Sunday, July 19, 2009

The Recession Can't Stop the WSOP

By Anselmo Theunis

It's true that the number of entrants in the WPT have been down this year. Almost 25% fewer compared the previous year. However, the numbers don't lie, poker is still an in demand commodity. Let's just look at the WSOP events. Three events are already sold out from the first 9 events that passed. And it only signifies one thing; lots of poker players really want to join the events but the slots are only limited.

Looking for evidence? Let's check the WSOP statistics from 2003 till the previous year. Year 2003 mark the win of Moneymaker and the WSOP only had 839 players. In 2004, the number of players have gone to 2,576, about three times more than the previous year. And then the jump to 5,619 in 2005 and 8,773 in 2006. WSOP series in 2007 and 2008 got 6,358 and 6,844 players respectively.

The decrease would be attributed to the passage of the UIGEA in which a number of poker sites have leave the US market. Since this event a lot of poker fans have given up in playing online and also it mark the decrease in online satellite opportunities that gives chance to players to play in big tournaments.

The US government has really made life difficult for online poker players since the passage of the UIGEA. But the numbers say differently, people wanted to play poker and nothing can stop them.

One testament would be the huge success of the $1,000 NLHE tournament, also called the "Stimulus Special" by the WSOP brass. This poker comp holds the largest stat in a non-Main Event history of WSOP with more than 6,000 entrants. But the large number of players did not stop poker pro Steve sung to bag the title and win his first ever WSOP bracelet.

There will be no question that this years Main Event will reach the 6,000 mark even though lots of difficulties are present at the moment like the recession, flu scare and the UIGEA law. This is because of the number of entrants that joined the preliminaries that predicts a great outcome for the Main Event.

When the numbers on the WSOP will increase, it only means one thing. And that would be for the government to consider legalizing and legislating online poker. Hope the UIGEA will be repelled and let's play!

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