Thursday, March 5, 2009 | 2 a.m.
The Tourney
- What: Fifth annual National Heads-Up Poker Championship
- When: Friday through Sunday. Play begins at 1 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and 11 a.m. Sunday
- Where: Caesars Palace poker room
- Bracket draw: 10 p.m. today at Pure nightclub, after 9 p.m. red-carpet arrivals
- If you go: Free to watch in the tournament viewing gallery, which is open to spectators on a first-come, first-served basis
- TV: NBC Sports, six consecutive Sundays beginning April 12. Air time in the Pacific time zone has yet to be announced.
- Structure: A field of 64 players competes head-to-head in a bracket-style format playing one-on-one games of no-limit Texas hold ’em. It’s single-elimination until the final match, which is best-of-3.
- How to enter: Invitation only with the exception of six spots filled by players who qualified via tournaments or promotions at Caesars Palace or online
THE MONEY
- Entry fee: $20,000
- Total prize pool: $1.5 million
- Purse breakdown:
1st place: $500,000
2nd place: $250,000
Places 3-4: $125,000 each
Places 5-8: $75,000 each
Places 9-16: $25,000 each
THE CHAMPIONS
- Defending champion: Chris Ferguson
- Previous winners:
Paul Wasicka, 2007
Ted Forrest, 2006
Phil Hellmuth, 2005
The Field
NEWCOMERS
This year’s field includes 16 players making their debuts in the National Heads-Up Poker Championship:
- Peter Eastgate: 2008 World Series of Poker championship event winner
- Ivan Demidov: 2008 World Series of Poker championship event runner-up; third place in World Series of Poker Europe main event in London
- John Phan: 2008 Card Player magazine Player of the Year
- Glen Chorny: 2008 European Poker Tour Grand Final winner in Monte Carlo
- Gavin Griffin: First poker “triple crown” winner, with a World Series bracelet, a World Poker Tour title and a European Poker Tour title
- Bertrand Grospellier: Won the World Poker Tour Festa Al Lago event in October at the Bellagio
- Dario Minieri: Online poker star and native of Rome often plays in “live” games wearing his trademark scarf
- Ilari Sahamies: Native of Finland has a big following in the online poker community
- Vanessa Selbst: Won the $1,500-entry pot-limit Omaha event at the World Series of Poker, the only woman to win a World Series bracelet in an open event in 2008
- Brad Garrett: Won three Emmy Awards for his work on “Everybody Loves Raymond”
- Jeff Ishbia and Kenny Yeh: Caesars qualifiers
- Fred Collins, Blandino Gines, Nicholas Joy and Leon Yanovski: Online qualifiers
WORLD CHAMPS
There are 12 World Series main event winners in the field:
- Doyle Brunson (1976, 1977)
- Johnny Chan (1987, 1988)
- Phil Hellmuth (1989)
- Huck Seed (1996)
- Scotty Nguyen (1998)
- Chris Ferguson (2000)
- Chris Moneymaker (2003)
- Greg Raymer (2004)
- Joe Hachem (2005)
- Jamie Gold (2006)
- Jerry Yang (2007)
- Peter Eastgate (2008)
WOMEN
There are six women in the field: Annie Duke, Clonie Gowen, Jennifer Harman, Vanessa Rousso, Vanessa Selbst and Jennifer Tilly
CASHED EVERY YEAR
Only two players have made money in all four years of the tournament: Scott Fischman and Huck Seed
HIGH-LOW
- Youngest: Tom Dwan, 22
- Oldest: Doyle Brunson, 75
Sun Archives
- Jeff Haney on the buddies and top students of the game who went to the wire (3-5-2008)
- Heads-up final a battle of brains (3-5-2008)
- Jeff Haney on the odds on top players in the upcoming Heads-Up Poker Championship (2-27-2008)
- Jeff Haney on how Paul Wasicka got his groove back in time to capture the top prize in the heads-up tournament (3-7-2007)
- Jeff Haney on the personal format of the Heads-Up Poker Championship, set for this weekend at Caesars Palace (2-28-2007)
- Jeff Haney on Ted Forrest, whose Heads-Up play trees Chris Ferguson in the final round of the second annual tournament at Caesars Palace (3-8-2006)
With many of poker’s most recognizable figures packed into a relatively small space, this weekend’s National Heads-Up Poker Championship commands perhaps the most star power in the game — per square foot, anyway.
Each player in the field put up $20,000 to play, but all of that money and more will be returned in the prize pool.
As poker pro Gavin Griffin sees it, those factors not only create a win-win situation for the players and the tournament organizers, but they could also indicate the direction in which big-time poker is headed.
Griffin advocates a poker tour populated by established tournament pros and based in part on professional golf’s tour, complete with a system of exemptions, qualifiers and corporate sponsors.
With televised poker ratings trending downward and live tournament fields also largely on the decline, Griffin envisions such a tour — with “brand name” players as headliners — as a catalyst for reinvigorating the game.
“The heads-up tournament is a really cool format to watch because you have so many big-name players, and I think people might be starting to realize that this is the format that is going to attract the most viewers,” Griffin said.
“I know viewership has gone down for televised poker over the last two years or so. I think what will get the most people watching is when they eventually have a poker tour that’s kind of like the PGA Tour. A certain number of people have exemptions to play and there would also be a certain number of tournaments every year where players can qualify for the tour.”
Griffin, competing in the National Heads-Up Poker Championship for the first time in the event’s five-year history, became the first player to win poker’s unofficial “triple crown” last year.
He won the World Poker Tour Borgata Classic in January 2008, adding the title to a World Series of Poker championship bracelet and a European Poker Tour victory.
Even top tournament pros, however, can be hampered by big travel expenses, entry fees and the “rake,” or the house’s cut of the prize money.
“A tour would be good for us as players because hopefully we’d be able to bring in some sort of corporate sponsorships so we wouldn’t have to pay our own buy-ins,” Griffin said. “The way tournaments are now, it’s so hard to make money in tournaments because of how much each casino or each tournament host takes out of the prize pool.
“But it would be a better setup for the organizers as well, because people want to watch the big-name poker players.”
Griffin is emphatically answering a question that has vexed poker players and officials since televised poker emerged as a worldwide phenomenon this decade: Do viewers tune in primarily to see familiar faces (Phil Hellmuth, Daniel Negreanu, et al.) or to enjoy the nuances of the game itself regardless of who’s playing?
Easy. It’s to watch the big-name stars, according to Griffin.
“It’s nice to know that some guy can show up out of nowhere at the final table once in a while and win, but we’ve got to the point in poker viewership where people don’t want to see that all the time,” Griffin said. “They would rather watch poker pros who have established themselves over time as great players.”
Griffin, who placed sixth of 256 entrants in last year’s $10,000-entry World Series of Poker heads-up tournament, expects to encounter a rugged field in this weekend’s event, which takes place Friday through Sunday at Caesars Palace. He considers a couple of players who made their name at the so-called “nosebleed” stakes online — Tom Dwan and Ilari Sahamies — among the toughest.
“They’ll be a pretty brutal draw in the early rounds,” Griffin said. “I might be a little upset if I run into someone like that in the first round. But most of the best players in poker are on this list of 64.
“Even the celebrities seem to know what they’re doing. Orel Hershiser had a great run last year. I don’t see too many soft spots.”
An intriguing showdown could develop between one of the Internet hotshots and an “old stalwart” — as poker pro Gavin Smith put it — such as Negreanu or Erick Lindgren.
A tournament specialist who travels the world playing poker, Smith counts the annual heads-up event as a highlight of the circuit.
“First off, you are getting all the stars of poker in one place,” Smith said. “In the World Series or the World Poker Tour, you might get one well-known player at the final table. Here you get to see dozens of them.
“Secondly, in heads-up poker there’s action every hand. You don’t have to wait all night for two big hands that are going to provide all the excitement. And the whole match can change instantly, at any time. The event sort of produces its own drama.”
WHAT ARE THE ODDS ON A REPEAT? GLAD YOU ASKED ...
No sanctioned betting takes place on the outcome of the National Heads-Up Poker Championship in Nevada casinos, although we hear a thriving underground, person-to-person wagering market surrounds the action.
A year ago our unofficial oddsmaking on the tournament proved prescient (Las Vegas Sun, Feb. 27, 2008), so we’ll give ourselves an official pat on the back: Our No. 1 choice, Chris Ferguson at odds of 22-1, went on to win the tournament and its $500,000 top prize.
In the final match, Ferguson beat Andy Bloch, who was our fourth choice in the 64-player field at 24-1.
The other members of last year’s final four — Phil Ivey at 25-1 and Huck Seed at 32-1 — were our fifth (tied with two others) and 11th choices overall.
Ferguson, who also placed second in 2005 and 2006 in the heads-up tournament, again tops our hypothetical tote board of opening odds — for amusement only — to win the 2009 tournament this weekend at Caesars Palace.
The following is the entire list:
21-1: Chris Ferguson
21-1: Andy Bloch
23-1: Phil Ivey
23-1: Tom Dwan
24-1: Allen Cunningham
25-1: Huck Seed
25-1: Howard Lederer
25-1: Phil Hellmuth
27-1: Kenny Tran
31-1: Barry Greenstein
31-1: Paul Wasicka
32-1: Daniel Negreanu
33-1: Ted Forrest
33-1: Scotty Nguyen
35-1: Doyle Brunson
35-1: Jonathan Little
35-1: John Phan
40-1: Chad Brown
40-1: Gavin Griffin
40-1: John Juanda
40-1: Ilari Sahamies
45-1: J.C. Tran
Each 50-1: Johnny Chan, Ivan Demidov, Peter Eastgate, Gus Hansen, Erick Lindgren, Greg Raymer, Gavin Smith
54-1: Scott Fischman
Each 60-1: David Benyamine, Glen Chorny, Antonio Esfandiari, Layne Flack, Bertrand Grospellier, Joe Hachem, Phil Laak, Mike Matusow, Dario Minieri, David Pham, Erik Seidel, Mike Sexton
Each 63-1: Sam Farha, Jennifer Harman, Orel Hershiser, Gabe Kaplan, Vanessa Selbst
Each 75-1: Annie Duke, Clonie Gowen, David Williams
Field (all others), 4-1 combined: Don Cheadle, Fred Collins, Eli Elezra, Brad Garrett, Blandino Gines, Jamie Gold, Jeffrey Ishiba, Nicholas Joy, Chris Moneymaker, Vanessa Rousso, Jennifer Tilly, Jerry Yang, Leon Yanovski, Kenny Yeh
Transport yourself to the opulent and excessive Roman Empire at Caesars Palace. But the ever-changing Caesars Palace is far from ancient. The hotel and casino is constantly raising the bar for what visitors can expect in a Vegas resort experience.
Caesars Palace features 3,348 rooms and suites in five towers, including the new luxury boutique Nobu Hotel and Restaurant, which opened Feb. 4, 2013, in the totally remodeled Centurian Tower. Caesars features 129,000 square feet of gaming space, including the Strip’s largest poker room and a 250-seat sports book. Other amenities include about two dozen restaurants, a four-level shopping mall, four pools, a spa, Pure and Poetry nightclubs and Pussycat Dolls.
Dining options include restaurants from world-renown chefs Guy Savoy, Wolfgang Puck, Bobby Flay, Gordon Ramsay and, on Feb. 4, 2013, Nobu Matsuhisa.
You never know what characters you’ll run into at Caesars with regular performers like Jerry Seinfeld, Bette Midler, Elton John and maybe even the emperor himself.
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