Today's episode: Donald Key, Final Table predictions and Lee Watkinson on Sklansky vs. chimp.

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Seat 8:  Lee Watkinson
Hometown:  Cheney, WA
Chip Count:  9,925,000
Lee Watkinson is a 40-year-old poker pro, businessman, and animal rights activist from Cheney, WA.  He is one of only two players at the final table who currently owns a WSOP gold bracelet.  In 2006, Watkinson won the Pot-Limit Omaha World Championship.  He owns a few businesses as well, including a record company and a clothing line - which were started exclusively with his poker winnings.  The Washington State native holds a degree in economics, which perhaps explains why Watkinson is so astute as an investor and poker professional. Yet, often when he is interviewed Watkinson is quick to shift everyone's attention to a greater, more humanitarian purpose. Watkins and his fiancé Timmi DeRosa share a commitment to rescuing and retiring captive chimpanzees, many of which have been used in everything from movies to research laboratories.

Watkinson and DeRosa told about how chimpanzees are not as useful as they become older and are commonly discarded.  So a few years ago, the couple made a commitment to rescue as many creatures as possible and eventually build an animal sanctuary.  “All the animals need our help,” Watkinson says.  “But we really try to focus on the chimpanzees.” But -- when it comes to poker, Watkinson is not monkeying around.  He arrives seventh in the chip count. 

Today's episode: Donald Key, Final Table predictions and Lee Watkinson on Sklansky vs. chimp.

Download it now  (right click on the link, then click "Save As" to download)

Browse the archives

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Donald Key, Final Table predictions and Lee Watkinson on Sklansky vs. chimp.

Direct download: WSOP Main Event Final Table Preview - July 17

Lee Watkinson took over the chip lead late on Day 4, but after a bad beat early yesterday hung around the average stack size.  He got it all in with a set versus his opponent's flush draw only to suffer one of the toughest beats on the world's biggest stage. 

However, Lee's patient, disciplined play kept him in contention by constantly winning small pots, waiting for the big one.  It finally came when he doubled up with AK versus the 99 of William Spadea.  The hand was eerily similar to the one that doubled up Spadea earlier in the day. 

The mountain of chips Watkinson is sitting on--14m to be exact--makes him the odds-on favorite to win the whole shebang--and an extra $10,000,000 for being a Full Tilt Poker online qualifier.  Not to mention Buddy will monkey-kick the shit out of anyone who puts a bad beat on Lee.

I'm mad at "Lead Tournament Reporter" Jeremiah Smith.  I wanted to call the new roped off area the "media moat."  Unfortunately, Jeremiah's much more industrious than me, and he already made the joke in a previous post.  Although, I can add that the "moat" works two-fold.  It not only pisses people off (as Jeremiah mentioned earlier), but it also forces annoying railbirds to shout even louder so that they can be heard by the pros they are pestering.  Awesome.

In other news, someone decided it would be a good idea to make all the chips in play at this point in the tournament the same color - orange.  Basically the denominations break down as follows: orange, slightly darker orange, and slightly lighter orange.  It's a little disorienting.  The people doing chip counts look more confused than the cops chasing Pierce Brosnan at the end of The Thomas Crown Affair.

Besides being the nicest guy left in the main event, Lee Watkinson has 4.6m chips and a crazy chimpanzee.  It’s a toss-up for which story-line carries more significance in the poker world:

1)    Lee going for an extra $10,000,000 if he wins the main event as an online qualifier for Full Tilt Poker, or

2)    Lee’s chimpanzee punching David Sklansky in the stomach

Since there’s dozens of online qualifiers playing the main event and only one Sklansky-punching monkey in existence, I guess #2 wins by default. Lee brought one of his two rescued chimpanzees to Steve Z’s annual WSOP party (hurting for a date, anyone?). In the middle of showing off for a crowd of ladies, Buddy decided he didn’t like Sklanksy putting a cramp in his style, so he socked him in the gut.¹  Awesome. 

Some more chimp counts:

This photo was taken of Lee Watkinson on Day 1 of Event 30 ($2,500 No Limit Hold'em - six handed). With the constant flux of temperature in both the Amazon Room and The Pavillion, you can never tell if a player is covered up in order to disguise any possible tells from the table or because they are just simply freezing cold.

Befitting the wild fluctuations that are inherent to the game of pot-limit Omaha, players are dropping like flies here on Day One of the $1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha tournament. After four hours of play, the starting field of 576 has already been whittled down to 216. As expected, the event was dominated by Europeans—PLO remains the most popular poker game in Europe—and most of the big names who call America home busted out early. For a time the exception to both was Robert Williamson III.