Welcome to the BLUFF Daily Buzz, where we scour the entire internet for all the latest news in and around the world of poker. If it involves chips and cards, or people known to associate with chips and cards, we’re there.

Full Tilt Durrrr Million Dollar Challenge continues

Tom “durrrr” Dwan completed the second leg of his live Full Tilt Durrrr Million Dollar Challenge at the Les Ambassadeurs club in London yesterday, and his opponent was none other than the combustible Finn, Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies. Blinds began at $500/$1,000 and went as high as $2,000/$4,000; the two both bought in for $250,000, and each opted for one $250,000 rebuy during the 500-hand session of pot limit Omaha.

Still tired from the previous day’s session against Marcello “luckexpress” Marigliano and a night of high stakes action with mysterious Swede Isildur1 on Full Tilt, Dwan nevertheless managed to carve out a $68,000 win against Ziigmund during a session that saw some big swings in both players’ favor. Afterward both of them acknowledged that it could have gone either way, though Sahamies admitted to fatigue near the end of the match. “I played badly in the last five hours and made six or so bad calls in the last half an hour,” he said. “But we played for such a long time that I was a little bit tired. It was one of the toughest I’ve ever played in and it was great to be involved.”

Minus the loss to Marigliano, Dwan is up $42,500 over the first two days of the three-day challenge. Tomorrow he will face businessman and high-stakes amateur Sammy “Any Two” George in what Bluff Europe calls Dwan’s “most +EV match of the challenge.”

(Tom ‘durrrr’ Dwan beats Ilari ‘Ziigmund’ Sahamies in Full Tilt Million Dollar Challenge - Bluff Europe)

Marcus Bebb-Jones may be extradited to the US on murder charges (Photo: The Daily Telegraph)

British poker player faces extradition to US for wife’s murder

A British poker player with more than $240,000 in tournament winnings since 2007, is facing extradition to the United States on charges that he murdered his wife.

Prosecutors for the United States government told a British extradition court today a sordid tale with Marcus Bebb-Jones, now 46, at the center. The prosecution maintains that in 1997 Bebb-Jones murdered Sabrina Bebb-Jones, dumped her body in a national park, and then took off for a weekend in Las Vegas where he racked up thousands of dollars in charges on her credit cards. Over the course of his “playboy lifestyle” weekend he attempted suicide by firing a gun into his mouth but somehow managed to survive the incident without serious injury. He later moved to live in Kidderminster, England, with his mother and his son, who is now 15.

After returning to England, Bebb-Jones found success playing mostly small buy-in tournaments in the United Kingdom. His first win came in September of 2007, when he booked £90,000 ($184,370) for winning a £100 pot-limit holdem tournament at the Grosvenor Grand Prix in Walsall. All told he has eight final tables to his credit, including an appearance in the final nine of the 2008 Grosvenor UK Poker Tour main event at Brighton, where he finished in seventh place.

Bebb-Jones was questioned by police at the time of his wife’s disappearance but never faced criminal charges, as her body could not be found. Her skull was found by a rancher in a mountain pass in northwest Colorado in 2004, however, opening the door to criminal charges. If extradited to the United States, he would face a maximum punishment of life in prison without chance of parole. The British Home Secretary is set to make a final decision on Bebb-Jones’ extradition by next week.

(Champion poker player facing extradition over wife’s murder - The Daily Telegraph)

Cada media blitz continues

Joe Cada has been the WSOP Main Event champion for a little more than a week, but life hasn’t slowed down for him since the moment he won the tournament. David Letterman and CNN have come calling this week, following on the heels of FOX, CNBC, CBS, and countless radio stations. This evening he continued his media tour with a stop in the Bristol, Conn., studios of ESPN, where he appeared on SportsCenter. (If you missed it, you’re in luck - ESPN runs it a few hundred times per day.)

Cada will keep with the sports theme this weekend when he travels to Ann Arbor, Mich., for the Michigan-Ohio State football game on Saturday. There’s no advance word as to whether he’ll appear on that broadcast, but given how quickly he’s taken to the media game it also wouldn’t be a very big surprise.

A Piece of Taylor could be worth $5,000

Piece of Taylor up for grabs at CardRunners

CardRunners founder Taylor “Green Plastic” Caby will be at the final table of the Full Tilt Poker Million early next month, and you can win a piece of his action - for free.

Truly Free Poker Training (TFPT), a program sponsored by Full Tilt, is backing the Piece of Taylor promotion which will see one of its members win 1% of Caby’s action at the Poker Million final table. TFPT lets players earn free memberships to training sites CardRunners and StoxPoker just by playing at Full Tilt, and the accrued benefits don’t affect any bonuses or rakeback. That means it doesn’t cost anything at all to take part in this promotion - a rarity in poker.

Anyone who is signed up at TFPT by December 3rd will have a chance to win the Piece of Taylor, which is guaranteed to be worth at least $500. But if Caby can overcome fierce opposition from the likes of James Akenhead, Luke “FullFlush” Schwartz, Dag Martin Mikkelsen, Juha Helppi, and Peter Vasiliou at the December 4th final table, the value of the one-percent share goes all the way up to $5,000.

(Piece of Taylor - CardRunners)

The new look of the online poker tables at UB.com.

Online poker players have used the moniker “UB” for over ten years and now UltimateBet will simply be known as UB Poker an will be found at a new domain name, www.UB.com.

The move from the old company name to UB.com comes complete with some software updates and a much improved tournament schedule. Company executives are promising that the new branding initiative isn’t just about a fancy new logo but a new way of doing business.

“The launch of UB.com represents a turning point for our company. We have assembled a great group of professionals who are passionate about poker to build the UB brand. Our goal is to create products and services that poker players really want,” said Paul Leggett, Chief Operating Officer of Tokwiro, the parent company for UB Poker. “We are trying to listen very carefully to both our players and the poker community to help us achieve this goal.”

Critics will point to the superuser scandal of 2008 as the reason behind the new corporate identity but Leggett stresses it’s all about returning the company to the players.

“The launch of UB.com is not just a new domain with a different logo, it’s much more than that. It’s a complete new direction for UB. It’s software built with the serious poker player in mind,” said Leggett. “And finally, it’s tournaments and promotions that poker players care about.”

Annie Duke, Phil Hellmuth and Joe Sebok will continue to represent UB Poker at international tournaments around the world. All three will also have input into the day-to-day operations of the company.

“In the ten years since I have been involved with the UB brand, I have never been prouder to represent the company as much as I am right now. We have great people captaining the ship, we have a great vibe and some serious swagger. I look forward to the day when we are the largest poker site on the planet,” said Hellmuth.

Antonius is up over $8 million this year

Last night the ongoing saga of “Isildur1″ continued, but ended a little differently than the other chapters we’ve documented so far.  Not only was the mystery Swede on the losing end of a monster session against Patrik Antonius, he also dropped the biggest pot in the history of online poker, worth almost $900,000.

That monster hand was the crowning jewel of a remarkable run by Antonius, who took his opponent for $2.7 million at the $500/$1,000 PLO tables over the course of a lengthy evening session in which the two players logged more than 2,000 hands.  There were several other big pots, more than one exceeding half a million dollars.  As for the historical hand, here is how it went down:

Preflop, the two players kept it rather tame.  Isildur1 raised to $3,000 and Antonius called from the big blind.  The flop fell Q75 and Antonius checked to Isildur1, who bet out $5,000.  Antonius made it $21,000 to go, Isildur1 called and they both saw the turn come  A.  This is where the fireworks really start.  Antonious made a pot-sized bet of $48,000 and Isildur1 repotted it to $192,000 total.  Antonius moved all-in for $415,479.50 and Isildur1 called, having him covered by just over $11,000.

When the cards were turned up, Antonius revealed A6Q9 for top two pair, the nut flush draw and a gutshot.  Isildur1 also had top two pair and a better straight draw with his AKQT.  At that moment, the two were chopping the pot, but both players hands could improve on the river, which is exactly what happened.  The river brought the 8, making Antonius his nine-high straight and shipping the  $878,958.50 pot his way.

It seemed as though most of the big pots were going Antonius’ way last night and the big session only added to his ample profits on the year.  After a $3 million day yesterday, Antonius is up nearly $8.5 million over the course of 2009.  Prior to last night, Isildur1’s performance over the past month made him the second most  profitable player of the year.  Yesterday set Isildur1 back quite a bit, but he is still up more than $2 million since he started playing on the Full Tilt Poker high stakes tables.

It remains to be seen if Isildur1 is going to cut his losses, take a break, or be back at the tables tomorrow, but we’ll be keeping an eye out on those cash game tables to see if Antonius can continue to crush and if Isildur1 will be back for more any time soon.

Seven days ago Joe Cada sat across from Darvin Moon in pursuit of a world championship at the WSOP Main Event. Monday night he sat ringside at Madison Square Garden for World Wrestling Entertainment’s Monday Night Raw along with his agent Dan Frank and fellow Team PokerStars member Dennis Phillips for a Main Event of a different kind.

Towards the end of the two-hour episode RAW the three appeared behind the announcer’s table. Cada is slowly adjusting to life as world champ and the chance to be at Madison Square Garden was, apparently, too good to pass up.

“Life has gotten real interesting all of a sudden. Tonight I was ringside at WWE Monday Night Raw, tomorrow I’m taping with David Letterman and I’ll be playing in a cash game backstage with the Late Show production crew, capping it off with seats on the glass for the New York Ranger game,” said Cada. “I highly recommend playing poker for a living and shipping the Main Event. I’m very grateful”

Cada will be appearing on the Late Show with David Letterman Tuesday along with Phillips.

While Full Tilt Poker was busy serving up its trifecta of FTOPS events on Sunday, the other sites did not just roll over and let them run the busiest online poker day of the week. Rather, quite the opposite happened and PokerStars hosted their “Landmark” Sunday Million tournament, commemorating more than $250 million in Sunday Million prize since the tournament’s inception. The special version of the popular weekly event promised a $2.5 million guarantee which was easily shattered when more than 18,000 players signed up to take part in the $200 + $16 buy-in event.

The tremendous Sunday Million prize pool came in at $3,656,600 and, thanks to a six-way chop, the top six finishers all took down in excess of $140,000. In addition to taking home the biggest payday at $282,662.86, “Zadman5311” also won the event while “m8675309a” and “call110” rounded out the top three. Mark “The Omaholic” Roland also made an appearance at the final table, but busted out in 7th place, just missing out on the chop talk.

Other big winners on the day included “egor2077“, who defeated Tom “titantom32″ Braband heads-up in the Sunday Warm Up and Marc “mysterio6044″ Karam who took down the Sunday 500.

Here are the final table results from several of the Sunday Majors, including the UB Poker $200K GTD:

PokerStars Sunday Million
Prize Pool: $3,656,600
Entrants: 18,283

1st: Zadman5311 ($282,662.86)
2nd: m8675309a ($200,844.74)
3rd: call110 ($250,037.00)
4th: ZyeD3 ($144,353.10)
5th: waWe ($205,477.38)
6th: Guldlemmen4 ($177,650.76)
7th: Mark “TheOmaholic” Roland ($54,849.00)
8th: MATPOC28 ($32,909.40)
9th: E-Daddie ($21,939.60)

Notable finishes: Bryan “bparis” Paris (14th), Str8$$$Homey (25th), Brian “$tinger 88″ Hastings (44th) and Ravi “govshark2″ Raghaven (62nd)

PokerStars Sunday Warm-Up
Prize Pool: $952,600
Entrants: 4,763h

1st: egor2077 ($149,017.54)
2nd: Tom “titantom32″ Braband ($110,977.90)
3rd: FUTURE102 ($78,589.50)
4th: xQ024 ($53,821.90)
5th: olle101 ($40,485.50)
6th: fabregarp ($30,959.50)
7th: timdmd ($21,433.50)
8th: funywiteshss ($11,907.50)
9th: Brad “smerks” Marsh ($7,620.80)

Notable finishes: Matt “All_in_at420″ Stout (32nd), Lauren “locoenlacabeza” Kling (39th), Jamie “pokerjamers” Armstrong (41st), Jonathan “FatalError” Aguiar (56th) and Thayer “THAY3R” Rasmussen (64th)

PokerStars Sunday Second Chance
Prize Pool: $316,400
Entrants: 1,582

1st: WhoGivzABuck ($56,952.00)
2nd: Joao “vovo_leo” Monte ($41,132.00)
3rd: Bal87 ($31,640.00)
4th: dan82mur ($23,730.00)
5th: tcblade ($16,611.00)
6th: Sam “siola” Iola ($13,447.00)
7th: Kevin “KevBoyStar” Stani ($10,283.00)
8th: smokrokflock ($7,119.00)
9th: Ship ThA $$$ ($4,429.60)

Notable finishes: Brandon “AreTheseUtz” Hall (11th), PeachyMer (13th), Jared “SOXFAN83″ Mahoney (14th) and Matt “ADZ124″ Marafioti (18th)

PokerStars Sunday 500
Prize Pool: $614,000
Entrants: 1,228

1st: Marc “mysterio6044″ Karam ($102,568.70)
2nd: ohnistun ($74,908.00)
3rd: Steven “19FMS86″ Levy ($56,588.00)
4th: 1shark2007 ($41,752.00)
5th: McMang ($30,086.00)
6th: $30K ($23,946.00)
7th: Zackattak13 ($17,806.00)
8th: levinhostar ($11,666.00)
9th: Christian “charder30″ Harder ($6,385.60)

Notable finishes: Jay “J_HasTheNuts” Conley (20th), Evan “Oakplayer” Schwartz (25th), Bahbak “bigredAK” Oboodi (28th) and Randal “RandALLin” Flowers (29th)

UB Poker $200K GTD
Prize Pool: $209,200
Entrants: 1,046

1st: JAYHOVAHVOL1 ($37,321.28)
2nd: SCHAPPUSCHA ($37,321.28)
3rd: Eric “SHEETSWORLD” Haber ($18,932.60)
4th: Michael “MIKEIVEY” Meredith ($13,493.40)
5th: AMYGDYLA ($11,401.40)
6th: CLASS_ACT ($9,309.40)
7th: Mohsin “CHICAGOCARDS1″ Charania ($7,217.40)
8th: JVONK424 ($5,125.40)
9th: Mike “MEEELOSH” Lawson ($3,556.40)

Team Bluff is in full swing at Carbon poker.  Last week, the winner of the Team Bluff October leaderboard, ‘89yotastacked’ defeated 2008 Bluff online poker player of the year David ‘The Maven’ Chicotski.  The match was hard fought, but ultimately came down to an all in preflop hand with ‘The Maven’ holding AQ, and ‘Yota’ holding QQ.  No help for The Maven, and ‘Yota’ was $500 richer.

All ‘89yotastacked’ did to earn a match with The Maven is do what he normally does: play online poker at Carbon Poker.  Yota had the best results of the month out of all the members of Team Bluff, and earned a match with The Maven, and took the match down.  Yota’s top scoring Team Bluff teammates (those that finished 2nd – 5th on the October Team Bluff leaderboard) also picked up $25 for Yota’s win.

November’s leaderboard is shaping up, with player ‘Y2icon’ on his or her way to playing a heads up match with a Team Bluff pro, for $500.  All you have to do to become a member of Team Bluff is to sign up for Carbon Poker using the exclusive Team Bluff links.  No minimum hands, no requirements other than making a deposit.

Sign up for Carbon Poker today, and get your share of the free money as a member of Team Bluff.

The FTOPS XIV Main Event promised participants it would have at least $2.5 million in prize and it more than delivered on that guarantee, with $2,735,500 up for grabs and the promise of six figure payouts for the top five finishers in the massive event. It certainly helped that the FTOPS XIV Main Event was the largest Main Event it FTOPS history, drawing 5,471 players who plunked down the $500 + $35 buy-in.

Hosted by the newest addition to Team Full Tilt, Tom “durrrr” Dwan (who busted in 949th place and returned to his ongoing high stakes battle with “Isildur1” just fyi), the tournament drew nearly 70 Full Tilt Red Pros and a range of players from the full time online grinders to the recreational players who satellited their way in on a whim. A total of 720 players would make the money with the top 18 finishers all receiving a five figure payday. David Colclough had the best showing of the Full Tilt Pros with his 250th place finish and Garrett “GBecks” Beckman (93rd), Michael “Pot Odds 3″ McNeill (80th), Blair “blur5f6″ Hinkle (49th) and FTOPS XIV jersey winner “RymesWOrange” (24th) made it deep as well.

While those players would bust out and likely head to bed for some much-needed rest, the top nine players, headlined by Adam Junglen, assembled at the final table around 7AM ET:

Seat 1: Adam Junglen (6,437,047)
Seat 2: Dr Fill Good (2,809,815)
Seat 3: kinheim (6,650,416)
Seat 4: bankrollme87 (6,205,370)
Seat 5: Kevin “ItsTime2Win” Pionkowski (2,171,959)
Seat 6: zhivago2 (8,358,848)
Seat 7: dfunks222 (2,187,007)
Seat 8: nuts7878 (2,563,029)
Seat 9: Valuechecking (3,649,009)

The action at the final table kicked off with a bang when “Dr Fill Good” doubled through “zhivago2” on the second hand of play. Zhivago’s JJ couldn’t hold up against Dr Fill Good’s AK. That put Dr Fill Good up to nearly 6 million chips, which was a much-need boost considering the blinds were up to 50,000/100,000 ante 10,000.

Just about a round later, zhivago2 would have their revenge. Dr Fill Good raised in middle position and zhivago2 called form the small blind. The flop fell 752, zhivago2 checked, Dr Fill Good continuation bet 300,000 or so and zhivago2 check-raised, making it nearly 1 million to go. Dr Fill Good responded by making it almost 2 million to go and zhivago2 retaliated by moving all-in. Dr Fill Good called, showing AT for two over cards and a flush draw. Zhivago2 showed 22 and had Dr Fill Good drawing dead after the turn came 5 to make zhivago2 a full house. That pot gave zhivago2 the chip lead with nearly 11 million chips, while Dr Fill Good was left with just 200,000 chips.

Dr Fill Good doubled up their short stack twice, but busted out in 9th place when they got it in again holding 88 to the AJ of “Valuechecking.” The eights looked good on the flop and turn, but a J on the river gave the pot to Valuechecking and sent Dr Fill Good to the rail. Coincidentally, it would be a dramatic river card that would be the demise of Valuechecking, who was poised to double up after getting it all-in preflop holding AK to zhivago2’s AT, but zhivago2 rivered a ten to knock Valuechecking out in 8th place. Just three hands later, “nuts7878” would meet a similar fate, getting their last 1.1 million all-in with AQ against Kevin “ItsTime2Win” Pionkowski’s QJ. The J9349 board was not kind to nuts7878 though, pairing ItsTime2Win’s jack and knocking nuts7878 out in 7th place.

ItsTime2Win continued to amass chips at a rapid rate. Next, he tangled with “bankrollme87” in a blind on blind confrontation. Bankrollme87 raised out of the small blind and ItsTime2Win called out of the big. The chips went in the middle after the 986 flop with bankrollme87 showing 39 for top pair, bad icker while ItsTime2Win held 79 for top pair with an open-ended straight draw. Bankrollme87 picked up a flush draw with the A on the turn, but the river 4 was no help and bankrollme87 was out in 6th place.

That hand out ItsTime2Win alongside zhivago2 and “Adam Junglen,” who spent the first portion of the final table picking up small pots without showdown to maintain his big stack. Zhivago2 put some distance between themselves and the rest of the field when they knocked out “kinheim” in 5th place. Zhivago2 minraised from late position and kinheim moved all-in from the big blind. Zhivago2 called with AJ and had kinheim’s JT drawing slim. The board ran out 99357 andzhivago2’s ace high was enough to rake the pot.

A little while later, zhivago2 would cross the 20 million chip mark after “dfunks22” open raised all-in for 3.7 million with the blinds at 120,000/240,000 ante 30,000 and zhivago2 was in the big blind with JJ and called. Dfunks222’s A7 could not catch an ace as the board ran out QJ4KQ and the field was cut to three.

The final three struck a deal that ensured each would walk away with more than $290,000 on their $500 investment. The assurance of a massive payout did not stop them for playing for the extra money on the side and the gold jersey though.

After sparring for several rounds, a big pot cropped up when ItsTime2Win raised from the button, zhivago2 called from the small blind and Junglen made it 1.4 million to go out of the big blind. While ItsTime2Win tossed his hand, zhivago2 elected to reraise all-in instead, having Junglen covered by nearly 10 million chips. Junglen called with 66, zhivago2 showed QJ and it was off to the races for the biggest pot of the tournament, worth more than 17 million chips. The J85 flop favored zhivago2 and the 9 on the turn helped neither player. The river brought the K and Junglen was out in 3rd place while zhivago2 headed into heads-up play with a more than 2-1 chip advantage.

The top two finishers would log nearly fifty hands of one-on-one play. ItsTime2Win would pull close to even with his opponent early on when his post flop aggression forced zhivago2 to concede a 12 million chip pot. The very next hand he would claim the chip lead when both players made two pair by the river, but ItsTime2Win’s eights and tens bested zhivago2’s sixes and nines.

Zhivago2 would take the lead back after the two bet and raised each other on every street as the board came out Q537. Zhivago2 bet out just over 1 million into the 15 million chip pot after the 4 hit on the river. Getting 16-1, ItsTime2Win called and mucked when zhivago2 showed 79 for a pair of sevens.

The match would be over two hands later when ItsTime2Win raised from the button, zhivago2 reraised out of the big blind, ItsTime2Win called and the duo saw a flop of 952. Zhivago2 led out for a 2 million chip bet and ItsTime2Win moved all-in for an additional 9.5 million or so. Zhivago2 called with JJ and ItsTime2Win showed A3 for just ace high. He picked up a club draw with the 6 on the turn, but the 3 on the river gave the pot to zhivago2 and concluded the Main Event at shortly after 9AM ET.

Zhivago2 earned $418,839.16 for the Main Event victory and brought the latest installment of the FTOPS to a close. Those looking for their next tournament series fix will have the Mini FTOPS getting underway on December 9th and those looking to rail some high stakes tournament can feast on the $25,000 buy-in Heads-Up PLO World Championships on November 21st and 22nd.

Here are the complete results from the Main Event of FTOPS XIV:

1st: zhivago2 ($418,839.16)
2nd: Kevin “ItsTime2Win” Pionkowski ($316,554.40)
3rd: Adam Junglen ($290,418.94)
4th: dfunks222 ($175,072.00)
5th: kinheim ($131,167.23)
6th: bankrollme87 ($90,271.50)
7th: nuts7878 ($58,813.25)
8th: Valuechecking ($41,032.50)
9th: Dr Fill Good ($28,722.75)

An impressive 9,832 runners took part in the penultimate event of FTOPS XIV, a $120 + $9 buy-in No Limit Hold’em Knockout event. Hosted by November Niner Steven Begleiter, the tournament generated a prize pool of nearly $1 million and offered a first place prize more than 1,000 times the size of the buy-in.

Some of the players who navigated their way through the enormous field to make it deep into the money include Bryan “Squirrely1″ Sapp (89th), “SpadeSkillz” (57th) and Andrew “TiltyJoker” Lee (47th). These players missed out on the final table, but nine other players, headlined by BLUFF blogger Christina “cristinalindley” Lindley, survived to battle for the jersey and the top prize:

Seat 1: Dinhjo (6,220,000)
Seat 2:BikStik8585 (7,276,474)
Seat 3: SNG Ninja (8,201,863)
Seat 4: Al-Extrem1 (1,458,822)
Seat 5: boltsva (1,401,536)
Seat 6: Alcatrez27278 (5,388,636)
Seat 7: little chief17 (12,996,445)
Seat 8: bethwolf22 (2,402,830)
Seat 9: Christina “cristinalindley” Lindley (3,813,394)

The final table got underway with a little Hollywooding. With the blinds at 100,000/200,000 ante 25,000, “Al-Extrem1” had just six big blinds to their name. That didn’t stop them from tanking when facing a raise from “little chief17” and then, after a good 20 seconds of thought, moving all-in. Little chief17 called with KJ while Al-Extrem1 showed AA. The QQJ paired little chief17’s jack and the J gave them a boat to crack Al-Extrem1’s aces and send them to the rail in 9th place.

“Boltsva” managed to triple up when they moved all-in for their last 1.5 million from the button and both “Alcatraz27278” and little chief17 called out of the blinds. After the flop fell T73, Alcatraz27278 moved all-in for their remaining 4.6 million, little chief17 folded and Alcatraz27278 showed 22 to boltsva’s QQ. The turn and river came 9 then K to give both players a flush, but boltsva’s was bigger, so they more than tripled up to 4.6 million. Christina “cristinalindley” Lindley was also able to chip up when her AK was able to spike an ace on “BikStik8585” to double up to 6 million chips.

On the hand following cristinalindley’s double up, boltsva lost those newly earned chips to little chief17. Little chief17 raised from early position, boltsva called out of the big blind and the two saw a flop of 942. Boltsva checked, little chief17 fired out a bet and boltsva check-raised all-in. Little chief17 called, tabling A9 for top pair while boltsva showed 66. With no six on the turn or river, boltsva was out in 8th and little chief17 took a commanding chip lead over the field with 18 million chips to their name. The very next hand, BikStik8585 busted in 7th place when their A7 was outflopped by Alcatraz2278’s 55 on a 753J3 board.

Alcatraz27278 was chipping up nicely until a blind vs. blind hand against “SNG Ninja.” The chips went all-in preflop with SNG Ninja holding KK to Alcatraz27278’s 66. The kings held to give SNG Ninja the more than 15 million chip pot and leave Alcatraz27278 with just 5 million chips. They would not be the next player to go though. The honor of 6th place went to “bethwolf22,” who shoved all-in from the small blind for 3 million chips or so with K6 and cristinalindley called out of the big blind with KJ. Cristinalindley would flop the nuts as the board fell AQT and, with no jack for a chop on the later streets, bethwolf22 was out. Alcatraz27278 would be the next to go, finishing in 5th place, while “Dinhjo” took 4th when their small blind shove with Q7 ran into SNG Ninja’s A4.

Once play got down to the final three, the trio paused to make a deal that offered more than $100,000 to little chief17 and cristinalindley and gave over $95,000 to SNG Ninja. Immediately after play resumed, SNG Ninja made their exit in 3rd place when they raised from the small blind, little chief17 reraised out of the big blind and SNG moved all-in for more than 12.5 million total. Little chief17 quickly called with QQ and SNG Ninja’s K8 was drawing slim. The board ran out 87792 and the queens held to take the tournament down to heads-up play.

Little chief17 held a more than 2-1 chip advantage over cristinalindley at the start of heads-up play and they steadily increased that margin to 5-1 as play continued. Down to her last 7 million chips, cristinalindley made a stand, calling little chief17’s reraise all-in holding KJ. Little chief17 showed AJ and had the advantage going into the flop. The innocuous board ran out T82T5 and little chief17 took the pot and the match to claim the gold jersey and a cash payout worth $125,959.96.

Here are the complete results from the final table of Event #24:

1st: little chief17 ($125,959.96)
2nd: Christina “cristinalindley” Lindley ($106,460.01)
3rd: SNG Ninja($95,968.83)
4th: Dinjho ($52,306.24)
5th: Alcatraz27278 ($38,344.80)
6th: bethwolf22 ($27,529.60)
7th: BikStik8585 ($19,664.00)
8th: boltsva ($14,059.76)
9th: Al-Extrem1 ($9,940.15)

The biggest prize of this prize of this especially lucrative Sunday was the $539,350 set aside for the winner of the prestigious $2,500 buy-in FTOPS Event #22. A total of 938 players turned out for the event, but only 100 of them returned for Day 2 of play on Sunday. Of those, all but ten would receive some sort of cash payout and the top six finishers would all bink six figure scores for their efforts.

The stacked Day 2 field included a number of experienced players, including the champion of the FTOPS XIII installment of this event, Jake “psutennis11″ Toole. Toole would not repeat as champion after busting out in 15th place, as he was one of the many known pros who fell just short of the final table. Others who made deep runs in the event included Tom “titantom32″ Braband (21st), Andrew “Browndog19″ Brown (19th), Stephen “Stevie444″ Chidwick (17th), Evan “NEONPILS99″ Parkes (14th) and Chad “jse81″ Batista (11th).

The final table featured some recognizable names as well, like Dan O’Brien and the last Full Tilt Red Pro standing, British card player Gary Jones. Also in the mix was “Supa4real,” who is used to high pressure, high profile final tables as they finished in 8th place at the Main Event of this year’s WCOOP. Supa4real came up just short of the jersey Sunday evening, finishing in 2nd place to “obiedman“:

Seat 1: Ahvall (268,407)
Seat 2: Rabbit_hunterSA (500,726)
Seat 3: Supa4real (1,049,816)
Seat 4: Dan “DanOBrien” O’Brien (649,176)
Seat 5: TheAlligatorNo1 (277,421)
Seat 6: obiedman (414,152)
Seat 7: Timvd20 (1,769,808)
Seat 8: Gary Jones (315,432)
Seat 9: the_real_magic (383,062)

After beginning the day as the chip leader in the event, “Rabbit_hunterSA” was the first player to make their exit from the final table. Not ten hands after the remaining nine players consolidated on one table, Rabbit_hunterSA picked up KK against the AK of “Supa4real.” The J83 flop looked good for Rabbit_hunterSA, but running aces on the turn and river gave Supa4real the more than 1 million chip pot.

Supa4real would ship some of those chips to the last Red Pro standing when “Gary Jones” was able to flop a four while holding 44 to Supa4real’s QQ and double up. Not too long after that, Jones repeated the same feat to double up a second time, once again picking up pocket fours and once again cracking Supa4real’s pocket queens with a four on the flop to boost his stack up to 675,000.

“DanOBrien” was getting short on chips and shoved his last 250,000 in from the cutoff at the 10,000/20,000 ante 2,500 with A3. “Timvd20” called from the big blind with AK. The 765TJ failed to bring any help for DanOBrien and he was eliminated in 8th place. It would take a while before the next player to bust, as the final seven players exchanged chips in several dozen tiny pots. Eventually, “Ahvall” was getting down to the felt and shoved their last 270,000 chips all-in from early position and Gary Jones called from the big blind. Jones’ AK was racing with Ahvall’s 22. The overcards did not connect with the Q43 flop, but an A on the turn left Ahvall needing a deuce or a five in order to stay alive. The river brought the 4 and they were out in 7th place.

The next elimination would take place on the very next hand when “TheAlligatorNo1” moved all-in for 150,000 chips with A4 and Timvd20 called from the button with 99. The 994 brought quads for Timvd20 and TheAlligatorNo1 was drawing dead and out in 6th place. “The_real_magic” would disappear next when their QQ squared off against Supa4real’s AK in a blind versus blind all-in preflop confrontation. The_real_magic dodged the big cards on the flop and turn, but a king on the river gave Supa4real the pot and ousted the_real_magic in 5th.

With four players remaining, Timvd20 and Supa4real were the two players in control, wielding their big stacks against the shorter-stacked Gary Jones and “obiedman.” Timvd20 even picked up a couple of big pots off Supa4real to build their stack up past 3 million chips. They would give a chunk of stack to obiedman though, as obiedman picked up TT to Timvd20’s 77 to double up to 1.25 million. While obiedman was able to double up, Gary Jones was not so lucky when he put his remaining 200,000 in with A3 and Timvd20 looked him up with 44. The board ran out J3296 to eliminate Jones in 4th place.

Despite holding a substantial chip lead at the start of 3-handed play, Timvd20 would end up the 3rd place finisher. They took a huge hit after doubling up obiedman when they flopped a straight while holding A4. The board ran out 5329J and obiedman moved all-in on the river. Timvd20 called, then mucked, dropping down to 1.3 million chips. Later, Suap4real would collect the rest of Timvd20’s chips when Timvd20 ran their 33 into Supa4real’s AA. That nettedSupa4real a 2.5 million chip pot and sent Timvd20 to the rail in 3rd place.

Less than 300,000 chips separated the two finalists at the start of heads-up play and neither was in a hurry to get all of those chips in the middle since the blinds were still at a relatively low 14,000/28,0000 ante 3,500, which meant that each of them had around 100 big blinds to work with. Obiedman was able to put some distance between themselves and the competition thanks to two big hands in which they made full houses. They maintained that lead as the pair played out several dozen hands, culminating in the final hand of the tournament. Obiedman raised from the button, Supa4real called from the big blind and the duo saw the flop fall QQ9. Supa4real check-raised all-in over the top of obiedman’s flop bet and obeidman quickly called, holding QJ. Supa4real had the other queen, the Q along with the T, so they would need big cards, a nine or a ten to stay alive. The 5 on the turn was no help, nor was the J on the river. Obiedman scooped the pot and the outright victory, claiming all $539,350 of the first place prize money. Supa4real earned a respectable $340,000 for 2nd place.

Here are the complete results from the final table of Event #22:

1st: obiedman ($539,350.00)
2nd: Supa4real ($340,025.00)
3rd: Timvd20 ($252,087.50)
4th: Gary Jones ($193,462.50)
5th: the_real_magic ($146,562.50)
6th: TheAlligatorNo1 ($105,525.00)
7th: Ahvall ($70,350.00)
8th: Dan “DanOBrien” O’Brien ($54,873.00)
9th: Rabbit_hunterSA ($39,895.00)

Who is that masked man?

While Tom “durrrr” Dwan was busy filming the new season of “High Stakes Poker,” resident mystery Swede “Isildur1” continued in his quest to take over the high stakes online poker world by logging sessions with Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond, Brian Townsend, Phil Ivey, Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies, David Benyamine and Patrik Antonius over the past two days.

While some, like Ziigmund and Ivey called it quits after a short session, others, like Antonius, logged a number of hands against Isildur1. Like many others in the online poker world, Ziigmund grew suspicious and even expressed his concerns to Isildur1 in the chat box:

Ziigmund: I am afraid to play hu against you’
Isildur1: v funny
Ziigmund: who the **** r u?
Isildur1: noome u heard of

After dropping more than $100,000 to Isildur1, Ziigmund decided to call it quits, adding:

Ziigmund: this is too sick
Ziigmund: no more hu with you

Many railbirds are growing increasingly suspicious of Isildur’s extremely high win rate. Forum gossip has posited everything from bot use to a second account of an already established pro to a super user account. While the identity of Isildur1 remains a mystery, a post from Barry Greenstein in the Pokerroad Forums did shed some light on who Isildur1 is and why his identity remains a mystery:

“He’s not a publically known player at this time, but he has done very well in big head-up games on European sites. He just started playing on American sites…I have a feeling you will start hearing about in live games and tournaments once he gets a little older, since he likes to play poker all the time,” Greenstein wrote in the November 12th post. He also added that the steep taxes on gambling earnings in Sweden likely play a role in Isildur1 keeping his real identity under wraps.

Even though the identity of the formidable foe remains top secret, the biggest players in the game are all lining up to take their shot at him, even after watching durrrr drop $3 million to him earlier this week. Antonius took his crack at Isildur1 Friday night and, while he didn’t lose $3 million, he did drop a chunk of change to Isildur1 on both the No Limit Hold’em and the Pot Limit Omaha tables. The epic session with Antonius, plus several smaller winning sessions, puts Isildur1up more than $6 million in the month of November. Those kinds of numbers make Isildur1 the second biggest winner of 2009 so far. Isildur1 trails only Antonius in winnings on the year, up just over $5 million compared to Antonius’ profits of $5.7 million.

While it may seem that Isildur1 is unstoppable, a lengthy Saturday night session against David Benyamine proved to be less profitable for Isildur1. The Frenchman got the best of Isildur1, who ended up only $5,000 at day’s end Saturday night.  Townsend’s brief Friday session with Isildur1 also saw teh Red Pro and Cardrunners coach come out in the black.   These slight hiccups seem to be just minor setbacks for the new high stakes sensation who continues to put in more than 2,000 hands on the Full Tilt Poker tables daily.

It’s quite the big weekend for online poker players, what with the FTOPS Main Event, the $2.5 Million guarantee PokerStars Sunday Million and the regular onslaught of Sunday tournaments on most player’s MTT schedule. The festivities got off to an early start with the first of two days in FTOPS Event #22, the prestigious $2,500 buy-in 2-Day No Limit Hold’em event. This tournament saw its numbers up from FTOPS XII and XIII, netting 938 players competing for $2,345,000.

The big field helped the tournament to easily surpass its $2 million guarantee and there is over half a million dollars up ready and waiting for whoever can manage to take the event down. When play paused on Day 1 at the conclusion of Level 17 there were 100 players remaining in the field. Ten of those players will return to play Sunday only to walk away empty-handed as the bubble does not burst until there are ninety players remaining.

FTOPS XIII 2-Day Event winner Jake “psutennis11″ Toole is still alive and kicking, but short on chips. as is former FTOPS Main Event winner Va Shon “Julian Verse” Watkins. Red pros Taylor Caby, Bill Gazes and Gary Jones are all still alive, with Jones currently sitting on the second largest chip stack in the event with 174,804. The chip leader at the moment is Rabbit_hunterSA who has a more than 50,000 chip lead on the rest of the field with 229,047 chips. To put that in perspective of the blinds, when play resumes the blinds will be up to 500/1,000 ante 125.

Others with big chip stacks headed into Day 2 of this event include Chad “jse81″ Batista (144,248), Shannon “BLUFFforRENT” Shorr (134,049), Shawn “jordankickz” Busse (93,058) and Dan “DanOBrien” O’Brien (81,909).

Play resumes at 2PM ET and the $500 buy-in FTOPS Main Event getting underway at 6PM ET. Hosted by the newest Team Full Tilt Pro Tom “durrrr” Dwan, the event will boast a $2.5 million guarantee.

Here are the top ten chip counts from the end of Day 1 in FTOPS Event #23:

1. Rabbit_hunterSA (229,047)
2. Gary Jones (174,804)
3. Chad “jse81″ Batista (144,248)
4. Gazou007 (141,884)
5. LOL_COLLUDAMENT (135,663)
6. Shannon “BLUFFforRENT” Shorr (134,049)
7. 747wd (133,563)
8. FLIPokerHer (126,684)
9. the_real_magic (117,430)
10. hawkjb1 (110,386)

The big names came out in droves for the final rebuy event of FTOPS XIV, Event #23. The $100 + $9 rebuy event drew a total of 1,167 players who rebought more than 2,400 times and racked up a fiendish 666 add-ons to boost the total prize pool to $424,100. While many of the biggest names were more focused on the $2,500 buy-in two-day FTOPS event, there were plenty of pros who made deep runs here, including the eventual winner, heads-up poker specialist Chris “Genius28″ Lee.

Justin Smith (40th), Zachary “CrazyZachary” Clark (39th), Tony “DrunkPPlaya” Gargano (19th), Jordan “pimpin_pens” Smith (14th) and Bjorn “kleath” Kleathersson (13th) also outlasted the vast majority of the field, but they would all fell short of the final nine. It appeared as though WSOP bracelet winner Vitaly Lunkin was going to rack up another final table for the Red Pros, as he held the chip lead with just 16 players remaining. However, in a testament to just how swing the game of Omaha can be, Lunkin went from chip leader to final table bubble boy, busting out in 10th place, while these players remained in contention for the jersey:

Seat 1: Chris “Genius28″ Lee (1,330,640)
Seat 2: borromias (683,066)
Seat 3: Clark “Snake8484″ Hamagami (370,176)
Seat 4: bearbuck (432,621)
Seat 5: aviator0925 (806,603)
Seat 6: portblair (657,082)
Seat 7: Kevin “krazylouie” Stanford (787,000)
Seat 8: TheBjerre (728,942)
Seat 9: BigDawg427 (898,370)

With the blinds at a relatively low 15,000/30,000, there was a lot of play for the final nine players. They took advantage of it, seeing flops before committing too many chips. Early on in the action, “BigDawg427” raised in early position and Chris “Genius28″ Lee called behind them. BigDawg427 led out for the size of the pot on the J93 flop and Genius28 raised the pot. BigDawg427 moved all-in and Genius28 called. BigDawg427’s AAQ8 was ahead for the moment, but Genius28 held a big straight draw plus top pair with his KQJT. The 3 on the turn benefited neither player and the T on the river made Genius28 his straight to eliminate BigDawg427 in 9th place and extend Genius28’s chip lead.

“Aviator0925” would pull even with Genius28 after eliminating “TheBjerre” in 8th place. The chips went all-in preflop with aviator0925 holding QJT2 to TheBjerre’s AA82. The K95 brought a straight draw for aviator0925 and the J on the turn would complete their straight. The river was an inconsequential 5 and the field was down to seven. Aviator0925 would help to shrink that number even further when they got it all-in preflop holding KK68 to the KJT7 of “borromias“. The 842 flop brought a flush draw for aviator 0925 and they improved to two pair with the 6 on the turn, which also left borromias drawing dead with one card to come and out in 6th place.

While Genius28 and aviator9025 consistently picked up pots to maintain their 2 million + chips apiece, the shorter stacks were struggling to stay alive. With the blinds up to 30,000/60,000 a short stacked “portblair” decided to make a stand with their remaining 380,000 chips. Clark “Snake8484″ Hamagami raised from middle position and portblair called from the small blind. The flop fell AAJ and both players checked. The turn was the 7 and portblair led out for 60,000 and Snake8484 called. The river brought the 4 and portblair bet out 120,000 into the 450,000 chip pot, leaving just 77,000 chips behind. Snake8484 raised enough to put portblair all-in and portblair called and subsequently mucked when Snake8484 showed ATK4 for aces full of fours.

Play continued five-handed for a while and she shorter stacks began to gain ground on Genius28 and aviator0925. Kevin “krazylouie” Stanford doubled through aviator0925 in a blind versus blind confrontation in which aviator0925 raised out of the small blind and krazylouie called from the big. The flop fell QT7 and aviator0925 bet out half the size of the pot. Krazylouie potted the action and aviator0925 moved all-in. Krazylouie called, tabling KTT5 for a set of tens while aviator0925 showed Q739 for top and bottom pair. Aviator0925 failed to catch up on the turn or river and they dropped to under 500,000 chips. They would quickly recover though, doubling through Genius28 when their AA42 prevailed over Genius28’s JJ89.

Aviator0925 would pick up even more chips when they racked up their third knockout of the night, eliminating “bearbuck” in 5th place. The chips went in preflop in a button versus small blind situation with bearbuck holding KQJ9 to aviator0925’s AAT7. The board came J7768 to make aviator trip sevens and eliminate bearbuck. From that point forward, the big pots kept coming at a rapid fire pace thanks to short-handed play and the rapidly escalating blinds. Genius28 and Snake8484 clashed in a blind vs. blind pot which saw all the chips go in the middle on a K72 flop with Genius28 holding a heart draw to Snake8484’s two pair. No hearts came on the turn or river and Genius28, who had been atop the leaderboard for nearly the duration of the final table suddenly found himself on the short stack.

Aviator0925 also saw their stack decrease substantially during 4-handed play, but a crucial double through krazylouie popped them back up to a workable stack of 2 million while krazylouie was left with just 200,000 chips. Genius28 would finish off krazylouie a few hands later when his JJ35 held against krazylouie’s A8QT to knock them out in 4th place and set up a relatively even-stacked final three.

The chip lead shuffled around the trio of players until Genius28 raised from the button and aviator0925 reraised to 960,000 from the big blind, leaving just 120,000 behind. Genius called the reraise and called aviator0925’s all-in on the KT5 flop as well. Aviator0925 was looking for a spade or a queen with their QQ84 while Genius28 needed straight cards in order for his QJT8 to improve. Genius28 improved to two pair with the J on the turn and made a straight with the A on the river to eliminate aviator0925 and take the slight chip lead at the start of heads-up play.

After a brief disconnection scare, Genius28 started to pull away from his opponent, taking a more than 2-1 chip lead. On the final hand of play, Snake8484 raised the button, Genius28 reraised and Snake8484 moved all-in holding AJJ6. Genius28 called, showing the superior pair with his KK8Q. The T86 flop changed nothing, nor did the 5 on the turn. The river K cemented the win for Genius28, who scooped the pot and his first outright FTOPS victory. Lee earned $93,302 for the win while Hamagami took home $59,374 for his runner-up performance.

Here are the complete results from Event #23:

1st: Chris “Genius28″ Lee ($93,302.00)
2nd: Clark “Snake8484″ Hamagami ($59,374.00)
3rd: aviator0925 ($42,940.13)
4th: Kevin “krazylouie” Stanford ($34,458.13)
5th: bearbuck ($25,997.33)
6th: portblair ($19,084.50)
7th: borromias ($12,298.90)
8th: TheBjerre ($8,906.10)
9th: BigDawg427 ($6,361.50)

Welcome to the BLUFF Daily Buzz, where we scour the entire internet for all the latest news in and around the world of poker. If it involves chips and cards, or people known to associate with chips and cards, we’re there.

Kid Poker & Vincent Chase, together at last

Erik Seidel was the first professional poker player to make an appearance on an HBO show when he turned up in the background of Curb Your Enthusiasm, but it looks like he won’t be the last.

Daniel Negreanu announced on his Twitter feed earlier this week that, like Seidel, he too had purchased a spot on an HBO show at a charity auction - with Kid Poker’s choice being the slightly younger, slightly hipper Entourage. Negreanu described his appearance as “a walk-on role,” but it’s not exactly clear right now whether he’ll be in the background like Seidel was on Curb or have a more prominent moment on camera like rapper 50 Cent did on the show’s recent sixth season when he made fun of Turtle at a stoplight. A non-background moment could be a lot of fun - it’s not too much of a stretch to imagine Vince and the gang heading to Vegas for the weekend and running into Negreanu on the golf course or in the Bellagio poker room.

No word yet on when the episode will air, though it could be a while since Season 6 concluded last month.

I Bet You gets some (belated) critical love

The Onion AV Club - the part of The Onion that’s meant to give serious reviews of culture rather than to make you double over with gut-busting laughter - recently put together its list of the top TV reality shows of the decade, and poker plays a prominent role. Besides the inclusion of shows like Survivor and The Amazing Race that have featured poker players as contestants, televised poker itself actually comes in at the #5 spot on the list. The AV Club loves poker because it “made household names out of dozens of previously obscure weirdoes, degenerates, and social misfits.” Awwwwwww, gosh, AV Club, we love you too!

Sharing the spot on the list with televised poker in general is the the Antonio Esfandiari-Phil Laak show I Bet You, which the AV Club calls “one of the damnedest, most delightful reality series of all time.” For two season the two made prop bets against each other on all sorts of things, from F1 racing at the Mario Andretti Racing School to a demolition derby in Tennessee, before host network Mojo HD went under (presumably not due to Esfandiari and Laak’s show). Another season is already in the can but, sadly, currently has no place to air.

(The best reality series/competitions of the ‘00s - The Onion AV Club)

Sunday Million guarantee jumps to $2.5 million this weekend

One thing about being a market leader, you’re always hitting milestones. PokerStars will reach a pretty big one tomorrow when it will cross the $250 million threshold in total prize money awarded on the site since it first opened its doors. That’s a lot of daily donkaments, SCOOPs, and WCOOPs! To celebrate the milestone, PokerStars is upping the guarantee for this week’s Sunday Million to $2.5 million. With $200 per person in the prize pool, that means 12,500 players will have to show up to break the guarantee.

All the regulars will be playing the tournament just like they usually do. But if you’re not a regular, hear these words: if there were ever a time to try to win your way into this tournament on the cheap, it would be right now. Satellites to the Sunday Million start at just $1 and the top prize will be worth at least $300,000 - take a shot!

Earlier this series, Steve “UFman2″ Burkholder had an opportunity to rack up another FTOPS jersey in Event #5, the Stud Hi/Lo event. He would fall short, finishing in 4th place, while another former jersey winner, DeceptionPt,”would nab win number two. Burkholder was back at the FTOPS final table again last night and, this time, he would not walk away without the victory to his credit.

With his final table showing in Event #20 last night, UFman2 joins the ranks of rumprammer, OmadJoped and bd3109, who have all made more than one final table so far during the course of FTOPS XIV. Bd3109 is currently #1 on the FTOPS series leaderboard with 370 points, but after his showing last night, UFman2 is nipping at his heels with 340 points to his credit.

It would be a tough road for UFman2 to notch that second victory, as Event #20, a $200 + $16 buy-in No Limit Hold’em event, absolutely shattered its $400,000 guarantee thanks to a surprisingly large field of 2,803 players. There was more than $560,000 up for grabs in the event, including a six-figure payout for the first place finisher.

Some of the notable names who made a run in the event, but fell short of the final nine include, nanQ (31st), WhySoCereus (22nd), Bobby “getting deep” Hodson (18th). Johan Brolenius had the top finish of the Red Pros, busting out in 45th place. Once the final table was set, UFman2 had to contend with a number of experienced players, including former FTOPS winner David muckducks” Cairns, Shyam “S_Dot111″ Srinivasan and longtime poker forum mainstay, Aaron “SaulGood” Surbeck:

Seat 1: TIGR778 (1,149,995)
Seat 2: Shyam “S_Dot111″ Srinivasan (1,026,607)
Seat 3: Steve “UFman2″ Burkholder (1,540,747)
Seat 4: 007-0253 (1,320,542)
Seat 5: SmokeChoke (1,068,868)
Seat 6: David “muckducks” Cairns (1,438,274)
Seat 7: Tarsis (614,863)
Seat 8: Aaron “SaulGood” Surbeck (5,033,197)
Seat 9: LuckyLukeKK (821,907)

Aaron “SaulGood” Surbeck came into the final table with a substantial chip advantage thanks to a lucky nine on the river that eliminated “melder1” in 10th place and set the final table. He would quickly drop a million of his chips to Shyam “S_Dot111″ Srinivasan when his TT failed to hold up against S_Dot111’s AK, but he still held almost twice as much as his next closest competitor. S-Dot111 would soon narrow the gap even further though, eliminating “Tarsis” in 9th place when his 88 held up against Tarsis’ 33.

S-Dot111 went for another knockout when he picked up KK against “LuckyLukeKK” who held QQ. The flop fell QJ3 and, with no king on the turn or river, LuckyLukeKK doubled up while S_Dot111 dropped to 1.7 million chips. Another big pot in which S_Dot111 raised from the small blind with AT and Steve “UFman2″ Burkholder moved all-in from the big blind with 9T did not work out his way either. S_Dot111’s ace high looked good as the board ran outQ62[Q, but the river 9 paired up UFman2 and they doubled up. A short while later, S_Dot111 raised from the cutoff and “SmokeChoke” moved all-in from the big blind. S_Dot111 called with A5, which was in bad shape against SmokeChoke’s AA. The board brought no help and S_Dot111 was out in 8th place.

“007-0253” was the next to fall when they shoved from middle position for their last 650,000 chips and SaulGood called from the button with 99. 007-0253 showed A8 and was drawing slim after the flop fell T72. The 2 on the turn left 007-0253 dead to an ace and with the Q on the river, they were eliminated in 7th place. SaulGood would eliminate another player shortly thereafter when LuckyLukeKK raised from under the gun and SaulGood reraised from the big blind. LuckyLukeKK moved all-in and SaulGood called, tabling 88. LuckyLukeKK showed AK. An eight on the flop meant the end for LuckyLukeKK and they were out in 6th.

UFman2 would handle the next elimination, knocking out the other former FTOPS winner at the the table, David “muckducks” Cairns in 5th place. It was another coin flip situation, with UFman2 holding AJ to muckducks’ 99. The A72 flop favored UFman2 and things only got better for him with the J on the turn. The river 4 did nothing for muckducks and they were eliminated. After taking down the more than 3.5 million chip pot, UFman2 overtook the chip lead from SaulGood, holding nearly 7 million to his 5 million, while SmokeChoke and “TIGR778” were struggling with 1.1 million and 850,000 chips respectively. They would be unable to overcome the chip disadvantage and would make their exits in 3rd and 4th place respectively.

That set up the lengthy heads-up match between UFman2 and SaulGood, who opted to make a deal before playing down to a winner. UFman2 was awarded $100,000 while SaulGood took $85,0000 and another $2,000 was set aside for the winner. The dealmaking process was arguably more challenging for the duo than the game itself, as they traded control of the dealmaking back and forth, both fearing they were going to mess it up.

Eventually the deal was successfully made and the two began a heads-up battle that would go on for nearly an hour before a winner was determined. The chip lead traded back and forth several times, including a huge hand in which SaulGood’s bottom pair of deuces dodged overcards and a flush draw to stave off elimination. Despite his best efforts, SaulGood was not able to overcome UFman2, who has a fair share of FTOPS experience on his side. In the end, it would be UFman2 who won out and joined Deception Pt as the second two-time career jersey winner of this FTOPS.

Here are the complete results from the final table of Event #20:

1st: Steve “UFman2″ Burkholder ($102240.40)
2nd: Aaron “SaulGood” Surbeck ($85,000.00)
3rd: SmokeChoke ($54,378.20)
4th: TIGR778 ($40,923.80)
5th: David “muckducks” Cairns ($28,590.60)
6th: LuckyLukeKK ($19,060.40)
7th: 007-0253 ($12,893.80)
8th: Shyam “S_Dot111″ Srinivasan ($8,969.60)
9th: Tarsis ($6,727.20)

The late event of the day was Event #21, a $300 + $22 6-handed Razz event hosted by Nick Schulman. The 493 people who decided they wanted to spend their Friday night playing short-handed Razz were not enough to meet the $150,000 guarantee and Full Tilt had to throw in an overlay of $3,100. The Red Pros had an exceptional showing, with Chris Ferguson (47th), Thomas Bihl (45th), Luis Velador (17th) and “Miami” John Cernuto (11th) all making it to the money. Other notable finishes include “rumprammer” (51st), Dan “imabigkidnow” Kelly (39th) and Yuval “yuvee04″ Bronshtein (19th).

With the elimination of Frank “Gator93″ Hernandez in 6th place and the bets getting astronomically big, the final five players decided to make a deal based on chip counts that guaranteed at least $16,655.09 to all of them, with the biggest payout going to 4th place finisher, “Moleon,” who netted $19,240.48. Runner-up “fulltiltok” got the next biggest sum, while the event’s champion, “BaDnEws216” had the third largest payout of the night with $18,060.17.

Here are the complete results from Event #21:

1st: BaDnEws216 ($18,060.17)
2nd: fulltiltok ($19,217.17)
3rd: NES_Pro ($17,277.00)
4th: Moleon ($19,240.48)
5th: Sensor ($16,655.09)
6th: Frank “Gator93″ Hernandez ($5,400)

Welcome to the BLUFF Daily Buzz, where we scour the entire internet for all the latest news in and around the world of poker. If it involves chips and cards, or people known to associate with chips and cards, we’re there.

Sebok cracks a million - Twitter followers, that is

Monty Brewster had to spend money like a drunken sailor to get his first million; Joe Sebok only had to post his thoughts 140 characters at a time.

Sebok has been on the forefront of the Twitter revolution for some time now, gathering plenty of attention from outlets like the New York Times for PokerRoad’s work with Twitter during this year’s WSOP. The guys who run the show at Twitter repaid Sebok with a spot on its list of suggested feeds for users to follow, which has led to people who don’t know anything about poker knowing all about Joe Sebok. A lot of them, in fact.

One meeeeeel-yun followers!

The UltimateBet-sponsored player’s Twitter feed crossed the one-million-followers mark today and continues to climb higher, making him more popular on the microblogging service than more mainstream celebrities like Paris Hilton (978,000 followers), TV personal finance maven (and Kristen Wiig impression fodder) Suze Orman (917,000 followers), and UFC president Dana White (763,000).

You can find Joe Sebok’s Twitter feed, along with plenty of your other favorite poker players, on our Poker Tweets page.

Tweet of the day

Speaking of Twitter, here’s a great one from one of my favorite poker tweeters, Erik Seidel:

My kids think the website and book, “Stuff White People Like” is my unauthorized biography.

Tom "durrrr" Dwan is now a poker blogger

A won-durrrr-ful blog

Online poker fanboys, prepare to spend a little time getting to know one of your favorite players a little bit better: Tom “durrrr” Dwan has a new blog.

The newly named Full Tilt pro dishes on plenty of topics in his catch-all first post, titled Hiya, including his recent European travels, his love of skydiving, and a helicopter ride with Patrik Antonius and Phil Ivey:

We were heading to what I thought was a Jay-Z concert with Coldplay opening, however in the UK, it was the other way around… news that Patrik and I were not very happy to hear.  As way bigger Jay-Z fans, both of us were pretty sad about his shorter set… I thought Patrik was gonna head-butt someone. I wasn’t quite as bothered as he was, but was still pretty disappointed. Regardless, the show was still super sweet.  The funniest part of the night was when the helicopter landed in a huge soccer field, and some kids supposedly thought Phil was Jay-Z, which is hilarious if true.

Dwan also mentions his recent heads-up matches with “Isildur1,” noting that “there have been some huge swings because of both of our aggressive styles.” He doesn’t go into more detail, though; it looks you’ll have to come back next month to learn more about what it feels like to dump $2.9 million to a mysterious Swede without blinking.

(Official Poker Blog of Tom “durrrr” Dwan)

Gambling is bad, mmm-kay?

Well, that didn’t take long

With all the mainstream coverage of Joe Cada’s WSOP triumph, you knew it wouldn’t be long before somebody used the 21-year-old champ as their own personal soapbox. Today’s example comes from the Detroit Free Press, which published an editorial by former Michigan attorney Michael Burke, the author of a book called Never Enough: One Lawyer’s True Story of How He Gambled His Career Away. (Axe to grind much, Monsieur Burke?)

Cada attributes his success in poker to the skill he has honed over the course of playing a million hands, a fact that Burke uses as a jumping-off point for an anti-poker rant which demonstrates that Burke either has little understanding of the game or is hiding his understanding in order to make his desired point, which seems to boil down to “gambling is bad, mmm-kay?”:

Most poker players live under the illusion, or delusion, that the game relies primarily on skill. They will tell you their success is based on their ability to understand and apply certain mathematical probabilities and on their skill at detecting any sign given by another player that might serve as a clue to that player’s hand. Of course, those who play poker online have little opportunity to refine their skill in understanding these “tells.”

To buttress their position that poker is a game of skill, most players will never use the term “bad luck.” Instead, when a player loses, you will hear that player say he had a “bad beat.” The 40th annual World Series of Poker attracted 6,494 poker players. Some 648 players received prizes. I can assure you that every one of the 5,846 players who lost their buy-in fee of $10,000 will have a story of how they lost due to a bad beat.

Instead of talking about the fact that large numbers of the players in the Main Event field have won their seats through satellite tournaments, Burke prefers to cling to the illusion that every one of them has ponied up the cash on his own by painting a picture of “the unemployed auto worker who removed the final $10,000 out of the family savings, or the gamblers who invaded their dwindling pensions and IRAs, or the mothers and fathers who raided their children’s college funds.” Rather than speaking of personal responsibility and acknowledging free will, much less acknowledging the reality of how so many people get their WSOP seats, Burke blames the existence of gambling itself for the problems of his nameless, faceless examples.

Columns like Burke’s are thrown together hastily whenever a poker story gets widespread attention, so it’s a good thing the game has achieved enough of a mainstream following that people recognize the skill involved in making solid decisions at the table time after time. Otherwise, people might actually buy in to his kind of fluff.

(Know when to fold ‘em: Before you start - Detroit Free Press)