I joined the Poker Players Alliance in 2006 at the WSOP. It was just starting out back then, and was created to assist poker players with unlawful or unethical situations they may encounter. The main issue at the time was professional players being compensated from poker organizations for using their likeness for profit.

Then the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act hit the industry, and the role of the PPA became more of a unifying force to help battle against the American government. This has put the organization at the forefront of the game’s battle in the U.S., and numbers have grown to over a million members this past year.

You can expect the organization to have a table set up at every WSOP. It’s the best gathering of poker players all year, with over 50,000 players and fans going through the Rio from May 30th to July 7th. If you’re not a member yet, go to the Poker Players Alliance website and check it out.

Every online poker room has some sort of WSOP satellite action, but some have gone to extremes this year. The two sites that have pumped up this promotion are Bodog and Full Tilt Poker. The Bodog poker room has been giving away multiple seats each week since February, and they’re currently awarding five seats per week. They have satellites for as low as $1.50 and other qualifiers are $7, $18, $27, $5.50 (plus tourney fee), and special qualifiers that use Bodog Points.

Full Tilt has offered $10M to any of their players that qualify for the WSOP main event and wins it. They are running hundreds of satellite tournaments each week, including the Race to the Main Event Giveaway, the 150-Seat Main Event Guarantee, the $200 Tuesday Main Event Guarantee, the $300 Wednesday Main Event Guarantee, the $1K Thursday Main Event Guarantee, and the $500 Sunday Main Event Guarantee.

Last week Team Bodog announced the newest addition to their poker team, Justin Bonomo. Justin is probably one of the best poker players out there but unfortunately is known for his multi accounting 2 years ago in Poker Stars and Full Tilt Poker Tournaments. He has long since apologized for his actions.The 22 year old will now be on the team with Bodog members Evelyn Ng, Jean-Robert Bellande and David Williams representing the Bodog online poker room at televised tournaments around the world. His first tournament will be the 2008 WSOP in Las Vegas. Justin has already managed to add 14 final tables and 1.2 million dollars in career winnings to his live poker tournament resume.Personally I think that this is a great move for both Justing and Bodog as it will help his once destroyed reputation and turn his name into something positive. This is the time for the poker community to recognize him more than just a cheat. Players wishing to join Justin Bonomo at the 2008 WSOP can qualify online to play the $10,000 main event as a Team Bodog member.

Ayre Force is the first of its kind and just released graphic novel from Bodog. Based on real people this novel reveals the hidden activities and past of billionaire founder, Calvin Ayre, as he leads the covert operations unit composed of members from the Bodog team.
The poker pro’s include, Evelyn Ng, David Williams and Josh Arieh along with MMA fighters Tara LaRosa, Jorge Masvidal, Trevor Prangley and musicians Bif Naked, Jason Darr and Nazanin.

Calvin Ayre and his unit have been in a years-long war with pharmaceutical magnate Janus Winter, attacking the illegal operations of Wintercorp all over the globe. Now, Janus has upped the anti by unleashing his genetically-engineered, superhuman children on Calvin and his team, intending to end the war between Bodog and Wintercorp!

This graphic novel is defiantly action packed and lead by an outstanding creative team: Shawn Martinbrough, Adam Slutsky, Joseph Philip Illidge, Andrew Dalhouse and Marshall Dillon.

All materials used in the production and distribution of the novel are environmentally friendly and all proceeds from sales will be donated to support the Calvin Ayre Foundation.

Ayre Force

According to actor Vince Vaughn, Cinco de Mayo was the perfect excuse to play a little poker — for a good cause, of course. E! Online reports that Vaughn celebrated Cinco de Mayo at the Velvet Margarita poker party in Hollywood Monday night. The buy-in was $120, with all proceeds going to the charity Friends of El Faro, which donates money to an orphanage in Mexico.

Reports E! Online, Vaughn and his friends sat at a private booth and enjoyed the bar’s signature margaritas. By the end of the night he had turned his attention to the blonde in the cute pony tail and cowboy hat. According to an eyewitness, “Vince seemed interested in her. He wanted her to stick around.” The two left the party together.

Having an online poker room as a poker sponsor is a huge advantage for any player. Having all or most of your tournament buy-ins covered for you would alleviate much of the pressure of being a tournament pro.

Poker room sponsorships seem to be as individual as the players. Specific terms are usually private, but most consist of tournament entries with little or no winnings going back to the poker room.

Beyond the financial advantages that being sponsored would provide, having one has become a badge of honor among players on the circuit. Having a sponsor means that you’re good enough for a company to spend tens of thousands of dollars on you. This adds an intimidation factor to a player’s game; it tells everyone at the table that you’re skilled and experienced. The only worry you could possibly have when you have a sponsor is having enough success to maintain that sponsorship into the future.

Final table to be played out on November 9th, four months after the start date of the WSOP. Johnny Chan likes the idea. What do you think?

In a press conference to be held later today, World Series of Poker and Harrah’s officials are expected to announce a major change to the way the final table at the Main Event is played out. It is expected that they will push to suspend final table play in mid-July and then resume action four months later on Sunday, Nov. 9th. (ESPN will be broadcasting the Main Event/final table two days later, Nov. 11, at 9 p.m.)

Although it hasn’t been made official yet, it’s as good as done and there’s already been plenty of feedback on the move to delay action. You gotta wonder what that’ll do for players riding a hot streak during play leading up to the final table.

“Poker is a game of skill. The hands are random. … It’s how you play your hand. I don’t believe in hot streaks,” Poker pro Johnny Chan says.

“It might be huge for the continued growth of poker; however, the down side is this long gap allows the players to become completely different people between the time they make the final table and when they play it,” says poker pro Greg Raymer.

What do you think of the change? Let me know…

Washington State Democratic candidate Dino Rossi went on-air Tuesday to express his strong opposition to that state’s felony law banning online poker. Although the majority of the on-air interview between talk radio host Dori Monson and the politician dealt with questions concerning the budget, the first question up was about online poker. When asked what he thought about Governor Christine Gregoire’s decision to make playing online poker in the state of Washington a felony, here’s what Rossi had to say:

“I never would have signed that bill. Because actually, they made it a crime for someone playing poker online on their computer. They made it a crime that’s equal with child pornography. Now, a felony will mess up your life for a very long time. You have some college kid that’s playing poker online and you’re giving him a felony for that? It doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t fit the crime.”

Later on in the interview Rossi was asked if he would support a measure reversing the ban and he said that he “would sign legislation that would overturn it, certainly.”

It’s not hard to find a chance to win a seat to the WSOP main event. Not only is every online poker room offering them, but most land-based casinos are offering some type of satellite action. Lots of companies are using the WSOP brand to sell their products, and dangling a WSOP package as their prize.

PokerStars has a ridiculous amount of WSOP satellite action. They even have a freeroll promotion where you can win your way to Vegas by winning your way up levels until you win the main event ticket.

BodogLife Poker has satellite qualifiers for $1.50, which are played every day at 2:30 am ET and also at 9:30 pm ET. These cheap satellites are also played every day at 10 am ET, except on Wednesdays.

A good site from which to get your satellite info is  http://www.wsop-satellites.com/. They keep a current list of WSOP satellites.

Every poker room runs some kind of freeroll action. Action changes by the day, and if you’d like a complete list of freeroll action go to http://www.freerolls.net/

PokerStars is currently running a promotion called the Million Dollar WSOP Giveaway. There are daily free qualifiers that will get you to the next step, towards winning one of the many all-inclusive WSOP main event packages.

Party Poker runs many sizable freerolls every day. They have multiple $1250, $2500, $250, $200,000 qualifiers, and $500 freerolls for their players.

Carbon Poker runs a $50 freeroll every two hours, plus a daily $2000, $1000 and $500 tournament.

Poker Time has a bunch of daily freerolls too, with multiple prize pools of $1000, $200 and $250.

Check the individual poker rooms for times, or check the freeroll monitor I mentioned earlier. You’ll have to be a member of each site to play in their freeroll events.