On Tuesday night, the $40,000 buy-in No Limit Hold’em tournament kicked off coverage of the 2009 World Series of Poker (WSOP) on ESPN. The cable network added several new elements to the broadcast of the world’s most prestigious tournament series, including a Jack Link’s Wild Card Hand of the Day, which allows viewers at home to see one player’s cards, while covering up their opponent’s with a logo for the beef jerky brand. The animated broadcast, encapsulated by ESPN commentator Norman Chad yelling, “Take that, you Commies,” concluded with Russian Vitaly Lunkin (pictured at right) defeating Isaac Haxton for the $1.9 million top prize. This week, the PocketFives.com Podcast powered by Carbon Poker welcomes WSOP on ESPN Producer Jamie Horowitz.
The first episode of the 2009 WSOP on the cable station kicked off with four PocketFivers taking to the felts of the $40,000 buy-in No Limit Hold’em event held back in May. In the end, Bodog pro Justin ZeeJustin Bonomo (pictured at left) railed his Panorama Towers neighbor Isaac Haxton when play was heads-up. Like many viewers, Horowitz sat on the edge of his seat watching the action unfold. He told the PocketFives.com Podcast, “Year in and year out, the excitement picks up when we start televising the Main Event. It’s the one thing the fans tell us every off-season that they want to see more of. This year, I’m excited to see Ante Up for Africa. It’s one tournament we hadn’t televised before that had been part of the conversation among players. It’s a very different tournament.”This year’s November Nine was determined in mid-July. The finalists are in the midst of a 100 day break that will end on November 7th, when the feature table will resume in front of a packed house at the Penn and Teller theater at the Rio. Horowitz previewed this year’s November Nine: “We talk about this every year, but we never get tired of it: the story of how quickly the story of the Main Event has changed in the modern era of poker. The Moneymaker year was such a surprising thing. We’ve all begun to wonder if a pro will ever win again.” Moneymaker’s victory over poker veteran Sammy Farha in the 2003 WSOP Main Event turned the game on its head, attracting a throng of newcomers.
Two Wild Card Hands aired during Tuesday night’s broadcast, both involving 2004 WSOP Main Event champion Greg Raymer (pictured at right). Chad and Co-Host Lon McEachern are not told the cards and speculate during the hand on what will be flipped up. On the Wild Card Hand’s development, Horowitz recalled, “It’s an exciting new element. Some things that we try to balance in our programming are showing poker hands so that we can detail the journey of players, teaching poker, and telling stories. This is a good way to [teach fans to play poker]. It really allows you to play along and question decisions. It pays off at the end when you see what they were holding.”For the next several weeks, the WSOP on ESPN will air at 8:00pm ET on Tuesday nights and run for two hours. Next Tuesday marks the debut of the WSOP Champions Invitational, which attracted 20 former Main Event winners to the Amazon Room in a winner-take-all tournament for a vintage Corvette. Horowitz noted what changes viewers can expect: “We’re trying to do a better job of setting the table at the very beginning. [In addition,] we’re going to be doing something we started last year, which is show not just how many chips you have, but also what percentage of the chips in play you had. That’s a more relevant detail. We try each year to elevate the amount of poker we talk. We hope that each year the novices are learning more poker.”
The most notable change to the 2008 WSOP Main Event was the delay of the final table by four months in order to coincide with its television broadcast in November, a trend that continues this year. On the future of the $10,000 buy-in feature tournament, Horowitz forecasted, “It’s going to continue to grow. The WSOP is the premier brand in all of poker. It’s no different than when a Red Sox player looks on their schedule to see when they’re playing the Yankees. For poker players, they look at the schedule and want to know when the Main Event begins.”
Check out the rest of this week’s PocketFives.com Podcast featuring ESPN Producer Jamie Horowitz.
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