Welcome Back WillWonka

Congratulations to WillWonka, winner of the Junior's Cheesecake. Will, in my opinion, has emerged as one of the emerging poker blog talents out there. His audience increasingly grows, and he is always providing thoughts and ideas. Well done, Will (but share with MrsWonka as well).

I watched the 2002 WSOP Main Event, won by Robert Varkonyi but remembered for Phil Hellmuth having his head shaved. Phil is chatting it up early with Gabe Kaplan during the final table, and Phil mentions that he doesn't see any of the amateurs winning. In fact, if Robert V wins, he says, he'll shave his head. Phil gets his head shaved, but it was fascinating to watch. ESPN still provided minimal coverage, although they were just launching showing the cards players were playing with when it was heads-up in a hand (I'm not sure how they did this; they just had the cards as a graphic). I've always liked Kaplan as he is a long-time poker guy. He's not only seen it all, he's sat at the table (I read some article that he took $200k from Amarillo Slim heads-up in the '70's). Russell Rosenblum and Harley Hall, who have both made subsequent final tables at the WPT, are the other American amateurs. It was the emerging of online poker, with UltimateBet caps. It wasn't polished, and Varkonyi rode his QT to a dominant run. I don't know enough of his history since, as he is often cited as the worst Main Event winner (or at least I posed the question on a 2+2 forum and he seemed to be the popular choice).

Not much poker right now. I've got some sort of throat deal going on, drinking GatorAde and eating crackers. I played just a bit on FullTilt last night at the $1/2 table. It is an interesting experiment to do that. I bought in with what was left of my FullTilt bankroll ($89), and moved it up to $125 or so. I may just leave it there and do that, see what I can get it to at the lower limits. The lower limits have more tables for sure going, so jumping into a casual multi-tasking game seems to be easier than to get back to the normal stakes online.

I'll be flying to Memphis Thursday with the family, but I won't be able to sneak to Tunica. Woe is me! Wish I could be out in LA. Looks like the tourneys are really heating up, with Kenna James and David Plastik winning last weekend (the Grinder was runner-up to James).