Sunday, January 17, 2010

Rumor mill

While playing at Caesars Palace today, the table talk turned to remarkable hands we've seen. Somebody mentioned the astonishing one that took place at the WSOP main event in 2008, with four aces being beaten by a royal flush.

The dealer told us that he had been dealing that day (not at that table, however), and that there had been no ESPN cameras at the table in question when the hand went down. They had the players reenact it for the cameras during a break later in the day, so what you saw in the final broadcast was a little play-acting by the participants, rather than the hand as it originally occurred.

I had not heard this before. I have no way of knowing whether it's true, though it certainly seems plausible on its face. After all, it was not a featured table, and they couldn't have known in advance that something that rare was going to occur. On the other hand, it seems likely that the loser of the hand would have vacated the premises by the time that ESPN learned about the hand and made a decision to stage a reenactment.

I know that among my readers are a good number of people who were there as players, as dealers, as bloggers, as reporters, etc.. If anybody knows for certain about this from first-hand knowledge, I'd be interested in your report. You can submit a comment anonymously if you like. Or you can email me directly, and let me know if it's OK to post here whatever you have to report, and whether it's OK to use your name.

Inquiring minds want to know!

7 comments:

Jamie said...

Hadn't heard that either and I have a tough time believing it, though anything's possible. From what I remember, Ray Romano had just been seated at that table so it's possible the cameras were following him around.

Anonymous said...

I used to work with the guy who got the royal flush, and he never said such a thing. and he is a huge douche so he would have said something

Matthew Yauch said...

"My buddy Raymond dealt this hand. I had just been rerouted and he took my spot. He told me that Ray Romano had just been moved over to the table and the ESPN cameras were already there when it all went down. They got it all on film so we'll be seeing this replayed over and over and over again once the broadcast starts. He said that he, along with everyone else, sat there completely stunned for quite some time..."

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/29/news-views-gossip/wsop-main-event-discussion-thread-days-1-6-only-241267/index5.html

Post #67

Typical "my friend told me..." story, but sounds plausible since I remember something about Ray Romano in that shot as well.

The Game said...

Poker Grump sounds like Forrest gump.

Jordan said...

It isn't a completely crazy story. From my understanding, they've re-dealt flops and added in post-production shots of the "flops" (recreated in studio) when they did not have great footage or angles, so it isn't crazy to think that they'd restage a hand, even though I guess from the comments that it didn't happen here.

geezer said...

Sometime in the mid 90's at a 10-20limit he game short handed players I made a royal vs 4aces.. I raised from behind with kj hearts bb called flop Ah10hA bb checks I bet, turn A bb checks I bet river Qh ..heads ups my 2nd reraise he just calls with 4 Aces (i had the rep of a nit) this was at Mesquaki in Tama Ia.. I still see the other player Rick from Wisc

EDakaEH said...

Always a possibility. I can't find the link, but I remember reading an interview about Dutch Boyd. ESPN calls to ask him what he had a couple hands on a featured table. Dutch tells to put he had the nuts after he can't remember.

There's also the famous the famous Phil Hellmuth hand from the 2003 wsop where he bluffs out the guy with trips. Somehow a stack of chips disappear as the player with JT double checks his cards.