Live from Two Plus Two Studios, February 15th 2011 - The feature guest this week on the Two Plus Two PokerCast is WPT winner and recent Superstar Showdown participant Eugene Katchalov. Eugene makes his debut appearance on the program to talk about his match with isildur, growing up in New York city and even his Chernobyl experience. New PokerStars Team Online member and poker coach Andrew "Foucault82" Brokos returns to the PokerCast providing some great strategy insights stressing the need for players to constantly be thinking about their own game. Mike and Adam also connect with tournament director Matt Savage to get the latest on the L.A. Poker Classic currently taking place at the Commerce Casino and preview the upcoming main event. DJ Sensi provides some more great poker strategy about 'Blind Stealing in Rush PLO' in this weeks Leggo Poker / Deuces Cracked strategy segment. Mike and Adam also give a PCL Season 11 update, preview Viktor Blom's next Superstar Showdown match and of course give away the password for the February 20th Poker Stars VIP Club Invitational for PokerCast listeners.


PokerCast Theme - Demitone Productions Inc. © 2007 : Take Me Over - Cut Copy - Zonoscope © 2011 : Savage Night at the Opera - Destroyer - Kaputt © 2011 : Peripheral Visionaries - Young Galaxy - Shapeshifting © 2011 :

first,

ps-
Anderson Silva disapproves of this thread

http://pokercast.s3.amazonaws.com/twoplustwo_160.mp3

Have to do it..........3rd!!

ah, finally!! awesomeness... 4th?

i could upload a torrent to ************.org if u guys really want to see the new season premiere of WPT. If not its available at the poker bay (dot) org. I don't your policy on 'piratestuff', but I'm pretty liberal on that issue

thanks for this

maybe it's just me, but the link to play the pokercast through 2P2 is not working. It just loads another banner at the top.

...and I'm not downloading itunes! ~_~

Same here want to listen to this episode at work and dont have itunes on the work computer.

Fix the link please and thank you!

Same here - I got the itunes tho

Just download the file from the RSS feed....

http://pokercast.twoplustwo.com/podcast/160.mp3

i'll take a first page post ^.^

Whilst I agree with Adam that the Empire Casino is a wholly inappropriate venue for the WSOPE, I don't think that moving it all the way to Cannes is a good idea. I assume that the move has been driven by sponsorship and on-line qualification potential. If they really needed to go to France, they could have selected Paris, though the Aviation Club is obviously too small. The virtue of Paris is that it is only 2 hours by train from London, so would have maintained the connection with the burgeoning "London Festival". It's also a fabulous city to stay in and has a decent amount of budget hotels. People are going to be shocked by the prices in Cannes.

Of course, they could have followed the EPT's lead and stayed in London at a non-Casino venue, of which there are plenty, including ones that could host a single day one. I think a .fr site is a really odd choice though because it effectively excludes the rest of Europe. I can only hope they have done a deal to allow some of the other larger sites to satellite in. I'm not sure which ones would be up for it, given their existing sponsorship commitments. Otherwise, this looks like a re-run of the Betfair mistake.

The WSOPE deal will increase the numbers playing the tournament due to all the French online qualifiers, but will destroy it as a credible brand.

In London, due to the toughness of the field it had some credibility as a "real bracelet" (at least the Main Event). Now it's going to just be some random tournament full of French donks.

Dude, the main event in Vegas on day one isn't even poker it's so full of donks.

A large percentage of the field who start cannot win the tournament and the brand is doing just fine.

I'm aware that the Main Event is full of donks. I guess I didn't really make my point clear. I'll try again.

There are 60 WSOP tournaments full of donks. To succeed (in terms of credibility, not numbers) the WSOPE had to be something different. And as (possibly) the toughest tournament of the year the WSOPE Main Event did that. The "new" WSOPE bracelet is probably going to be seen as less important than some random $1k WSOP bracelet.

Of course, WSOP probably only care about numbers, so in that way this will be a very good move. But the WSOPE Main Event was seen as a major title and in the future that will not be the case.

Also, I think the make up of the field will be a much higher % of French players than the "old" WSOPE was UK players, which takes away from the tournament IMO. Previously it was extremely international (and despite my posts I'm not some ultra-nationalist UK person), now it will be very French-centric.

I should also say, it probably will be seen as a major title again one day once the French market/standard of play matures, but that's a few years (5+ IMO) away still.

GFK quoting himself ITT.

If players feel the field is going to be soft, they will play in the WSOPE. 99% of playerrs don't seek out harders fields, they seek out softer fields, so will lose virtually no one because there are more French players involved. Just as with Partouche, the softer field (French players being worse at tournament poker is an assumption, not a fact BTW) was a draw, not a deterrent.

Some poker fans may find it less prestigious, most poker players will prefer the weaker field.

GFK you couldn't be more off its going to go the complete opposite of what you saw. I played WSOPE first few years took the last one off because there wasnt much ev that def didn't cover the absurdly high travel expenses to go there and play there for a few weeks. All those great players who played WSOPE london will still be in France but a ton more great solid players who didnt bother with WSOPE will now go and you include all the fish. So the field will be softer but more names more people to go through and I still expect really stacked fts. Theres no way this isn't the move, it's great for the wsop brand and for tv poker to get a lot bigger fields so the fish watching on tv can see bigger 1st place. I do hope they leave the buyin where it is tho around 20k.

It's going to be 10K Euro so a little smaller than last years 10K pounds.

This is the point I was making (and I thought that was pretty clear from all apart from my 1st post!)

I think anyone who follows poker seriously can name the 4 WSOPE winner, I doubt this will be the case for the next 4 years.

Whether it is better for players is not something I am qualified to comment on since I've never played a $10k/£10k event, but I am a poker fan, so I am qualified to talk about what will be seen as more prestigious in the poker fan's eyes.

With all due respect your British comrade, James Bord was no more well known to the general poker community than Jonathan Duhamel.

Ha, no, but most people who follow poker can name him as the most recent WSOPE champion. I'm not talking random fish, but people who follow this closely.

If we get 4 random Paris LeFrancais winners, less people will remember them all 2 years later than remember the 4 London winners.

Having said all this, if it's better for the players then who am I to argue with it? I just personally won't have as much respect for the winners as I do for the past 4. In the same way that I have more respect for the winners of EPT London/Barcelona/Grand Final than the winners of EPT Random Eastern Euro city.

The WSOPE is differentiated by being located in Europe.

I think it is a good move by WSOPE.

so under over on WSOPA (asia) - and just wondering if they will try to locate in Macau or Singapore. Although i guess this will depend on ownership of properties a bit I guess...

anyway

Singapore... 4 floors of...

one time... please....lol.