Sunday $500K

This morning I decided to use up 5,000 Full Tilt Points by playing in a SNG where the winner gets an entry into Sunday's $500K. As luck would have it, I took it down and now face the prospect of playing in my first "big" online MTT.

ROI

lightning36 asks :

I saw your Waffles vs Chad ROI comment. Is there an explanation for the math that even a former social sciences major can understand??

We multiply each month's (1+ROI) as seen below. As a point of reference, I experienced my last positive ROI month in March, 2004 (8.35%).

The Myth of the Huge Field - Part II

Thanks to TripJax for his cogent comments. The next step is to set up a model and run some simulations, so that we can dispel this myth forever. The model is simplistic and does not take into account increasing blind structures, chip stacks or any other idiosyncrasies of a tournament. Nevertheless, I believe the results are just as valid.

I used the following assumptions :

1. For each hand on each table there is a 0.001 probability that one player will be eliminated.

2. There are 10 players per table and the tables are kept as equal as possible.

3. Play is hand for hand.

4. As per WSOP practice, 10% of the field gets paid.

5. Play is halted when the bubble is eliminated.

The results are that the expected number of hands played till the bubble is eliminated is independent of the size of the field. So cashing in a WSOP event is just as impressive if the field is 800 or 8,000. As for winning the bracelet, now that's a different story.

The Myth of the Huge Field - Part I

In a recent article in Card Player, we read about an online player who finished 812th (out of a field of 8773) in the 2006 WSOP main event, or just in the money, for a prize of $15k.

Last year he plowed through nearly 8,000 players and cashed for a respectable $15,000 while taking his first shot at the coveted world championship crown.

Now I'm sure that there's no better feeling than making the money in a WSOP event. But what's this about "plowing through nearly 8,000 players"? Did he really plow through 8,000 players? Is there any significant difference between finishing 812th out of a field of 8,773 or 406th out of 4,386 players? Or 203rd out of 2,193 for that matter? How does the increasing field size translate into actual extra play?

Note that I'm talking about finishing just in the money, not making the final table.

Worst beat ever

It was the worst bad beat I have ever witnessed. Doris McFuddle, a 26-year-old lab assistant from Wichita, Kansas, busted out of the WSOP Ladies' Event when her quad queens were taken down by a royal flush. A distraught McFuddle is pictured below as she scurries from the Rio in tears.