WPT Foxwoods: Can Monaldi Go Wire-to-Wire?

Day 3 play is underway at the WPT Foxwoods Poker Classic and only 22 rounders remain.  Greg Monaldi, the Day 1 leader, maintained the top stack.  He was the only player to start the day with over 1,000,000 in chips.  Monaldi (pictured at right) finished 4th in an earlier Foxwoods Poker Classic event ($1850 NLH), banking $32,536.  Not a bad week for the amateur.

No one else you've likely ever heard of remains in the top 22.  Although there is yet another Nguyen (first name, Van) in contention.

Get full chip counts and live blogging at Poker Wire and/or Card Player.

*Photo from The Hendon Mob database.

Friday Night Parting Shot: Savannah

If 20-year-old Savannah H. from McDonough, Georgia was any cuter she'd be a fluffy little bunny named Peaches, which is ironic because Savannah has a fluffy little bunny named Peaches. This self-described country girl loves her cowboy boots and is currently a college student while part-timing at her Grandpa's hardware store. Yes, you heard right. She's a 20-year-old, blonde-hair, brown-eyed, cowboy boot wearin' Georgia girl named Savannah who has a bunny named Peaches, goes to college and works part-time in her gramp's hardware store.

Where do we find these girls? Just sounds too good to be true?

In a way it is. You see, before you make plans to hop on the next plane down to Atlanta and roll on over to McDonough, you should know that sweet Savannah is, as they like to say down here, already spoken for. And since we're nice guys we'll even pimp her beau, Danny Moore, who's a singer/songwriter down in these here neck o' the woods. You can see where he's playing and check out a tune or two over at www.dannymooremusic.com.

But enough about lucky Danny. When we asked Savannah if she plays poker, she said, "I hardly ever have time to play poker, but I love it!"

And while her love of poker is certainly a plus, let's just say she had us at "a fluffy little bunny named Peaches."

If you're looking for Savannah over at MySpace, be warned that she's set her profile on private, and probably for good reason, 'cause as Chops likes to say "MySpace is creepy." And if you go there and it says her age is 14, don't worry we haven't lost our minds. On MySpace that is the only way to make your profile private (and again for good reason), and we do know for a fact that Savannah is 20 as she lives just down the way from the WCP office and we were lucky enough to meet her before this whole "Parting Shot" series got underway. So while you may not be able to see her full profile online or photos like the one where she's dressed as a pirate for Halloween, we will share with you a Jeff Foxworthy-like tidbit (this is Georgia now) she has up on her blog entitled "Ya Might be from Georgia If"....it's posted after the jump, along with a pic of Peaches.

Foxwoods, Godsmack and Tony Bennett

The 2006 Foxwoods Poker Classic got underway yesterday with 431 players in the field and a WPT title and $1,331,889 first-place cash at stake. While a number of pros stayed behind in Vegas getting ready for the Five-Star Classic, many familiar names were in the field including some of the new youngin's finding success over the past year like 24-year-old Brad Kondracki (8th - 2005 WSOP ME), 21-year-old Josh "Sdouble" Schlein (2nd - WPT Aruba Poker Classic) and '12-year-old' Nick Schulman, who's back at Foxwoods after becoming the WPT's youngest champion there at last November's World Poker Finals.

Bombshell Poker, Why Not...

With our weekly parting shot, Friday has turned somewhat into a female appreciation day here at Wicked Chops Poker, so let's give a story from earlier in the week. Its' just due.

Briefly mentioned on Tuesday in our Evelyn Ng goes to Bodog post, believe it or not, another new online site has launched and...wait wait!!!...don't go!!!...before you stop reading we promise it'll be worth your while...wait!!!...waaaiiit!!!...ok...another new online site has launched and this one promises to be the "sexiest" around.

Meet the girls of Bombshell Poker.

A press release from the company claims that, "Bombshell Poker offers an endless supply of 'models by day, professional poker players by night.'"

So please, play Bombshell Poker. Because if Bombshell ends up being a bomb, then these girls may end up being professional- something-elses by night if you catch our drift.

You just couldn't do that to the Costello twins, could you?

Although with promotions like, "Win-a- Date with a Bombshell" and giving users the ability to "email the girls directly," maybe they're moving in that direction already.  If Trischelle ends up as a "babe" over the next few months we may just know for sure.

More Bombshell babes at the jump...

The Grinder Chats + People Still Think Online Poker is Rigged

Two-time WPT title winner Michael "The Grinder" Mizrachi chatted up ESPN.com readers yesterday.  Mizrachi revealed that "The Grinder" nickname actually started as his online handle years ago.  Also revealing was that people still think online poker sites are rigged.  Grinder was late for the chat (a ghost in the machine?), so FOWCP Andrew Feldman held down the fort and was barraged with conspiracy theories on online poker (something tells us Jeremy from Birmingham has had to make more than a few Firepay deposits in his account recently), to which we had some thoughts on as well. Excerpts below:

Jeremy (Birmingham, AL): Andrew - Have you ever heard the term "pot-building" in regards to online sites dealing out drawing cards at the same time as strong hands on purpose in order to encourage the players to bet and call all the way down, thus increasing the size of the pot and subsequently the size of the rake? And if so, do you think that it is true?

Jeremy (Birmingham, AL): Andrew- Have you ever noticed that the number of bad beats online seems to be much greater than in real game play? Do you believe that online sites increase the number of bad beats so they get a bigger rake?

Chops (Wicked Chops Poker): Have you heard that online poker sites killed JFK and hid the aliens that crashed in Roswell, NM?

Andrew Feldman: Good old chops. Check out their poker site, usually has some good information, and if not information, maybe something else..: http://www.wickedchopspoker.com

Check out the full chat transcript on ESPN's Poker Club.

New Bond Attracts Gay Men, Knows Jack Squat About Poker

(editorial note: If you'd rather just see photos of Sienna Miller, Eva Green and Caterina Murino than read about how the new James Bond is a 'wuss,' 'poof' and 'skirt,' scroll down and click 'continue reading...')

Remember when Wicked Chops Poker almost changed it's name to Wicked Chops Baccarat after hearing that the new Bond film was going to be Casino Royale, which, at least in the book by the same name, had James Bond saving the world in a game of Baccarat?

As we said back then, "Seriously, think of all the teens around the world who will dream of one day becoming the world champ in baccarat after they see the new Bond flick."

Alright, maybe that doesn't ring a bell.

Oh wait, remember that post that had like 5 photos of Brit hottie Sienna Miller, who was also reportedly shagging the new James Bond, Daniel Craig, when she wasn't off bonking Jude Law?

OK, as we were saying, we learned back then that the new Bond film was actually scrapping Baccarat for some funny sounding card game called Texas Hold'em (Why Texas? Hold what? Why the use of an apostrophe?). Well, ever since that announcement, Craig has run into some heavy criticism from Bond fans who think he's just not 007 material. First, word got out that he chipped a tooth during a fight scene (wuss) and then rumors circulated that he suffered heat rash in the Bahamas (poof) and finally we heard that he could only drive automatic cars (skirt).

But most damningly, the British tabloids now report that the new Bond doesn't know how to play poker?

Seriously. No joke.

A source told The Sun newspaper: "Daniel could not play cards - it was so funny. It is a critical part of the film, where Bond shows how cool a customer he is. But it was frustratingly ridiculous how long it took to teach the cast how to play or behave at a poker table."

"Everyone at the hotel has been laughing about a Bond who can't play cards."

Or drive a stick. Or take a punch. Or knows that in warm, humid weather you're suppose to wear loose-fitting, light clothing, such as natural fabrics like cotton that allow the skin to sweat more efficiently than synthetics.

And to make things worse, Craig also just admitted that he's more of a gay magnet than chick draw.

"I was out recently and all these gay guys were over me like a rash, but they never ask about the Bond plot," said Craig.

Kind of like that heat rash you got down in the Bahamas, wasn't it?

But things aren't so bad for Craig. His two co-stars are Eva Green and Caterina Murino. Eva, in case you don't know, is the French temptress who starred in the movie The Dreamers, in which she played a young naked girl who was naked for two hours, as far as we can remember. If you didn't see it, you can watch clips here and here but be warned they're the kind of clips you don't view at work, in front of children or in the presence of your wife, girlfriend or pet.

And if you don't know Caterina Murino, she's that Italian girl who's hot and is co-starring in the new James Bond film with Eva Green. See above.

Pics of all girls mentioned in this post after jump. For our gay reader(s) or the "curious," go here.

PokerStars.com is Sticky

PokerStars.com, where poker players become world champions (or lose a SNG after flopping a set of jacks only to have another flop a set of fives and river a fourth), is February's stickiest web site in America according to Nielsen//NetRatings. With the average user spending 18 1/2 hours on PokerStars.com per month, the poker site has out-stickied AOL by more than 3-to-1 and Yahoo! and Friendster by 6-to-1.

MySpace.com surprisingly didn't even make the top 10 cut (considering some of the photos you come across there, you'd think it would be the stickiest . . . in one way or another).

We first came across this tidbit over at our Spanish amigos (spanish for "friends") site, Póquer-Red, who pointed out that the commenters over at 2+2 were theorizing on how PokerStars.com could be so sticky considering most people don't waste their time on an actual poker sites' web pages.

"Badgerpoo" smartly suggests, "It looks like the pokerstars client actually acts like a web browser when it displays the pictures along the bottom. This has probably skewed the results wildly as no one using the client is actually viewing."

"ImsaKidd" ponders, "It probably counds (sic) idle time. Lots of people leave the client open w/o playing."

But we here at Wicked Chops Poker think "Sciolist" and "tomdemaine" have the answer.

"Sciolist" claims, "They are looking at pictures of Lee Jones. I know that's what I do in my spare time," to which "tomdemaine" simply responded with the image we share above.

Ah, Lee Jones. So, so dreamy. Like an everyman's Calvin Ayre. If only he had a MySpace page, we could be friends.

Jesus Defends Online Poker's Legality

As mentioned in The TOKE earlier this week, Chris "Jesus" Ferguson, Howard Lederer, and Greg Raymer are inside the beltway this week speaking out against three bills that aim to make online poker illegal.  In a press conference yesterday, the three pros, along with Michael Bolcerek of the PPA and Radly Balko of the Cato Institute, detailed key points of their stance:

:: If poker is legal in U.S. casinos, then it should be legal online.

:: Rep. Bob Goodlatte's Internet Gambling Prohibition Act (Goodlatte (R-VA), pictured at right) would essentially censor the Internet "by allowing courts to order ISPs to shut down access to offshore gambling sites." PPA prez Bolcerek compares this censorship to that of the Chinese government, which also blocks Internet content from its people.  Fucking commies.  Balko, a policy analyst for the libertarian Cato Institute, adds that, "Monitoring what American citizens do in their own homes, with their own money and in their own time, just isn't the federal government's responsibility...The government is not our babysitter."

:: Goodlatte's bill would require banks and ISPs to intrude on U.S. resident's privacy.

:: Other games significantly rely on a greater chance element than poker, like horse racing or state lotteries, can be played legally online. Poker is a much more skilled game. As Jesus said yesterday, "Once you sit down at that table, you're all equal."

:: The vast majority of the American public (ranging from 75% to 85%, depending on the poll) want online poker to be legal.

While all issues raised by the opposition group are potent, the point on public polling may prove most compelling, as policymakers tend to listen to their people.  The public's desire for legalized online poker may push the Fed to make the right call in the end: regulate it, tax it, and reap the financial benefits.

Love DOES Exist!!! Anna Benson of GoldDiggerPoker.com Wants Kris Back!!!

Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeessssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss!!!

Yes!

Yes!

Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesssssssssssssss!!!

(Publicity) Whore Anna Benson of golddiggerpoker.com is showing the world that true love may exist afterall.

Like the Cyndi Lauper song "Change of Heart,"(lyrics at the jump) Anna Benson of golddiggerpoker.com has had a, uh, change of heart, withdrawing her petition for divorce. 

While Wicked Chops Poker will sleep soundly tonight, knowing that love, commitment, and goodness always prevails in the end, even happier are the rest of the Benson's Orioles teammates, as they now anxiously await Kris to crack and cheat on Anna so they can all bang her senseless.

Photo: Dimitrios Kambouris/WireImage.com

Quien es mas macho? Senor Pitt o Senor Clooney?

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!

No.

No.

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!

There may be a rift between George Clooney and Brad Pitt.

Word on the street (i.e., press) is that OSCAR WINNER GEORGE CLOONEY ain't happy that his bud, oscarnomineebradpitt, backed out of a plan to build a Vegas resort with him--only later to consider building a similar resort in Palm Springs.

Apparently, George doesn't remember what Pitt did to his wife, Jennifer Anniston.

We didn't.

Oh yes we did.

Clooney and Pitt, otherwise known as CloonPitt, were investors in Las Ramblas, an 11-building complex off the Strip worth $3 bills. The latter half of CloonPitt--Pitt--decided that the deal wasn't to his liking. Likely because Cindy Crawford's weird husband, Rande (yes, Rande) Gerber was involved*.

However, this could all just be conjecture, or something else that means something is not true or speculative, as Clooney's agent claims that any talk of Pitt backing out of an arrangement is an "out and out fabrication" unless of course he's backing out of an arrangement to bang Angelina Jolie utterly senseless**.

Not that we'd blame him for that.

*Unsubstantiated but come on, possibly true. Dude is creepy.  **Quote is true, last part of sentence "technically" isn't.

UPDATE: First the Bradifer split. Then CloonPitt. Now is Bradgelina coming to an end too? Enquiring minds can go to WWTDD.com to find out. All we're saying here is that a source said, "Brad and Ange have been fighting like cats and dogs over where to have the baby, over whether Angelina should continue to fly and also over her thinness," which is pretty much what WWTDD.com says but he also has a story about Tom Cruise getting his ass beat. So he has that going for him.

PokerStars Signs Up 5 Millionth Player, Loses One

Alright, we don't want to report on Robert Varkonyi winning the Extreme Poker Championship or how some lady named Beatric (sounds like a pill you take) beat out Carlos Mortensen heads-up and 284 players to win a Lotus in the Venetian's poker tournament celebrating the opening of its new $2.6 million poker room.

We don't even want to put our Wicked Chops spin on one of the many poker related press releases hitting the wire today, even if one is about the Bombshell Girls.

Instead we'll tell you about relatively old news concerning Evelyn Ng, although it officially became new news yesterday with a Bodog press release we received. Yes, former Team PokerStars pro Evy Ng will no longer be making Greg Raymer look pretty at PokerStars events as she now joins her pal David Williams and Atlanta's Josh Arieh over at Bodog.

Evy first revealed this news three weeks ago over at her "MySpace blog".

Evy stated on March 16:

"I'm very excited to announce that, as of this month, I am now a sponsored player for Bodog.com. The NBC National Headsup Championship (which took place March 6th & 7th at Caesar's Palace) marked my debut as a Bodog representative."

When a guy named Phyuck Yu asked, "Hey evy, what happened to your sponsorship with pokerstars?," the former poker dealer beauty responded, "I chose not to continue with PokerStars when my contract was up."

Riveting stuff.

In related, somewhat old news, PokerStars signed up its five millionth player last week. A chef named George Draper from the land of a thousand chefs, Las Vegas, was the lucky player who received a World Series of Poker main event prize package and a seat to the main event of the World Championship of Online Poker just for signing up on PokerStars.

Sure beats the $25 sign up bonus we got.

Reminisce about Evy's days on Team PokerStars with the below pics of her sitting between some guy and some world champ during PokerStars' mini-media tourney before the 2005 WSOP main event.

The TOKE: Stepping Up To Keep Poker Legal, WWGD, + Poker & Taxes

:: Raymer, Lederer, Ferguson tryin' to keep it legal.  As we've detailed many, many times, poker should be kept legal and regulated by the Fed.  Three poker heavyweights (mentioned in the first sentence of this paragraph...see above) and the prez from the well-intentioned but ill-conceived-messaged PPA, Michael Bolcerek, are meeting with lawmakers this week to build support for online gambling. Watch as Bolcerek turns a just cause for all of us into yet another insert foot-in-mouth quote: "This is a truly American tradition. Truman played. Departed Chief Justice William Rehnquist had games in chambers," says Bolcerek, continuing that we should regulate it, tax it, "but don't treat poker players like al Qaeda."  Ugh.  Somebody shut this guy up.  Don't get us wrong, we hate al-Qaeda more than anyone, but you're not gonna build support for this by comparing poker player's plights to that of terrorists.  Moron.  U.S. News & World Report

:: What would Gank do?  American Jr. pro poker player John Turmel, who is also a "medicinal" marijuana advocate (aren't we all?), was hit with a minor fine, three years probation, and 100 hours of community service last week for mary jane trafficking.  To answer the first sentence of this paragraph (see above), Gank wouldn't have been caught trafficking it, he would've just smoked that shit.  Poker 777

:: Yes, it is considering taxable income.  In case you're wondering how to handle all of them poker/gambling winnings when you "report it" on to the Fed on your taxes, Poker Player Newspaper has some answers for you. Poker Player Newspaper