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Ty Stewart sees Jeffrey Pollack for the first time at 12:40 PM in the hallway outside the Shadow Bar. Ty quickly updates Jeffrey on the status of everything emphasizing the press conference, which Pollack is running. At 12:43, Stewart dons his jacket and walks fast from the Shadow Bar, pulling me along. We’re going to pick up the bracelet.

They call the cage “the desk” in English casinos and that’s where we go, to the first floor, to get the championship bracelet, which is in its large Corum presentation box. Ty carries the box up to the Flame Bar, where he is going to get it ready for its display at the press conference.

He starts by shining it with a cloth he pulls from his pocket. Pollack and Stewart are fanatics about the bracelet. The bracelet is, to their thinking, the physical manifestation of what makes the World Series of Poker special. As long as they protect the bracelet, they are protecting the franchise.

For instance, the question came up of who was the all-time female money winner for the World Series. Annie Duke, with her finish the day before, became the first woman over $1 million. But is she? Do WSOP-Europe earnings count? I think they should. The event is called “World Series of Poker.” The field is definitely “World Series” caliber. The starting chips, blind levels, professionalism of the event (e.g., marketing, tournament operation, buy-in) are what the World Series should be. To me, these European events should definitely count as World Series events. [This also, of course, comes up in “measuring” Annette Obrestad’s earnings.]

But what about Jennifer Harman? Just eight days earlier, in finishing second in the HORSE, she earned £40.688, which is the equivalent of about $81,000. Adding together her $580,000 in World Series earnings plus her $410,000 from a pair of World Series Circuit Main Event cashes, that puts her at $1.07 million, and the HORSE money got her there a week before Annie.

Should the Circuit money count? I know the World Series Circuit events have turned into a developmental tour for the World Series, but that wasn’t the case when Jennifer was kicking butt. ESPN broadcast her Circuit final table for two hours, longer than most World Series bracelet events. Phil Ivey made that final table and other finishers in the money included 2007 WSOP MVP Tom Schneider, Allen Cunningham, T.J. Cloutier, and Tony Ma. In her other WSOP-Circuit cash, among the 18 finishers in the money were Barney Boatman, Chris Ferugson, Chad Brown, Mimi Tran, Nicky Frangos, and Erick Lindgren. These were not minor league lineups. And the buy-ins in both were $10,000.

I made the argument to both Stewart and Pollack and they reached the same conclusion: WSOP-Europe money counts in “World Series of Poker earnings”; WSOP-Circuit money doesn’t. To them, the equation was simple:

WSOP-Europe = bracelet

WSOP-Circuit = no bracelet

[If Jennifer Harman feels somehow slighted, she doesn’t need to. Based on closing exchange rates on Friday, September 14, when Annie Duke went out of the Main Event, her career World Series earnings (including the £30,770 consolation prize for getting eliminated by Annette Obrestad, who took down Jennifer the day before) were $1.006 million. When I checked WorldSeriesofPoker.com today (October 21), Annie had been busted down to $998,629. These ladies can’t catch a break.]

The importance of the bracelet is physical as well as metaphorical. “We don’t put them on. That’s a line we don’t cross. I put on only one, Phil Hellmuth’s, and that was because he let me.”

Finally clean of all fingerprints, Stewart carefully places the bracelet on the velvet pillow. But there’s a problem. The bracelet looks small against the background of the large pillow. Although I’ve heard many players complaining about the new bracelet design, I really like it except for this one shortcoming: it doesn’t convey massiveness. It is elegant and probably more comfortable to wear, but it doesn’t look like a WWF championship belt. Corum set out to design something that specifically DIDN’T look like that, but the one time you need a garish, crude hunk of metal is when you place it on a great big pillow.

Ty puts the pillow aside and instead uses the display box. Even though this is only about a pillow Ty Stewart found in the lobby, this is a regular feature of Harrah’s management of the World Series of Poker. They aren’t afraid to try new things, and they don’t labor over their decisions that don’t work out. They discard them and move on.

The bracelet looks fine in the display box.

Ty tells me about how important it was for this inaugural World Series of Poker-Europe to “feel” like the World Series. This included getting the leading American players to make the trip and almost all of them did. It was especially nice that Phil Hellmuth, Johnny Chan, and Doyle Brunson showed up.

When Doyle was unhappy with his room at the Hampshire, Jeffrey Pollack gave Brunson his suite. Unfortunately for Pollack, upon switching rooms, he agreed that Doyle had a point. So Jeffrey moved to another hotel.

At 1:10 PM, one of the guys from Betfair comes by and mentions the odds the site is going to post on the players at the final table. They are primarily a sports betting site. They aren’t anticipating a lot of action but there’s the synergy. Ty takes the odds sheet.

“Let me talk with Jeffrey about it.”

Stewart and Pollack discuss it briefly in the Asian restaurant upstairs where Jeffrey is conducting a lunch meeting. They conclude it’s okay for Betfair to do this. Betfair is the presenting sponsor but they aren’t operating the tournament. They can’t do anything to control the outcome. It will be made clear that Harrah’s has nothing to do with this. And if Betfair doesn’t make book on the final table, other sites will, and this is, after all, part of their business.

Ty goes back to the Betfair lounge prepared to say yes. For some reason, he thinks there is a £250 limit on wagers and wants the extra assurance that it’s not even a large enough amount for someone to suggest, even unreasonably, that Betfair’s booking of such action could somehow alter the outcome.

But he is incorrect. The Betfair guy tells him, “It’s whatever the size of the bet is that they can get matched.” Stewart decides he better take a look at the web page. Convinced that it’s clear this is unaffiliated with Harrah’s, he gives his approval.

At 1:20 PM, we run into Jack Effel, the tournament director. Ty asks how Jack’s voice is holding out and mentions that he’ll get some breaks. Around this time, he finds out that all nine players have completed their pre-game interviews.

Everything is falling into place with the press conference just ten minutes away and the final table starting within the hour. Standing at the Flame Bar with Stewart and Effel, I see a monitor with the prize breakdown and notice the prize pool amounts to MORE than £10,000 times the number of players in the field.

The “extra money” was the result of two things. First, unlike at the World Series, the juice is charged separate from the buy-in. (Incidentally, the juice was just 3.5%, the kind of number Harrah’s ought to set for the Main Event in Vegas, especially if they are serious about “giving back to the players.”) Second, based on the formula for the prize pool and the number of entries, the first prize would have been about £943,000. To make first prize an even £1 million, Betfair kicked in another £57,000.

That was very nice of Betfair, but that raises one important question: How much would Milwaukee’s Best Lite contribute to the prize pool if they left the girls with the tool belts and skimpy outfits at home?

At 1:30, we go the short distance to the landing by the double-staircase, where the press conference is about to begin.

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