WSOP Schedule and Phil Hellmuth Boycott

The twenty twenty five World Series of Poker schedule has been released in full, one hundred live gold Bracelet events. Tim and I are going to hit on it a bit of a rapid reaction. I know it's more than twenty four hours later, so quotes around rapid. But we've been very, very busy here at the Poker Gro Cup, at the Poker gro Studio, so it still is a

very rapid reaction for us. I'm gonna say that we should probably like we'll give our thoughts, okay, and then maybe like some things will marinate, we'll see more takes or whatever, and we'll have like more thoughts as we go towards the city, towards the summer. So don't take this with you know, an end all be all type of idea. So yeah, the wa space schedule got released. One hundred live gold Bracelet events. As I mentioned, May twenty seventh is when it all kicks off, and it'll

end on July sixteenth. Of course, it will end with a new World Champion of Poker being crowned. The Main Event everyone's favorite tournament of the year. Whether you are a player, a fan, whatever you are in the game, the WSP Main Event is the biggest and the best. The Main Event runs July second through sixteenth. We are going to talk a lot about the Main Event because mister WSP himself, mister phil Helmuth, decided to drop a

bombshell last night and ignite the poker world. There are thirty PGT qualifying events on this year's schedule, so thirty percent of the schedule qualifies for the PGT. I believe that's up from twenty eight last year. Basically, we're just gonna run through our biggest takes, the new additions that are on there, you know, maybe touch on some things that they have missed, but yeah, kind of more of an open form. Let me first say that they did

add some new events. You know, something's got removed or replaced, one thing, I feel like people are calling it a new event the industry employees, it's really just the casino employees of the new name, my brand. But I also felt that they always allowed the industry, you know, but the official new events, if you want to call them that, they have a one thousand dollars buy in Battle of the Ages, no limit hold them. So this is going to be I believe it's two starting flights. One starting

flight is for people who are fifty and over. The other starting flight is for people who are under fifty, or maybe it's fifteen under and then over. I forget exactly, but it's basically split down the middle, over fifty, under fifty, and then they'll combine. I think this is kind of an interesting concept. I don't hate it. Hate it? Oh you hate it? Why doesn't make any It's a normal tournament, just split up. I don't like it.

play with VIPs. So you know, you feel like you're you're getting into the water battling with the people that are of your ilk versus you get in there and you're like, eh, I gotta play with all these young kids, they're better than me whatever. At least you might feel like you have a better shot on day one against people like you in terms of skill level and all that sort of age, et cetera.

from from you, let them have it. Come on, they stole from me. Listen. Imitation the highest flattery. I was about to say it took them a couple of years, but it's here and listen. This is going to be huge. Yeah, massive, It's going to be that word I love so much, massive massive. They should have put massive roller. Oh that's a good name. I might, you know I might so, Yeah, one hundre k buy in pot limit Omaha high Roller. This is going to be absolutely freaking in. Before it

was fifty it was crazy. Then Now you know this hunter k. It's it's about time. It's rightfully on the schedule, and like I said, it's going to be absolutely crazy in there they added a twenty five K high roller half and half half PLO half no limit hold them. I think this is also awesome. They've had this tournament before at much lower price points. I think the highest was five K. Yeah. I think they even have a fifteen hundred before, they've had a yeah, and then they

had a five hundred. I think, yeah. I mean, but this is going to be awesome. I think this one's going to be really cool. Players have been asking for this, so yeah, they're listening to the players.

event that I'm sure will be crazy. And then they took out the three K horse that was at the end of the schedule last year and they replaced it with a three thousand dollars Buying Tours TRS replacing Hold Them with Triple Draw. So those are the those are the new events on the schedule this year. Some other changes that popped out. Initially, Colossus Buying went up and went from four hundred dollars to five hundred dollars. Yeah. I kind of always liked the four and dollars one.

You know, what's the big deal? Why you got to go up to five hundred, Yeah, exactly. They added some extra flights for some of the massive field Nolan that hold them tournaments. I'm gonna try and just work that word in as much as awesome now massive, So Mystery Millions I believe went up to four or sorry, went up to five flights from four, and that Mystery Millions the one K buy and that's that's right at the

front of the schedule. Again, I think this is an incredible move when they did it, to put it at the front of the schedule like that kicks off the World Series. It's gonna be massive, you know, massive, first place prize, massive, big bounty, massive, massive, massive, massive, massive, massive Millions. Colossus I think added a starting flight as well. Monster Stack added a starting flight. I believe Mini Main

Event added the starting flight. So just like one extra starting flight for a lot of these different tournaments, which is fine because as these fields continue to grow, you know, I think it's only necessary that that's how you get more people in. I mean, we see it every single year with these events, the alternate lines, the Late REDGS lines, they're ridiculously long, you know, hundreds of people along stuff like that. So slamming another flo no big deal. I

don't hate it. I also understand it from a business perspective, you know, drive up that revenue. It's good for the bottom line. Of course, fewer freeze outs on the schedule this year kind of a bummer. I like the freeze outs, but listen, I can say that here now if I was the one, you know, looking at the p and L, I get it, like, you know, so it's not like

the end of the world. I guess. One kind of big notable change is the Flipping Go is gone, and that's mostly notable because now the Waspy is under ownership of GG Poker. That event was I think it was the flipp and Go buy GG Poker is what it was called. Like they put it in as like their sponsored event, their element, and it was like everyone kind of complained about the event, but then everyone also blasted in it like all the time, so it was weird. But that's out this year, so that won't be on

the schedule. I also found it interesting that the if you exclude twenty five K and higher buying events. This is from a news Aurora on Twitter. He works for Pope Refuse does great work. A news twenty two to one to two on Twitter. He said, excluding the twenty five K and higher buying events, the average buy in

has gone up. And I'll just run through what he put on Twitter, and it says twenty twenty one was thirty two hundred and thirty nine dollars, twenty twenty two thirty two hundred and ninety two dollars, twenty twenty three thirty two ninety six, twenty twenty four thirty three seventy three, and then twenty twenty five is now up to thirty four seventy seven. And I believe if you include the twenty five K and higher buying events, the average buying

number also goes up. Of course, as we mentioned earlier, there's that there's one hundred K PLO high Roller on the schedule, there is the twenty five K high Roller half and half on the schedule, so all of that good stuff. So like what year kind of thoughts takeaways? You know, what do you got for me?

think it would be slightly better. Event the double board bump put, I think they made a mistake last year in two ways, one adding no limit and then the other it was it was a bump put every orb.

it affects the higher buying stuff. And that's you know, most apparent at the w soop when the lower buying stuff, like when you're playing the three and llars Gladiator's Poker Tournament and there are eighty five thousand people in that building, and like you're using every single dealer you have available, every single table you have available all this sort of stuff. Like obviously, the more dealers you need, the quality of

the dealers goes down a little bit. So and you like oftentimes in that tournament, I played that tournament many years, like you have to you're playing ten handed, yeah, for a long period of time. Like, so you're charging more RAKE for say, a lesser experience, you know, And it's that to me is like that doesn't equate in my head, Like you know, you should pay more RAKE for a better experience, or a more luxurious experience, or a more

efficient experience, like all of that sort of stuff. Right, So like when you're playing the high buy and stuff, you're getting the best dealers of the dealers that they have, You're sitting in a special area with some better seats, all that sort of stuff. So there's all of that

you know so greatly. But I also, I mean again going back to like if I'm on the other side, the business person in me would say, I get it, Like it's not you're probably gonna set record numbers in all you know, in the majority of not all of those fields. It doesn't really matter. So you know, I get it right, you know, And the price of everything has gone up, inflation and all that sort of stuff.

So yeah, I understand it. Do I wish it wouldn't happen, of course, Like yeah, I don't want more Rake, who the heck does? But I don't think it's going to slow down the World Series at all. You know, I think it's going to be one of those talking points. You know, some complaining here and there, but you know, ultimately everyone's gonna sho up and everyone's going to play it because that's how it is. All right, continue what else you got?

You know, they they bumped it up to one hundred. Fine, some subtle changes, not anything too crazy, didn't really mess with it. All the dates are pretty similar, like you know, everything pretty much aligns right.

continues like this. Who really knows. I know a lot of people made mention of the fact that the WSP plus that was used and a lot of players loved for wasby Paradise was not included in the press release. So I don't know if that's a thing that's to come or if that's a thing that's like held up by gaming because we are now in the States, we are in Nevada, et cetera. So maybe just TBD on that. But you know, I know a lot of people pointed

that out, that that's not in the schedule. They also pointed out, as we mentioned, there's no TOC stuff in the schedule too, So overall, you know, I think it's fine.

One idea that popped into my head when I was reading through the like the new events list, and and this came from actually came from you in a way, because the upcoming PGT Mix game series has an event called Mary's Mix the Player of the year should get to pick an event for the next year, So like Sean deeb, but Shan Deep wins Player of the Year, he can essentially like pick an event like and like he like designs it under like certain parameters working with

their officials and like you know, you can call it the so and so by Sean Deep, you know, buy w S player there Sean Deep or like whatever, you know something like that, Like I think that would be fun and just like a way, and it's only a one year thing, like you get it unless you win it again, of course, but like you get you get like your stamp on the schedule for winning WSP Player of the Year. Like I think that would just be

a fun little maybe we should sprinkle. I mean listen, like they have so many events, they have one hundred events, Like what's throwing away one event to like some kind of like thing, you know, like it'd be fun. That's not bad idea, Like instead of dealers choice, you call it Sean Deep's choice, like you know something like jerem

about it. Obviously you can't be like you know, we're gonna play blind man's bluff whatever, like like you know, they have to be like, okay, listen, like we can do this, this, this, this, this, you know, like these are the options. Build your own meal, you know, like that that sort of thing. And maybe it's just like a straight like Nolan and Holdham event, or like you know, it's something super boring, but it still has that person's name attached to it, you know, they kick it off

on the microphone like all that. I like that. I'm gonna steal that idea for us. Well you already I told you. I stole it from you because you named an event Moury's Mix. By the way, speaking of this, Mory's Mix. Okay, so there's an event on the upcoming PGT Mixed Game schedule called Morey's Mix. I asked more the other day. I said, limit Omaha. Why is limit Omaha More He's like, I don't know, Tim put it in there. All the players are asking what the hell's

limit Omaha is doing in there? I don't play limit Omaha. Well, just so everyone knows, he limit Omaha high, No high low, limit Omaha High.

of stuff. So like, you know, a twenty five k PKO I think be cool, and I think a lot of that player pool would love that sort of thing, So that would be that would be fun and introduce it that way.

thing I implement. But I would implement a five like a five hundred dollars buy in, twenty five hundred dollars buy in and a ten K buying heads up championship online that plays down to say in the money plays down to maybe eight players, and all those are restarting prior to the twenty five k heads Up, so we have to say the five hundred buying starts on Monday, the conclusion of it live, you know, then you followed by the twenty five hundred, followed by the ten k

that all wraps up the day before the twenty five k heads up starts. I think heads up poker is still a big thing, and you know, we couldn't really run a five hundred dollars buy in live. It takes up a lot of blood of room, but you could run it on.

necessarily dedicate the real estate to do that. So what if you just did day one of the formats online, then you had like a couple hundred people coming back for day two live, much more manageable, you know that sort of thing. I also back in they remember the Mixed Max Yeah, that was sweet. I love that one too, like, you know, so I would I would bring you know,

some of those back. A part of me, I listen, I know they've never had a PLO tournament above fifty K, and they are going to one hundred k. I think they could have gone higher too, Like, I just think they could have just, you know, absolutely slammed it. But other than that, you know, I I got nothing with the one tournament that always kind of like felt I guess a little bit weird to me was the twenty five K horse I just because I think it should

be a lot earlier. Well, because you have the you have the fifty k PPC, and I don't, you know, I just feel like they're too close. It's like just it's a weird thing overall. You know, I think the schedules it's good, you know, it's it's what you can be expected. It's not like anything you can really complain about unless your name is pel Helmi. Then we're going to get to that in a second. But uh, other than that, you know, good, fine, And yeah, I'm excited for another summer.

So so yeah, I think maybe, you know, there's part of me says that there's an appetite to make like some of these high roller stuff just two day tournaments just because like the office away. Now. Well yeah, but I think I know, but I feel like that crowd just they play all of our stuff, they put all the trait and stuff like they don't care like that. You know, they want in and out let's go. You know, they're in there out like it doesn't really matter to them.

I think the numbers would be fine there. But also you know, I don't mind the way that it is. It's not that big of a deal. I was. I think the thing that I was thought we had the best chance of seeing in terms of a GG poker effect was a smaller buying bracelet event than three hundred dollars. I thought that that had the best chance to be

like the big change. Now. I didn't think anything would really be that big of a change for this year, but I thought, if you if we see anything, they might do like hundred dollars like something like nuts right, like something like that. But you know, a very very similar schedule to recent years they're up to one hundred uh bracelets now live and then and then we'll have such a They're always going to ask there's a demand, is there? They're going to just continue to ask demand.

But that's just how it is. Let's protect this brand. That's just how it is. All right, Let's get to uh mister, what is it? Seventeen old races now eighteen gobers and that's probably where they am. How many? How many is seventeen? Yeah, I mean, it's just this guy. So last night, Monday night, right around eleven pm Vegas time, a story drops from poker dot org. I believe they were the first ones, right, And it's from Phil Hellmuth saying that he's not playing the WSP main event this

year twenty twenty five. And then a tweet comes out with a video from Phil Hellmuth where he is talking about it. I'll read what he put in the tweet, and then we'll have our our TRUSTe producer Rich Ryan put in the audio from what Phil Helmy said. Phil Helmy tweeted, I am not playing the WSP main event. It has become an quote endurance contest. I truly believe that eighty percent of the players want changes made to

the WSP main event. Twelve hour days or longer for six to seven days in a row is brutal and disproportionately affects older players. Let's hear what all Youth had to say in his video.

It's turned into an endurance test. I don't think that the World Series of Booker main event is measuring skill. It's still my favorite event in the world. Don't misunderstand me. I don't want to miss it, but I know that I can't do that. You know, I'm sixty years old. I know.

be remembered. This to me feels like Phil thinks he has more to do with the WSP than THEWSP has to do with the hunk, when if there's novasp, there's no hunk. I mean, bottom line, that is true. So like, why does this need to be blasted out on the internet. Why can't you just go to your people, because like who you obviously have a good relationship with and and actually have a conversation and talk to him about this. This seems silly he just thought of this and just

shot it out there. It seems extremely weird to just go about it like this, announcing this now, you know, hours after they dropped the dovasby main event schedule. Is an attack on the was a B. That's what this is. Like, I'm attacking them and I'm gonna make the biggest noise possible because i want to get my way, which seems not the right way to go about this. It's definitely like why would she just why wouldn't you just advocate

for it? Maybe you do some sort of silent petitioning talking to all the different players being like hey, and why don't you also like come with you know, some solutions, being like, hey, this is what I think. Maybe we cut the levels down from two hours to ninety minutes, you know, maybe we cut them down to one hundred minutes. Maybe we put a day off in the middle here, like maybe we do this, this and this, and like, you know, get some people on your side, right. I

remember years ago down at PCA. I think it was Scott Clements. This is when I forget which tournament I want to say. It might have been the WPT five Diamond, but it was one of the tournaments Appolage you had like changed their whole schedule to be like all no limit tournaments like one k nolmit Urm the main and Scott like made this petition and had like all these

people at PCA signing. He was going around having all these people sign this thing, because then he was gonna go to them and say, look, this is what the players want. They don't want this, they want this over here like do something like that. You know, this seems like this seems like hey, look at me, I'm gonna

throw a fit about this. And yeah, I mean, first of all, if you stack it correctly, there are plenty of days off in the Maine, okay, plenty is like, if you play one A, you have what three days off, four days off, three days off? Yeah, yeah, and then you play ABC and then you have a day off and then you start going and then there's a day off after you make the final table if you get that far, Like, I like what, I don't understand why you can't stack it like that. It's very easy, simple.

This may not surprise you, but I do side with Phil Homes. I'm so shocked. I think he could tweak this. And listen, let me also say this. Let me also say this. I'm not necessarily saying that Phil's entire message is wrong because I have said it. I think I've said it on this podcast before. Like the times that I've played the main event, I've like caught myself being like,

we're still on this level type of thing. I mean, I don't but like his thing was about the whole endurance, like big picture, right, like we'd put days off and this and that and whatever I would before trimming down the levels a little bit. Yeah, one hundred minute levels whatever that is, right, And you know, I'm team no dinner break. I don't care, Like I just think dinner breaks are ridiculous, but that's me. I also don't think that, you know, when he's claiming that, like sometimes you play

the three am Like, I don't think that that. I think that's more rare than it is. It is common, you know, it's oftentimes it just has to do with like how the field is playing and how things are breaking and what's happening, you know, versus like that's the plan from the start, Like that's not the plan from the start. You usually end right around midnight, you know, give or take of course, Like it's it's not crazy, and you have you have a break every two hours.

You have the long dinner break, so it's not the worst thing in the world, you know, to grind it. And I personally do feel like, and I've said this before, I've always thought this going back to when Sebastian Ruthenberg was heads up with Chris Ferguson and I believe it was the five K stud High Low event they were playing Forever in the Amazon Earth, and I was like, you know, part of it is endurance. Like part that

that's part of poker in certain situations. Now, should it always be an endurance match, No, but like part of it is. Part of the skill of this thing is who can play the best poker over the long haul? And this thing is the long haul. I'm but I also will say that I, you know, probably one hundred minutes or whatever. But now if I'm WSOP, I would say that I want this event to be the biggest and the best in the world, which it is, but I also wanted to have the best structure give the

most play to the players. So when there's other tournaments out there in the world that might have ninety minute levels on certain days, well we have to be better than that. Yeah. So that like that's where I would say, Okay, you can't go lower than one hundred minutes, right, you know, but let's just blow everyone out of the water, and we're two hour levels.

all the world. But you know, but like I said, if I was in chidship with probably ninety minute levels until you're in the money and we'll go from there.

everyone is pretty pretty good. The structure is very good, and if you're not a decent player, you're just gonna get eaten a lot. So now that said, while I said that, like, if I'm doabsity, I want like the biggest and the best, and I want the best structure in all of that, I would also be like, well,

how do we make the final tables where? Because this is obviously the biggest finel table in poker, the bigest spectacle in poker, right, how do we make it where it's not nine robots for lack of a better term, at the final table. Well, if you make the event itself more of a crapshoot in a way. You know. Now, I'm not saying crazy turbo like we're doing here in the studio, you know, like I'm not saying a two

day event or anything like that. But if you do make the structure a little bit faster, allow for a little bit more gamble, you know, push people a little bit more, then maybe you get a more colorful final table, you know, with some kind of wacky personality, some people that aren't just like the best of the best and they've studied so much and all this sort of stuff. So I can see the argument for both sides there.

I just think that the way Phil went out there and like delivered this message and essentially was like attacking them in a way that made it seem like he was making them force their hand, Like I'm Phil, I'm mister w Sop. I'm sitting out at the main event, you know. But if you change it, I'll come. Now. The second part of this is that do you really believe he's gonna not play. He's one hundred percent playing

in event. I mean, right, let's be serious, right, I mean he has to play, right, Yes, like I it just I mean I don't see any ways, someone as I saw, I saw his agent, Brian Balls, but said he's one hundred percent. Seriously, he's not sitting out. And then I saw Sean Deep say, Phil's actually really sharp because he realizes that bracelets are the best thing for

Phil helm youth. That is, why would you get locked up in the tournament for ten days, but instead you can just play like fifteen different events, you know, all these like two and three day tournaments that they have at the WSB. That's where Phil can go play and hopefully win, you know, another bracelet, another bracelet, another bracelet. You know. So if someone brought up, you know, like is he really going to play not play? And I was like, he's playing.

wants to give up that. So I think we'll see him play.

see him play. But you know, it is what it is another way that you could you know, if you are w s ap and I guess you're entertaining because I saw, you know, his thing is like we need a day off, and I think he also put out like a solution, like my solution would be like like three days day off, three days day off or something like that, is maybe you do a split day three, you know, so then you can still have the option of like essentially one A to a three A and

you you know, every other day is a day off in kind of that scenario. You know. Of course, what I just said is not totally perfect because there's four day ones, but you guys get the points. You know, something something like that I think would be better than

just like slamming a day off in there. I al because because and the reason why I say that is I like that once the main event starts, like having it out there and happening every single day other than the day off right before the main event, I think

that that's good natural promotion for the event itself. You know, don't give people any sort of out to look away, to not tune in to watch it, to not think about it, like you know, have media outlets and whatever, not talk about it, like you want everyone talking about that every single day, right, So if you just slam this day off in there, it's like, okay, well no one's talking about it for that day, you know, they're talking about something else, especially the World Series, when there

would be other stuff going on of course, you know. So so yeah, that's what I think, you know, kind of breaks that. But yeah, it's funny that, you know, if if you're doubs appear, if i'mbasp, this is the the most frustrating. Part of this is that we just dropped our schedule. It's a day that everyone looks forward to every single year. Like they started publicizing it, you know, last week. They were like it's coming on Monday, blah

blah blah. And then Phil goes and does this and like essentially steals all your thunder takes all the headlines and whatever, and like listen, yes, in a way, all publicity is good publicity, you know, no matter what. But he's also like stealing it away from you and trying to make it seem like this event is not the great thing that it is because it is a great event,

you know. So yeah, I think that that would be you know, if you're if you're in those offices, that would be like what you see this thing like come across your feet. You're like, he did what? Now he said what? Like, huh what? Let's say he doesn't play, I'm with you. I think he puts Yeah, if he doesn't play, is the doubest manament softer you're mister helmet over there, dude, Okay, A serious question though. Do you think him putting this message out there actually deters anyone

from not playing? Now I'm not saying it affects the number at the end of the day, But like, are there ten people out there in the world that say, like, yeah, Phil's right, I'm not playing. I mean, probably yes, but like, no, I'm just wondering. I'm sure there's.

always come back. So yeah, sure, maybe he's influenced ten people out there, but there's probably another twenty five people that are like, screw you, Phil, I'm gonna go I'm gonna go play even though it wasn't planning on something, you know, And there's look, I think you kind of voice your opinion on the length to play, but you'll pub still going to play.

super long because it's it's a lot right now. Like I feel like if if you still had two hour levels, but maybe you have clocks in play at an earlier juncture, it just speeds everything up, you know, because like people just like there's just so much tanking and tanking and tanking and thinking like all this sort of stuff because people can be so deliberate because there isn't that urgency. You're not like, oh, the blinds are gonna go up in twenty minutes, No, the bindes are going to go

up in seventy minutes. Like it's you know, it's just crazy. So you can be like, you know what, I can kind of just chill and whatever. And I mean, I'm not a professional poker player. I'm a recreational poker player. Do I take it seriously? Yes, very But I'm not a professional voka player. I don't go to play a

poker tournament to just sit there and fold. So I just have a hard time relating to the people who bucket list item or not, Like they show up and they literally just full and like they like the fact that they can fold for longer because the levels are someone like aren't you there to for a competition to try and win, Like, well, I don't understand why you would just show up and just be like just fold to get aces and eventually like go all in, Like

that's the best. That's how I play. Yeah, I know, I'm talking to somebody. So it's been It's been a fun twenty four hours, uh for the World Series of Poker overall. You know, I think that the thebasity schedule is good. You know, I would give it an as you know, it didn't blow my doors off, yes, but it certainly didn't go down from wherever it was before,

unless unless I'm missing something that I don't see. But you know, I feel that it's it's another good schedule and I think people are happy, you know, and I I know this year obviously people were like okay, gig poker,

let's see what they do type of thing. But also just having the schedule out there allows people to start planning, start pooking trips, start being like, oh, I'm like, you know, I'm going to go home like some nights this week and I'm gonna be like okay, like I would want to play this event here, in this event here and this event over here, you know, like and try and kind of map it out in my head because that's

what you want to do. And then you know, for a lot of people, myself included, that leads to you know, okay, like I need to raise this much money here, I'm gonna sell this much action, so like, you know, you just have it now. You know it's not you're not just waiting on this this unknown thing that you know is coming and is likely going to be similar to what it has last year, but you're still waiting on for the official thing to draw. So I don't need a look at any events because I play one. Yeah

you yeah, what's up with this? I just keep every year, I keep saying going to play the main event, and I finally, well, let me tell you how you need to play one event before I end a warm up? Yeah, I don't need it. I'm saving all my money. I'm going in cold even I'm saving every dollar to my name to play the WSP Man.

then it's a then it's a big tournament. But I think it's gonna be a good summer. I'm sure you and I will talk about it plenty. Have you Have you heard anything from the field like players today, Like have they had any comments on it? Has it been any sort of talking point here at the Poke Grove Cup, Like has anyone said anything? Is anyone commenting on Phil? Like you know what? You should almost run a bedding pool on Phil, like show into the room and just be like.

out of line, both negative or positive. So I think the players is like, oh it's out now I can start planning my stuff. I was standing behind an unknown pocal player and he was writing notes about you know, dates and events, so it looks like he was kind of you know, planning his schedule and it was some bigger buying stuff. So maybe he's trying to put his own like you know, package together that he can sell.

So I guess that's probably just at the forefront of everyone's mind right now, is just creating their own schedule and focusing on that.

around each other all that sort of stuff. So you know, the wind Poker Aria like et cetera. MGM usually has stuff in the summer, Gold Nugget has stuff like all these places have. Venetian of course has massive STUFFGTGT yes as well, you know, but everyone's able to kind of like, okay, this is out, you know, we can do our thing now. And yeah, the other thing I wanted to ask you is super super early take ten and twelve entries? Is the record? Really they're going over, just going over. I've

always been no, I don't know what you were. Actually ten thousand, So two years ago, ten thousand and forty three entries, first time ever, A ten thousand beat the previous record of eight thousand, seven hundred and seventy six. I believe it was so smashed it massive increase, massive increase, massive, and then last year ten and twelve, So are they going to do it again? They're going to crush it.

And here's why it's very soon. As crush it means like you crush it means eleven thousand, or like ten thousand, three hundred, Yeah, more like ten thousands.

online poker specifically, and then you know, live poker. I just I feel like fields everywhere are very healthy, if not, you know, up a lot, there's a lot of poker around, so you know, even if even if specific events may see like year over year declines or they're just holding steady and not really seeing a big increase, oftentimes there's like two tournaments or two big series going on at one time, and in that case, like they're both doing

extremely healthy. Whereas you know in years past, maybe there's a time when it's just one series and then that allows for that one series to get all the attention and everyone to go there. Even stuff like the high roller stuff that we see on Triton, the stuff that we see here in the studio with all of our events everything is you know, going very well. You see it a lot when you play at the Wind, you

see it down the street at Venetian, you know. So yeah, I think Live Poker is in a really good spot. So I would I would only guess that that carries over to the biggest series of the year, and that is the World Series pok And you know, we see an increase in the devisity mainavent field size. I'm not saying it's going to be some ridiculously crazy large increase, but I think, you know, I'll go with ten thousand,

four hundred is my number right now. I'm sure we'll we'll feel things out, you know, we'll try and keep our finger on the pulse and feel what people are saying, what they're going to be doing, all that sort of stuff. Actually, I should say ten three and ninety nine because we won't have the Hammi from there. But maybe we'll replace maybe we'll replace Philammy with the Sun who has been playing.

He's been playing, you know, better than help with the well he can he you know, he's probably got more stamina, you know, being younger. She doesn't need to. He just put his son in. That's what you do. And coach him on the side. No, don't, no coach. Well, that's that's like not a lot, right, that's yeah, that's not that. I think you know, mister w S's gonna standard laptop, but yeah, he.