Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
Last night they played down to the final table of the World Series of Poker main event. And the "November nine" are:
Seat 1: Darvin Moon
Seat 2: James Akenhead
Seat 3: Phil Ivey
Seat 4: Kevin Schaffel
Seat 5: Steven Begleiter
Seat 6: Eric Buchman
Seat 7: Joe Cada
Seat 8: Antoine Saout
Seat 9: Happy Shulman
Yes, Phil Ivey made the final table, which must have ESPN absolutely thrilled. That's huge ratings for sure. The only other name player is Jeff Shulman, publisher of Card Player magazine, who has promised that he will throw the bracelet in the garbage if he wins the main event (he's not happy with the WSOP ever since they started signing exclusive deals to cover the tournaments).
6,494 players started the tournament. First prize is just over $8.5 million. Everyone at the final table wins at least $1.26 million. We had a local player here in the Grand Rapids area make the top 200, Jamin Stokes. He also finished 3rd in the WSOP heads up championship, beating Johnny Chan in the process and winning over $200,000. Not a bad run for a local boy.
Those 9 players will now come back in November to play the final table live on ESPN.
Comments
That's interesting that the final table will be live. I've always had the impression that the 1 or 2 hour episodes of poker were heavily edited for time. How long does the final table usually last? I was thinking 5-6 hours, if so that would be a huge chunk of time for ESPN to devote to it.
Posted by: Odie | July 16, 2009 1:12 PM
I believe the ESPN coverage is a 2 day tape delay and not live unless something has recently changed.
Posted by: Jim | July 16, 2009 1:39 PM
Ed:
Did you see Nate Silvers Blog at 538.com about his experience there?
Posted by: KeithB | July 16, 2009 1:42 PM
Starting last year, the final table of the WSOP main event was delayed from July to November. ESPN then plays the episodes leading up to the final table and then they play the final table and broadcast it the next day, with some editing.
I did not see Nate Silver's blog about it, but it's interesting that he plays poker. His high school debate coach, Will Repko, is a good friend of mine and he is also a very, very good poker player.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | July 16, 2009 2:12 PM
It's great that Ivey made it...but every poker player lost money when Joe Seebok was knocked out. Had he made it with his media and family connections the UIGA would have been made a topic on Letterman and the overturning of that law would have been fast tracked.
Still, that Darvin Moon is a trip.
Posted by: Harknights | July 16, 2009 3:21 PM
Great, now I have to listen to Phil Ivey talk about himself on the broadcast. At least Helmuth is entertaining. Ivey is a prick with no theatrical plus side.
Posted by: Michael X | July 16, 2009 3:23 PM
Seat 1: Darvin Moon - Nobody
Seat 2: James Akenhead - Power rank 882
Seat 3: Phil Ivey - Power Rank 32
Seat 4: Kevin Schaffel - Power Rank 1103
Seat 5: Steven Begleiter - Nobody
Seat 6: Eric Buchman - Power Rank 600
Seat 7: Joe Cada - Power Rank 2656
Seat 8: Antoine Saout - Nobody
Seat 9: Happy Shulman - Power Rank 3993
This is exactly the result you would expect from a nearly random distribution. You may as well call these guys professional coin flippers. The data seems to confirm that playing no-limit hold-em does not require much skill.
Sorry, Ed.
-Matt
Posted by: Matt | July 16, 2009 6:25 PM
Matt, you're only looking at a single distribution. Take a larger look at the over-all tourney standings, money winners, POTY points leaders and you begin to see that the results of a single (and very large) 6-7,000 player tournament are not enough to judge whether NL Holdem poker requires skill. The one off winners do not hold up over time. And the pros dominate. (I'll not even delve into the changing demographics of the game, with the surge of newer, younger players making it very difficult to tell "who's on top" these days.)
Though you do sound like someone I'd like to invite over for my Monday night poker game.
Posted by: Michael X | July 16, 2009 6:53 PM
I disagree, Michael X, the WSOP NL Holdem event is exactly the kind of event to test this premise that the game doesn't require much skill. You would expect that the final table would be packed with the professional players if there is a large amount of skill involved with NL Holdem, and that is not the case.
Correct me if I am wrong, but POTY points and money winnings include games that are not NL Holdem. I am not saying that they aren't good poker players, but NL Holdem is not a good skill game. Even Ed, who I am sure is a good poker player, has posted stories about his bad beats. In NL Holdem you just can't recover from those. The odds overwhelm whatever advantage your skill gives you.
Suppose you had 6,000 people playing chess in a tournament. I can predict that all top 10 would all be pros and any amateur who learned by playing online would be crushed.
-Matt
Posted by: Matt | July 16, 2009 7:28 PM
Matt, you misunderstand NLH because you compare it to a game that has one fundamental difference: there is no element of chance in chess (save for who is white or black).
No one denies that after a certain number of players in a tournament the element of chance gets vastly exaggerated. But again no one judges NL skill on the basis of one tournament. Because we understand the place chance plays within the game. Instead, skill within NLH is based upon ones earnings/losses over the long run.
So to say that in a chess tourney the best would always win, is only to highlight the fact that chance is not a variable in chess. But that does not undermine the argument that NLH is a game of skill. Some would argue that it takes more skill to win over time in a game with more variables.
Wish I could write more, but I gotta show ta do!
Posted by: Michael X | July 16, 2009 8:55 PM
Matt-
If you think that the distribution of luck and skill in poker can be determined by a single tournament, I'd love to play poker against you for a few thousand hours.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | July 16, 2009 10:33 PM
Nate Silver is very good at poker, especially limit holdem. He was a prolific strategy poster on the 2+2 poker forums before he decided to going into baseball analysis and then ultimately being awesome at politics.
Posted by: Brad | July 16, 2009 11:26 PM
Michael, unfortunately for you and Ed, your own arguments work against you. The longer you play and the more hands you play the larger the number of hands net gets larger and larger, and the harder it is for you to prove the your prowess at NL is nothing more than chance. It is also difficult to count the losers. The people who lose more than they win will run out of money and stop playing, and enable the lucky ones to continue playing.
Suppose Michael, you and Ed flip 100 coins each and Ed manages to get 5 more heads than you do. That doesn't mean that Ed is better at getting heads, it was just pure chance. I just don't see how NL poker is any different. In a tournament environment it behaves the same way as coin flipping. If you try to count year over year you have the problem of getting outside of the error bars.
Ed, so it takes a couple thousand hours to determine if you are really good at NL poker? So, even if you win the WSOP, you may still be a crappy poker player. Just a lucky one.
-Matt
Posted by: Matt | July 17, 2009 12:34 AM
The whole problem with the financial crisis in the country is that everybody seems to see themselves at the final table, where this is but one winner.
We, the rest of us, are but chips, tokens, markers in the game among cheap, gutsy tinhorns.
Fuck ALL y'all. You ain't entitled to gamble with MY welfare...
Posted by: Woody | July 17, 2009 12:55 AM
Matt-
Luck can change everything in the short run, but in the long run the luck evens out. The very fact that there are professional poker players but no professional coin flippers proves me right. Danny Negreanu and Phil Ivey aren't just the luckiest guys in the world, they are very skilled at what they do. That's why they win.
Posted by: Ed Brayton | July 17, 2009 1:06 AM
I'll also add that one cannot willfully lose at a game of coin flipping. It is the ability to control the outcome in this way that separates poker and other games of skill from horse racing, slot machines, roulette or coin flipping and any other game of chance.
Posted by: Michael X | July 17, 2009 2:03 AM
I am not arguing that those guys don't have a lot of skill at playing poker. They make their living playing Poker, but not by only playing NL. I am just saying that those skills are dulled by a game like NL Holdem.
I can prove it to you. Suppose I play you head to head NL Holdem. We start out with the same size stack. I know that you are a better poker player than I am, so I cannot allow you to play poker. So, here is my strategy.
I learn enough about the cards to know if my two cards are good enough to win a decent amount of time. If I have a good chance at winning, I go all in. Pre-flop, all the time. Otherwise I fold. Won't that get me my coin flip? Or am I missing something?
The only way that your skill can enter into it is if we play a version of poker that requires me to actually play poker. Like limit, or high-low, or draw. Something that poker skill can make the difference.
-Matt
Posted by: Matt | July 18, 2009 1:34 AM
Well, not quite Matt, Ed can simple fold every time you do this until he holds 2 aces. At which point you're much more likely to be all out than a coin flip.
Posted by: Mu | July 20, 2009 12:33 PM