The buzz inside the walls of the Rio extends beyond just the tournaments on the 2013 World Series of Poker schedule. Online poker in Nevada is a very, very hot topic right now, and WSOP.com is making a lot of noise.
While the site has yet to launch, you can head to the Lambada Room of the Rio or look for one of the beautiful and friendly WSOP.com ladies walking the hallways to sign up for a free, personal WSOP.com online poker account. This is a great way to get a jump on the site's registration, and plenty of people have already taken this opportunity.
What's more is that the WSOP will be hosting daily raffles for everyone that has taken the time to register for WSOP.com at the Rio. What can you win? Plenty of fantastic prizes including 36 WSOP seats!
Players 21 years of age and older who sign up for a WSOP.com account will automatically be entered into the “36-Seat Giveaway” where a randomly-selected winner will win a seat into the next day’s first WSOP gold bracelet event. One of the events eligible in this promotion is the $111,111 One Drop High Roller No-Limit Hold’em tournament that is expected to feature a $10,000,000 prize pool and allow you to play poker with the biggest names in the game. In total, $182,333 in WSOP seats, including a seat to the WSOP Main Event, are being given away during this one-of-a-kind WSOP.com promotion.
In addition to the 36-Seat Giveaway, a “Hot Seat” promotion will allow any player who signs up for a WSOP.com online account and wears their WSOP.com patch on their chest at the table while playing an event to be randomly selected to receive 500 bonus dollars deposited directly into their WSOP.com online account once the site has received all regulatory approvals and launches.
With 62 WSOP gold bracelet events and three winners promised for the Main Event, this promotion includes $32,000 worth of value to those participating.
Hand #217: On the last hand of heads up, Cliff Josephy raised to 60,000 from the button. Evan Silverstein raised all in. Josephy asked for a count, then made the call for 680,000 total.
Josephy:
Silverstein:
The flop was huge for Silverstein, making him the favorite. According to the PokerNews Odds Calculator Silverstein was a 66% favorite to win the hand. The on the turn was not one of those outs though, and Silverstein was still looking to catch up. It was the on the river that sealed the deal and gave the victory to Josephy.
Event #9, the $3,000 No-Limit Hold'em Shootout, began with 477 players. Ten players made it to Day 3 with a chance to claim a World Series of Poker gold bracelet. It wan an impressive bunch that included four bracelet winners, but only one would emerge from the tournament with three single-table wins. That man was Cliff Josephy, now the proud owner of two WSOP bracelets (the first coming in 2005 in a $1,500 Stud tournament for $192,150).
Each final table participant began with a similar chip stack of about 71 big blinds to begin the final table. Despite jumping out to an early lead, Bulgarian Simeon Naydenov was the first to fall. After he doubled up David "Bakes" Baker on Hand #20, Naydenov fell on Hand #34 when he lost a race against Evan Silverstein. The next player to fall was Ryan Hughes when he lost a coin flip against Chris Klodnicki 34 hands later to exit in ninth place.
In a five-hand span, Josephy dispatched of Alessandro Longobardi and Tim West in fifth and fourth place, respectively to enter the dinner break with 65% of the chips.
Heads-up play began with Josephy holding a slight lead over Silverstein and 46 hands later, Josephy sealed the deal and captured his second WSOP bracelet.
We hope you enjoyed our hand-for-hand coverage of this final table, and urge you to follow our coverage for the remainder of the summer as more bracelets are awarded. For now, good night from Las Vegas!