Phil Ivey Poker and how he plays

Almost everyone agrees that Phil Ivey is among the best poker players on the planet. This is up for debate, as many players would tell you he’s perhaps best at ring games, but he’s not one of the greatest when it comes to tourneys. Needless to say, everyone can agree that Phil Ivey is one of the best on the planet and we all wish we could play some Phil Ivey Poker.

How did Phil Ivey get to the point he’s at now? Well, if you talk to Phil Ivey himself he’ll tell you it’s because he practices and practices and practices some more. When he’s not playing poker, he’s thinking about it. Phil Ivey will tell you the exact words he told me: “Play a lot, and when you’re not playing, think a lot about the game.”. So how can you become one of the big poker greats? It takes a certain kind of person to become one of the biggest greats. There’s lots of good books regarding the secrets to making a living with poker.

Any individual can play poker. You’d be surprised, anyone can make a good living playing poker. It takes a certain kind of personality to become one of the biggest greats. Whether those personality traits be patience, a cool temper, dedication or all of the above, you need a little something that many ordinary folks may not have.

Keep playing poker and keep studying the game and you’ll start making a comfortable living whether it be with your own style or Phil Ivey poker.

So what exactly is Phil Ivey poker? Well, it’s a certain style of play. If you’ve watched much poker on television you’ve probably noticed that Phil Ivey has a unique aggressive/random play style. A lot of players try to avoid getting into pots with Phil completely. Not just because he’s one of the greats, but because they know that it’s extremely hard to play against such an aggressive style of play unless you actually hit something on the flop or get lucky on the turn or river.

Phil Ivey poker is a great way to play poker in all variations. If there’s one television poker giant we would suggest studying and if not mimicking, it would be Phil Ivey. There’s no doubt the other poker giants are great players. But it’s no mistake that Phil Ivey is so widely respected among poker players and watchers alike.

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Los nueve finalistas de izquierda a derecha: James Akenhead, Jeff Shulman, Phil Ivey, Antoine Saout, Darvin Monn, Joe Cada, Steven Begleiter, Kevin Schaffel y Eric Buchman

Así se llaman a los 9 jugadores que consiguen llegar a la mesa final del Main event, estaba compuesta por jugadores muy buenos, pero la mayoría poco conocidos de cara al público exceptuando a Phil Ivey, uno de los mejores jugadores del mundo que por fin consiguió hacerse con un sitio en la preciada mesa final del Main event. Darvin Moon, un leñador de Washington, llegaba a la mesa final como cheap leader en fichas ( 58.930.000 fichas), pero claramente el jugador con menos experiencia de los 8 restantes y esto le paso factura, ya que realizo algunos movimientos desastrosos. Eric Buchman se hacía un sitio en la mesa final en segunda posición (34.800.000 fichas). Es problamente el jugador más consolidado de los nueve por detrás de Philp Ivey. Steven Bengleiter, es otro de los jugadores con menos experiencia , aunque llegó en una tercera posicición muy comoda para jugar(29.885.000 fichas). Otro de los jugadores más conocidos de la mesa final era Jeff Shulman, presidente de la revista “CardPlayer Magazine“, que se mostró un jugador muy estable en el torneo y llegó a la final table en cuarta posición(19.580.000 fichas) y siendo uno de los maximos favoritos a llevarse el preciado brazalete. En quinta posición( 13.215.000 fichas), llegó el futuro campeón del mundo, Joe Cada, que tras empezar muy corto en fichas, la suerte se puso de su lado y se llevó los 8.546.435 de dólares. En sexta posición (12,390,000 fichas) se encontraba el jugador de Florida, Kevin Shaffel. Phil Ivey por fin consiguió hacerse un hueco en el “november nain”y llegó el séptimo en fichas con 9.765.000. Realizó un juego muy solido jugando las manos más seguros. Un ejemplo de ello fue el fold preflop que realizó después de un re-raise del jugador francés Antonie Scoat ha su subida inicial. Phil se foldeó JJ frente a los 77 del francés. Además quedo eliminado tras un duro Bad Beat contra Darvin Moon, al acabar all in preflop (AK de Ivey y AQ De Moon). La Q apareció en el flop. Antonie Saout, un jugador muy sólido y para mi, el que se mereció ganar el Main Event. Llegó a la mesa final en optava posición (9.500.000 fichas) y poco a poco consiguió hacerse con un stack muy importante, tanto que se llegó a poner cheap leader. Pero la mala suerte se apoderó del pobre jugador francés, ya que en dos manos quedó eliminado de la final. Joe cada en ciega pequeña hace un raise con 22 al que contestá Scoat con un Re-raise con QQ. El futuro campeón del mundo tras unos segundos de dudas, decide pushear y Scoat con mucha rapidez hace el call. Se hizo un silencio profundo en el pabellón antes de que el croupier sacará el flop. Para la sorpresa de todos, apareció un dos que cambiaba mucho las cosas para Joe, ya que de estar eliminadó pasaba a consolidarse como lider en fichas. Scoat, incredulo, simplemente negó con la cabeza y siguió jugando. La siguiente mano, esta conformada por los mismos protagonistas que la anterior, Antonie Saout y Joe Cada,que  acaban All in pre-flop con 88 y AK  respectivamente. Hasta el turn todo iba bien para Antonie y sus ochos, que resistian el flip, pero el river trajó la desgracia para el francés en forma de K que le dejaba eliminado de la final. Por último, el short stack de la final era, James Akenhead(6.800.000), un jugador con mucha paciencia y muy habil.

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As if one superstar poker playe with theinitials P.Ivey wasn’t enough along come the second and what an impression this young Sweedish player has made!

(live-PR.com) – LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM — (Marketwire) — 11/16/09 — PKR.com player ‘PatIvey’ has gone down in PKR history after producing a performance which saw him claim back-to-back Masters titles.

A first in the tournament’s history, the 25 year old Swede claimed the coveted PKR Masters crown twice in consecutive months- scooping a huge $60,000 in the process. He then returned for a third month and despite making the final table with the chip lead, just missed out on the hat-trick – bringing home $11,250 for third place, and bowing out to Russian ‘ShatokhinNikita’.

On top of that impressive feat, ‘PatIvey’ continued his good run, with a Saturday Big Shot victory for $7,800 as well as a win in a $10,000 Guaranteed Prime Time Poker : http://www.pkr.com/en/ tournament.

Read our PKR Review and claim 30% of your PKR Rake Back right here.

Nothing excites young poker fans more than an unknown player emerging from nowhere to take on the big guns.

The classic example of such a player is Phil Hellmuth, who was a new name for many when he became world champion in 1989.

But the rise of internet poker has added a new dimension to the journey of the challenger – complete anonymity, save for a screen name.

The daily grind

As soon as a new name sits down at the same online table as Phil Ivey, Patrik Antonius or one of the many other high-stakes pros, speculation begins as to his or her identity.

Occasionally it will emerge that the player in question is a regular in mid-stakes cash games who has decided to ‘take a shot’ at the big time.

Of course, such a decision is a huge gamble for most players, but they could do worse than taking a leaf out of Tom Dwan’s book.

Despite appearances, Tom Dwan is one of the most successful poker players around

Dwan, known online as ‘durrrr’, started out with a bankroll of $50 and played $6 tournaments to build this up to an amount which he could take to the cash tables.

He patiently decided to grind his way up the stakes, before taking on the big names only after attaining plenty of cash-game experience.

And look at him now. At just 23 years of age, durrrr is the newest member of Team Full Tilt, entitling him to a percentage of the lucrative Full Tilt Poker company and ensuring he will probably never have to worry about money again in his life.

But how much did you lose?

Dwan claims that he has never gone broke in all his time playing poker, despite reported seven-figure downswings, but who knows if the same can be said for some of the other youngsters who flirt with celebrity and poker immortality.

Within weeks of sitting down with $250,000 at a high-stakes online cash table, even a few days’ absence from the tables can lead to an online ‘superstar’ being ‘confirmed busto’ by the often-unforgiving Two Plus Two forums.

The latest to try their luck goes by the name of ‘Isildur1’, but who knows how long he (or she) will last before being replaced by another magnet for applause and abuse.

Online poker is a fickle business.

Danger is my middle name

It seems as though the gamble doesn’t pay off for a number of young pretenders, but the few who succeed are in line for huge rewards and even greater acclaim.

One prime example is Di ‘Urindanger’ Dang, who won the biggest pot in the history of online poker when his pocket aces defeated the pocket kings of none other than durrrr.

Di Dang (right) and his brother Hac (middle) are two online pros who have proven to be no flash in the pan

And many other online whizzkids have adapted their skills to the live game, with Matt Graham and Matt Hawrilenko winning bracelets at this year’s World Series of Poker and Joe Cada taking down the Main Event title.

With all these success stories, no wonder they keep coming back.

If you’re a poker fan, then you probably already know Joe Cada won the 2009 World Series of Poker Main Event.  In addition to the bracelet, Cada earned 8.5 million for his first place finish.  Cada beat 6,493 other players to win the main event, including a final table with Phil Ivey.  I listened to a good portion of the event live on the internet before watching portions of Tuesday’s broadcast on ESPN.  It is very surprising to me that excitement surrounding the WSOP continues to grow.  2009 saw record fields, including an infamous day 1d in the main event that turned away hundreds of players.

I was rooting for Phil Ivey to win the main event.  Ivey is widely regarded as the best poker player in the world.  An Ivey win would have helped further the argument made by the Poker Players Alliance (and others) that poker is indeed a game of skill.  Instead, poker enthusiasts were treated to their worst nightmare:  suck out after suck out on a global stage.  Phil Ivey was knocked out by Darvin Moon when his Ace-King couldn’t hold against Moon’s Ace-Queen.  Kevin Schaffel was knocked out in eighth place with Aces when Eric Buchman’s Kings improved to a set of Kings on the flop and quads on the turn.  Steven Begleiter was eliminated holding Queens by Moon’s Ace-Queen when an Ace hit on the river.  If you were rooting for anyone other than Moon or Cada you probably felt like someone punched you in the gut at least once during the final table.

Hopefully the non-enthusiasts won’t let a few bad beats taint their views of poker.  Support has been building:

• H.R. 2267 the Internet Gambling Regulation, Consumer Protection, & Enforcement Act of 2009 now has 62 cosponsors
• Congressional Joint Tax Committee recently reported that licensing and regulation of Internet gaming would produce up to $41 billion in revenue over 10 years
• S.1597 the Internet Poker and Games of Skill Regulation, Consumer Protection, and Enforcement Act was introduced by Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ) in August of this year

The dark cloud on the horizon is the December 1st deadline for regulatory compliance of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA).  Online players have already begun reporting letters from their banks warning of the coming deadline.  Too soon to tell how this will change the poker landscape, if at all.

It would be a hard task to try to market some of the guys at the final table of the WSOP.  The chip leader to begin the final table, Darvin Moon, was a logger from Maryland and doesn’t quite hit the heartthrob level with the ladies. The winner of this year’s main event Joe Cada, looks like he is permanently smelling dog crap or an extremely nasty whiff of gas.  Watching nine men sit around a table is only good for so long, so my suggestion to the committee for next year’s main event, rig it so Vanessa Rousso is in it.  Rousso is a top poker pro, a Go-Daddy girl, and has done some photos for Sports Illustrated’s always popular swimsuit edition.  If Vanessa Rousso was at your final table next year, your ratings would go through the roof. If not, I will still watch to see nine people try to compete it out for the biggest prize in the world. But nine dudes, doesn’t quite do it for me.

The World Series of Poker is surprisingly still very big around the country, and could be bigger with Rousso as a spokesman.  A few years ago, there was a giant boom, and people everywhere were playing poker after Chris Moneymaker made an improbable run to win the WSOP main event bracelet and claim 2.5 million dollars.  Since then the first place prized as seen amounts as high as over 12 million (won by Jamie Gold).  The WSOP lets ordinary people like Moneymaker and this year’s winner, Joe Cada (8.5 mil) a chance to not only win the biggest event in poker, but to change their lives completely. Pros, amateurs, men, and women are all on the same level, what other sport can offer you that?  A pro hasn’t won the main event since Carlos Mortensen in 2001.

Tuesday night, the final two hour episode of this year’s WSOP’s main event was aired. And when I found the ratings I was surprised to see over nine hundred thousand houses tuned into the first hour, and over one million tuned in to the second half.  I thought poker was dying. I love playing poker, and I don’t mind watching it televised from time to time, but I know that the final table is a must see event.  Thousands of fans would scream after every hand was completed, and every hand they showed on television was actually quite intense.  Of course the dealer could just quickly put down the cards, but what fun would that be? They drag the suspense out. Even with the bad commentary throughout the program, the WSOP final table is something I recommend watching if you like poker. But let’s all cross our fingers for Rousso to make the final table next year, that would be a plus, and with her increasing success over the poker world, its not too far off.

So, after a marathon final table, the World Series of Poker 2009 has come to a close.

Congratulations to Joe Cada, who – at 21 – has become the youngest player to claim the world title.

But it was not easy for Cada to break Peter Eastgate’s record. He had to survive 17-and-a-half hours of play just to reach the final two.

And, despite holding a dominant lead over Darvin Moon after eliminating Antoine Saout in 3^rd, the pendulum swung back and forth over the 86 hands of heads-up play before Joe’s pocket nines held against Darvin’s queen-jack of diamonds.

World champion Joe Cada is mobbed by his team of supporters

It marked the end of a remarkable comeback for Cada, who was down to under 2.3 million in chips at one stage during the final table.

But the 21-year-old managed to fight back with a lot of nerve and a bit of luck to take the crown.

A long and winding road

In the lead-up to the final table, all the talk was of Phil Ivey, and whether he could reaffirm his tag as the best player in the world by taking the title.

It was not to be, however, as Moon got lucky when his ace-queen outdrew Ivey’s ace-king to send the Vegas pro packing in seventh place.

Phil Ivey hoped to be celebrating an eighth WSOP bracelet, but at 32 his chance will surely come again

Before Ivey’s exit, two other players had hit the rail after two very different aces-vs-kings encounters.

First out was James Akenhead. After having his chip-stack decimated when his kings ran into Kevin Schaffel’s aces, Cada finished him off to send the Londoner home $1.2million richer.

The next to follow was Schaffel himself. He looked to have put himself back in contention to win the event when he moved all-in with aces again and got a call from Eric Buchman’s kings.

But if the king on the flop wasn’t demoralising enough, Buchman made four of a kind on the turn to end the 52-year-old Floridian’s dream of Main Event success.

And then there were six

Following Ivey out of the door was Steve Begleiter. The former Bear Stearns exec was few people’s favourite to win after making some questionable plays en route to the November Nine, but he seemed to have improved his game after receiving coaching from multiple WPT champion Jonathan Little.

And ‘Begs’ was hugely unlucky in a hand against Saout, where he made a wonderful call on the flop with second pair against the Frenchman’s flush draw only for Saout to leave the New Yorker drawing dead after a third heart hit the turn.

To compound his ill-fortune, he got the last of his chips in with pocket queens against Moon’s ace-queen, but gt outdrawn once again.

Jeff Shulman was unable to emulate his father Barry's success, but he should be pleased with his performance

Next out the door was Jeff Shulman. The 34-year-old pro, who had finished 7th in 2000, didn’t really put a foot wrong throughout the final table. He played a patient game, no doubt influenced by the coaching of former world champion Phil Hellmuth, but it was not his day.

Shulman still managed to get his chips in with the best of it when his pocket sevens led against Saout’s ace-9, but a 9 on the flop ended his main event agonisingly short of the $8.5million first prize.

Crunch time

Eric Buchman must have thought the bracelet was his to lose after his elimination of Schaffel early on, and the New Yorker continued to bide his time and stay out of trouble throughout the early proceedings.

But he opened up his game when the tournament got four-handed, and lost a monster pot with ace-queen against Saout’s ace-king and exited soon after.

Yet again it was a questionable call from Moon which ended a player’s tournament, after the logger’s king-jack outdrew Buchman’s ace-five to send the 30-year-old back to New York with over $2.5million.

With three players left, Saout was most onlookers’ favourite to claim the crown, but two pivotal hands sent the chip-leader crashing out in third place. Who knows what would have happened if the Frenchman’s pocket queens had held against Cada’s pocket twos, or if his eights had held against Cada’s ace-king?

Antoine Saout probably deserved better than third place for his play

The final countdown

But in the end that coinflip ended Saout’s main event. He had turned an original stake of $50 into $3.5million, but still had cause to feel disappointed.

And his exit left Moon and Cada to fight it out for the bracelet. At the start of heads-up play Moon’s stack had barely deviated from the $58.93million with which he started the final table, while the chips of the other eight players had somehow all found their way to Cada.

Despite being less than half the age of his opponent, Cada’s greater experience of heads-up play (as well as his chip advantage) made him a strong favourite to defeat Moon, but it was far from easy.

The chip-lead swung back and forth over nearly three hours of play between the two rivals, but in the end Cada edged across the finish line and stepped into poker history.

Joe Cada, a 21 year old college dropout, has outlasted nearly 6,500 participants to defeat Darvin Moon and become the youngest Main Event champion in World Series of Poker history.

From TIME:

On the final hand, Darvin Moon, 45, called an all-in bet from Joe Cada, 21, and with $150 million in chips in the pot — 70% of the chips in play — none of the last five cards paired Moon’s queen-jack; Cada’s pair of nines held up, and he had outlasted 6,494 participants who began play more than four months ago at the Rio All-Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.

From the Associated Press:

Joe Cada bet on gambling instead of college and started playing poker full-time after winning enough to buy a house and justify playing tournaments in far-off places.

The 21-year-old’s wager paid off Tuesday in a way many players only dream when he became the youngest champion ever at the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas.

Cada, from Shelby Township, Mich., says the win and $8.55 million top prize gives him a lot of freedom.

From the AFP:

A 21-year-old college dropout won the World Series of Poker early Tuesday, completing the biggest comeback in the tournament’s history to earn a 8.5 million dollar jackpot.

Joe Cada, the youngest champion in the 40-year history of the game’s richest and most prestigious event, won with a pair of nines after about 90 hands head-to-head against second-place finisher Darvin Moon.

Moon had a queen and jack, and none of the other cards drawn in the Texas Hold ?Em hand improved it.

“I’d like to thank all my fans and my friends,” an emotional Cada told a raucous theater full of supporters in bright-yellow T-shirts bearing his name. Later he told reporters: “It’s really surreal right now.”

Cada squandered a huge lead at the start of play late Monday against 46-year-old Moon before barreling back in a finale of constant betting in which he moved strongly ahead for a time.

It was played before an audience of more than 1,500 people at the Rio Hotel-Casino at a table stacked with bricks of cash. A diamond-encrusted championship bracelet gleamed on the side of the table.

Cada’s triumph was particularly stunning because he was down to just two million chips out of 194.8 million on Saturday but came back to finish as the chip leader.

Congratulations go out to the youngest champion of all-time, Joe Cada.  At 21 years old, he played aggressively at the final table, at times perhaps recklessly.  He put his chips in the middle and ended up with the lesser hand several times, and yet once the river came he was the victor every single time.  He dealt bad beats to several players, especially Frenchman Antoine Saout when they were three-handed, and just saw everything go his way.  He won coinflips, he came back from the brink of defeat when there were nine players remaining, when there were six players remaining, and then when logger Darvin Moon (yes, a logger) almost overwhelmed him heads up.

Cada’s win proves several things.  It proves his own self-worth.  It proves that sometimes luck conquers all…and it proves that nice guys can get rewarded. Rewarded with 8.55 million dollars, that is.  While Phil Ivey may get a ton of the coverage tonight, Cada will get the cash.

Ivey, for his efforts, played very well under the circumstances.  If an allin with Cada which turned out to be a coinflip went his way instead of Cada’s, he’s have had almost 25 million in chips nine-handed and Cada would’ve been gone.  This is tournament poker, where luck tends to decide what happens after skill exits the door.  Instead, Ivey lost that flip and became short-stacked, forced to slowly grind his way back up gathering one blind after another orbit after orbit.  He accomplished that and then lost AK allin against Moon’s AQ.  Such is poker, where the best player often doesn’t win.  No worries for Ivey though, as he almost instantly jumped into the high-stakes on Full Tilt Poker.  Poker fans may not get their Ivey victory, but they’ll enjoy it while he lasts.  The man can console himself with the two other bracelets he won this year and the millions and millions of dollars already in his bank accounts.

Watch tonight on ESPN.

Phil Ivey var en av förhandsfavoriterna i WSOP inför finalbordet trots att han hade en av de minsta stackarna. Phil hade dock ingen bra dag och det mesta gick emot honom när finalbordet väl var igång.

- Det var tufft då jag hade så lite chips från början. Jag var tvungen att vänta och inte ta för stora risker. Jag bluffade i några händer men det var inte så mycket jag kunde göra. Sista handen var såklart olycklig.

I sista handen hade Phil AK mot Darwin Moons AQ. Med en dam på floppen avslutades WSOP 2009 för Phil Ivey som slutade på en sjunde plats.

- Det handlar om att vinna, så givetvis är jag besviken att jag inte gjorde det, men jag är ändå nöjd med hur jag spelade. Det var några saker jag kunde ha gjort anorlunda. Bland annat en hand när Shulman öppnade för 1,2 miljoner, och jag gick all-in. Jag hade KK. Joe Cada hade två tior. Om inte Shulman hade öppnat hade jag nog fått med mig Cada i den handen och dubblat upp. Så vissa saker kunde gått anorlunda. Men nu gjorde de inte det. Det är poker.

Vad säger du om upplevelsen att spela finalbordet?
- Det var en fantastisk upplevelse. Poker har verkligen kommer långt. Jag menar när jag först började spela tittade folk snett på mig när jag berättade att jag spelade poker. Idag är det helt anorlunda. Det är fantastiskt.

När ser vi dig på WSOP:s finalbord igen?
Förmodligen nästa år, avslutar Ivey med ett leende.

Läs mer om Phil Iveys inställning innan WSOP finalen

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After almost 18 hours, Shelby Township’s Joe Cada and Maryland logger Darvin Moon emerged as the final two at the 2009 World Series of Poker’s November 9 final table.
Seven others weren’t so lucky, including poker pro Phil Ivey. The WSOP final table resumes at 10 p.m. PT/1 a.m. ET Monday for Cada vs. Moon for the WSOP main event title.

The only thing I will allow myself to get hooked on when watching tv is sports. There’s nothing good about watching a game when the outcome had already been decided. That’s not to say that I haven’t gotten hooked on any tv show, I just choose to catch those online. Hulu.com is a great site for that. Besides only having limited commercials, I recently found out that some shows can be viewed in high quality. Fringe, a favorite of mine, is probably the best example of a show that definitely merits a tag for “Must watch in higher def.” I believe the highest setting that can be attained is only 480, but still, a show like that looks much sharper and cleaner with all the explosions and other special effects that they use on a normal basis. I didn’t get to watch a lot of college football but there were some great games that kept getting bonus coverage from time to time. Way to go Navy. I used to be a big Notre Dame fan growing, I’m not sure what happened to my affinity for that storied program. I think I just got tired of them…..haha…go figure. My Clemson Tigers did kick some ass yesterday. Seriously, how bad is FSU this year?! You’d think that a few weeks ago these kids could run through walls for coach, after hearing all the stories about Jim Smith asking Bowden to, possibly, step down at the end of the season. And, to top it all off, I was all over a couple of online streams to see how the WSOP final table played on day 1 with the Nov. 9. Reading all the updates for it was just riveting. I was one of the many cheering on Ivey to take this whole thing down. Too bad his A-K went down to A-Q, still, an absolutely sick and insane run. He is THE best, I’d find it hard to argue.

This is just an amazing bluff at the 2008 WSOP Main Event from Phil Ivey against two guys.

A great run by Phil Ivey this year but he came up just short, finishing in 7th place at this year’s main event.

Ivey was eliminated on the first hand after a break late tonight/early this morning by Darvin Moon.

Ivey appeared to have the edge up AK to AQ when Moon his a Queen on the flop. With a 3 on the turn, followed by a 5 on the river, Ivey was eliminated.

Still…a great run by one of the greatest poker players ever!

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The World Series Of Poker also known as the WSOP will continue this weekend with the November 9. The final table has been set and will reconvene on November 7th when these nine players battle for their share of over $27 million. First they will play down until 2 remain. The final 2 will finish play on November 9th and then the event will be broadcast by ESPN on November 10th.

When you see it, you’ll shit bricks.

He can do that because he’s Phil Ivey.  I don’t think the other guy is in the final table.  Phil Ivey is!

But I have to admit, I was disappointed.  I was watching this on TV during dinner when this happened, and I was predicting everyone’s move, and got it right, until Ivey checked and mucked his hand. I was like “Did I miss something? WTF?” I lost my appetite.

On November 7 the World Series Of Poker (WSOP) main event will see its final table come together to battle it out to see who goes home with $8.5 million.

6500 players each forked out $10k to play the main event in July [HERE] and the final 9 have had to wait till now to see who will be crowned champion.

Over at WSOP.com they’ve been running a poll and its no surprise that poker freak Phil Ivey is a massive favourite to come from way behind and prove beyond doubt he’s the best player alive.

Phil is a massive fan favourite getting 78% of the votes. Bookies however dont seem to share the opinions of fans and Betfair.com have given Ivey 7/1 for a win. The current chip leader Darwin Moon is the bookmakers favourite at 3/1 due to his monsterous chip stack.

Some interesting facts about Darwin Moon..he doesn’t own a credit card or have an email address and has never played online poker. He’s a logger from Oakland and won his entry into the main event by winning a $130 buy-in tournament. Its gonna be a sick payday if he wins.

For final table chip counts, player profiles and television broadcast times go to WSOP.com

It has been eight long years since a big name poker player could call himself world champion, when Ecuadorian pro Carlos Mortensen was victorious, but many feel that now is the best chance in a while for a top pro to take down the title.

After Carlos Mortensen's win in 2001, seven successive amateurs were crowned world champion

Sure, Peter Eastgate was a pro with a couple of impressive live cashes when he won it all last year, and Greg Raymer and Joe Hachem have since gone on to achieve great things in the game, but no one had really heard of them at the time.

It’s a different story now, however, with two of the bigger names in poker sitting across from each other on Saturday: Phil Ivey and Jeff Shulman.

Like father, like son?

Jeff Shulman (left) will hope to follow in his father Barry's footsteps and win a World Series bracelet

Some of you may be too young to remember it happening, but Shulman has been here before, reaching the final table in 2000 when he finished 7^th behind Chris ‘Jesus’ Ferguson and scooped a $146,700 prize for his efforts.

And the normally shy and reclusive editor of CardPlayer magazine has changed tack this year, putting his name in the news with his decision to hire former world champion Phil Hellmuth Jr. as his coach.

But neither this, nor his father Barry’s victory at the World Series of Poker Europe, have helped detract attention from Ivey, regarded by many as the best poker player in the world.

The 33-year-old Ivey has already won two WSOP bracelets this year, and this is his fourth top-30 finish in the Main Event since Mortensen’s win in 2001.

He is also a big player on the world tournament and cash game circuits. His brilliant reads and unique style have earned him over $12million in tournament earnings, while he regularly plays for hundreds of thousands of dollars at a time in the ‘big game’ in Bobby’s Room in Las Vegas.

Take a look at this clip for a great example of Ivey’s talent:

you see, there is a reason why he is the 3^rd-favourite with most bookmakers despite only holding just over 5% of the chips in play.

If there was no luck, I’d win every time

If either Ivey or Shulman takes home the gold bracelet at the end of the weekend, then it will potentially do a lot to silence some of poker’s critics.

Many of those opposed to the game see it as gambling and nothing more, grouping it together with games such as blackjack, roulette and craps.

But I hope you will agree that clips such as the one earlier in the thread demonstrate the great level of skill involved in playing poker at the highest level.

If someone like Darvin Moon wins the tournament, after admitting to getting lucky throughout, it will only add fuel to the critics’ fire.

But if either of these two is the last man standing then some may have to swallow their pride a little.

The final nine poker players will square off next Saturday at Noon at the Rio at the final table of the World Series of Poker.  It will conclude when two remain and await the championship. The winner will receive a payout of $8.5 million; ninth place takes home $1.3 million. 

The top four at the Main Event final table will control 75 percent of the chips. 

If you want to take in the action, the Penn & Teller Theater viewing is free to the public to anyone 21 and older. Space allocated on first-come, first-served basis. 

ESPN will air a two-hour telecast on Saturday and Monday’s final table. 

Las Vegas Backstage Access has followed the action and will continue to do so until the end. 

Player standing and stats going into the Main Event: 

1. Darvin Moon, 45, Oakland, MD, $58.9 million (in chips)

2. Erich Buchman, 29, Hewlitt, NY, $34.8 million

3. Steve Begletter, 47, Chappaqua, NY, $29.9 million

4. Jeff Schuman, 34, Las Vegas, NV, $19.6 million

5. Joseph Cada, 21, Shelby Township, MI, $13.2 million

6. Kevin Schaffel, 51, Coral Springs, FLA, $12.4 million

7. Phil Ivey, 32, Las Vegas, NV, $9.8 million

8. Antoine Saout, 25, St. Martine des Champs, France, $9.5 million

9. James Akenhead, 26, London, England, $6.8 million