Friday Poker News for August 13th

Posted by AlCantHang | Filed under Bloggers on the Rail

It’s been a great week in the poker world with FTOPS drawing huge fields to the tables, cash games are running at the insane levels, and ESPN began broadcasting the 2010 WSOP Main Event. There were plenty of stories throughout the week and here are five that caught my attention, details after the jump.

1. FTOPS XVII cruising right along. Brandon Adams represents Full Tilt with a win and Mike “chapmoney” Chappus is the first double winner this series.

2. The NFL withdraws it’s opposition to HR 2267.

3. Doubles Poker Championship debuts this weekend on the GSN network.

4. High stakes poker games on Full Tilt continue to run hot.

5. Phil Laak takes a bad beat, on an ATV.

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1. As documented earlier in the week, Brandon Adams became just the 6th Full Tilt red letter pro to capture an FTOPS title. His victory came in Event #14 playing some fine Omaha/8 along the way, Andrew “Browndog19″ Brown was his toughest competition at the final table. One of our newest red letter pros, James “Flushy” Dempsey made a deep run to 11th.

Mike “chapmoney” Chappus became the first player to capture two FTOPS titles this series. He started off well by winning Event #3 and added to his total in Event #24, both No Limit Hold’em tournaments. Yuval “yuvee04″ Brohnstein (FTOPS IX) and “Halfrek” (FTOPS VIII) are the only two other players to accomplish this feat before. Brohnstein doing it with back-to-back tournament victories.

2. The National Football League has always been one of the more vocal opponents to any sort of online gaming, the generally oppose anything which they have zero control over. This week they withdrew their opposition to Barny Frank’s HR 2267 (Internet Gambling Regulation, Consumer Protection, and Enforcement Act) after language was changed in the bill concerning online sports betting.

This is a definite boost to the chances of the bill passing. It’s always better to have the NFL on your side instead of the other way around.

3. Full Tilt’s Doubles Poker Championship will begin airing this Saturday at 9pmET on the Game Show Network here in the states. An interesting format of tag-team poker with some of the best players on the planet including Phil Ivey, Tom “durrrr” Dwan, Howard Lederer, Annette Obrestad, Jenn Harman, Phil Hellmuth, Chris Ferguson, Annie Duke, and many others with Lacey Jones acting as host. The $50,000 buyin tournament took place at the Golden Nugget.

4. The nosebleed cash games on Full Tilt continued the crazy action from last week. It looks like Phil Ivey was the big winner over the last few days with several 6-digit sessions. Also involved in some of the crazy action was Tom “durrrr” Dwan, Gus Hanson, Cole South, and David Benefield. We’re still waiting on the completion of the “durrrr Challenge” with Patrik Antonius but there are already rumblings about the next one to challenge Dwan. Most of the big action has been occurring at the PLO tables but also a little in the 7-game mix as well. You can track when your favorite players are online using the links below.

durrrr Challenge stats page
“Full Tilt See Who’s Online

5. Phil Laak decided to take a little vacation in Oregon with some friends and came away with more than he bargained. Thanks to Twitter, the world knew Laak was in an ATV accident quicker than regular media. It seems Laak went ass of tea kettle while tooling around on a 4-wheeler causing damage to his arm and receiving facial lacerations.

The world found out via Twitter when Laak send the following updates. Be warned before clicking on the pictures, they aren’t pretty. Laak is back in Vegas and on the road to recovery.

Atv accident, massive arm injury and lacerations to eye in oregon. Life is good http://twitpic.com/2byjbo

And this one is in Vegas airport two days into my recovery. Will be in my bed in LA in a few hrs. http://twitpic.com/2cjgs

Tags: AlCantHang, Bloggers on the Rail, Brandon Adams, FTOPS, Phil Ivey