped by.  His claim to fame is taking $600 off of Antonio Tarver earlier today in a $5-$10NL cash game.  Then Tarver knocked the piss out of him. 

9:23:45 I made up one half of the above blog.  You get to choose which one.

9:26 AMNON FILIPPPPPPPPPIIIIII just doubled up through Freddy Deeb.  Amnon had 263 showing versus the 8310 of Freddy when they got it all in. Amnon had a 97 low, ahead of Freddy’s 1098 low.  The river gave Amnon a 76 and the double up. If you’re not confused yet by this description of Razz, you are officially a nerd. 

9:28 The game moved from Razz to Stud hi.

9:35 I'm moving to the No-Limit Lounge.  Which is right next to me.  But up a couple of feet.  Some guy's foot is actually dangling in front of my laptop screen while he straddles the rail like it's a pony.  I'm tempted to take his shoe off and chuck it across the room, but that wouldn't be very nice.  So, instead, I'm going to join him on the rail from the lounge.  And push him over.  Not really.

4:44 Gavin Smith just made his entrance.  The last time I saw Gavin here he was sweating Greg Pappas at the stud final table.  He flipped me off.  Classy, as always.  ESPN just put a mic on him. 

 4:48 John Hanson has been moving full steam ahead.  Deeb still has the chip lead with Hanson now 1m behind, basically tied with Amnon.

4:50 The game has just changed to 7 Card Stud. The limits are 80k-160k with a 20k ante and 20k bring-in.  I expect play to slow down considerably as the average stack now has 30 big bets.  That’s a great number for the players as it puts less emphasis on the cards and more on the ability of the players.  When you are around the 10 big bet stage, you basically have to pick a hand and go with it.

4:53 Gavin yelled, “Happy Birthday, Amnon!” from across the room as Amnon dragged in his first pot in some time.  Turning another year older might just knock the matured Filippi out of the running for Alex’ “World’s Largest Eight Year Old” contest.  LA Mike is safe for now, but he better look out for Bill Chen.

4:58 Kenny Tran just raked in a nice pot from Freddy Deeb.  Deeb is sporting a red floral print shirt, althought it's not the red floral print shirt made famous by Phil Ivey in the 2003 WSOP.  Deeb got it all in with K’s versus Ivey’s set of 7’s only to spike another king on the turn.  Ivey deadpanned, “Must be the shirt.”  Unfortunately I’m too far away from the table to hear how many times Deeb dropped his just-as-famous-F-bombs after losing the pot.