WSOP 2006 begins

The 2006 World Series of Poker has begun. You can follow the whole thing at PokerPages if you like. I went down to the Rio today and got the grand tour.

If you haven’t been there, the tournament takes place in a wing of Rio ballrooms. There are 208 tables, with tournament, satellite, and live action games going on. To give you some perspective, a largish poker room might have 50 or 60 tables. The average Strip casino has about 80-100 table games, period. It’s already bustling, with more sign-ups than table space. I can only imagine the pandemonium when the final tournament starts.

This is the first year I’ve seen corporate sponsorship really take off, with Milwaukee’s Best Light featured prominently throughout the room (bullpen? arena? neither seems right). If you don’t know, they’ve sewed up the “presented by” rights. Corum watches, who are the official watchmakers of the WSOP, are also well-represented in signage, along with PartyPoker.Net (on all the tables) and a few others.

The first series I went to was in 2002, which is pretty late in the game, but I’ve still seen some tremendous changes. The tournament has far outgrown “Benny’s Bullpen.” I don’t know if it would have been physically possible to have it at the former Horseshoe this year. I doubt it. Even the relatively spacious, high-ceilinged ballroom was feeling a little crowded, and it’s just th e first week.

Naturally, I collected a raft of materials to educate future generations–they’ll be placed alongside the existing Binion’s Horseshoe collection, which documents the Series through 2004.

A quick site note: I’ll be out of town through next Thursday, so don’t expect too much in the way of postings. Along the way, though, I’ll be checking out the Borgata expansion, the Pier at Caesars (if it’s open) and of course more pizza from the Baltimore Grill than is advisable for someone training for a marathon.