Day 2B

The numbers are in, and 6,844 players entered the 2008 World Series of Poker Main Event. Fewer than half survived Day 1, and only about 1/3 of those will survive Day 2. Hopefully I will be among them.

I’ve done some research to learn my Day 2 seating assignment along with the players and chip stacks against whom I’ll be competing. Here’s the table:

George Price 35,700
James Viglizzo 10,900
Bernd Hirschberg 32,750
Thomas Wayne 11,125
Andrew Brokos 67,125
Drew Matheson 64,925
Steve Wong 43,350
Duane Woolsey 44,850
J McLane 16,525

There’s a lot of good news here. I’ve got the most chips of anyone and far more than most. Google wasn’t able to turn up much on most of these players, suggesting that they are probably amateurs with limited poker knowledge/experience.

The bad news is that the players who are 2nd, 3rd, and 4th in chips are all lined up on my left. This means I will have to act before them in most pots, putting me at a distinct disadvantage against them. There are also not that many chips at our table. While that means there are fewer threats to my survival, there are also fewer chips for me to win. There’s no prize for surviving Day 2, and if I do survive, I’m going to need every chip I can get for future days.

The only recognizable player here is Steve Wong. Steve is a professional originally from Hoofdorp, outside of Amsterdam. He was a very successful tournament player online and has now had a lot of live success as well. There’s an interview with him on Youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7F9YV6vC6cM.

Be sure to check out the comments to this post throughout the day, as I’m going to ask a few friends to post comments with update chip counts and maybe some key hands as well.