Yesterday, I went through every team’s schedule and predicted the outcome of every regular season NFL game on a spreadsheet (which I’m happy to share with you, just leave your email address in a comment to this post). Some of these predictions were rather difficult (example: Oakland at San Francisco), but for the most part, the decision of who you think should win the game is fairly clear. The team I picked to win every game is the team I think should and will be favored to win that game. In other words, I didn’t go for any sexy upset specials so I could be like, “see! I told you Seattle would beat Philly on the road!” That’d just be stupid.

I then compared the total team wins based on these predictions to the total season wins lines at Pinnacle Sports to come up with the following bets.

A couple of disclaimers: I made similar bets last year putting around $3,000 in play and ended up around a $400 loser. Also, in cases where the difference between the line on Pinnacle and the wins I predicted is 1.5 or less, I simply passed on making a call. There’s enough parity in the NFL that I’m only betting teams where I came up with a total number of wins of 2 or more away from the line on Pinnacle. This basically allows teams to have one or two fluke wins or losses but leave me still liking the bet.

Here are the bets I’m taking:

Love It

Cincinnati Under 5.5 (-142)
Dallas Over 9 (+110)
Miami Under 8 (-173)
New Orleans Over 10 (-145)
Oakland Over 7 (+192)
Pittsburgh Over 11 (+163)
Tampa Under 8 (-155)
Washington Under 6.5 (-187)

Like It

Atlanta Over 10.5 (+157)
Baltimore Over 11 (+210)
Carolina Under 4.5 (-101)
Denver Under 6 (+103)
Jacksonville Under 6 (+154)
New York Jets Over 10 (+123)

Am Also Taking

Arizona Over 6.5 (-230)
Green Bay Over 11.5 (+135)
Minnesota Under 7 (+108)
Philadelphia Over 10.5 (-151)
Seattle Under 6.5 (-205)

You can probably notice a trend where I tend to take the over on teams with a high win total and the under on teams with a low win total. The lines for all teams are between 4.5 and 10.5 with the exception of four teams (Green Bay, New England, Pittsburgh, and Baltimore). I think there’s value to be found in taking under the low totals and over the high totals. It’s entirely common for teams to win less than 5 games or more than 10 games. There were 11 instances where that happened last season, 12 the season before, and 15 the season before that.

This year more than I can ever remember, I’m expecting the bad teams to be truly awful and the good teams to seem almost unstoppable at times. The teams likely to be among the NFL’s elite this season are all fairly proven; Atlanta, Baltimore, Green Bay, New England, New Orleans, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh are all more or less returning the same group of players with which they have bulldozed the competition in years past. Conversely, the teams likely to among the bottom of the league this year look like the wheels have already fallen off before the season has even started; Carolina and Cincinnati both have bad defenses and are starting a rookie quarterback. Tampa, Washington, Denver, and Jacksonville also have bad defenses with shaky-at-best prospects on the other side of the ball (except for Tampa who I concede could be good offensively this year). It’s hard to imagine any of those teams putting up a significant amount of wins this season, so I’m taking the under on all of them. Even if there’s a breakthrough outlier among the group, sort of like the 10-6 Tampa team of last season, I’m still expecting to show an overall profit from taking the under on those teams.

On the other end of the spectrum, I feel like I’m freerolling on a couple of teams. Taking a look at their schedules, is there any way New Orleans wins only 9 games? Or Pittsburgh, the team with the best defense in the league that has proven they are more than adequate offensively, winning only 10? There’s also Dallas, who, for the first time in team history, might actually be underrated coming into a season; they have a solid defense and a talented offense that one might expect to gel and rebound somewhat this season. Is there any way that team only wins 8 games? Barring serious injuries to key players, it’s hard to imagine any of those three teams not at least pushing on their season wins line.

I could be wrong on my analysis, and you can let me know if you think I am, but I’m putting my money where my mouth is!

On last night’s show, Scotty put up his first true duck of a performance this season. Have a watch if you care to, if not, I’ll be summarizing below.

The contestants were allowed to choose any song recorded in this century. Scotty picked a total turd of a song, Swingin, a 1983 song by John Anderson that he managed to qualify for the show’s theme because LeAnn Rimes covered it in 2010. Basically, out of 11 years of recorded music to choose from, Scotty picked some lame cover of a 1983 song no one really cares about or likes. And for the first time all season, the judges gave Scotty negative feedback. Rightly so, too.

Let’s compare this to James Durbin’s performance last night. James did an absolutely unbelievable performance of Muse’ Uprising. Have a look.

After watching those two performances, you can certainly understand why James surpassed Scotty this week as the favorite to win the show according to bookmakers. He put forth a far superior performance and the judges loved it. Randy Jackson even said something to the effect of (paraphrasing), “that was the best performance we’re going to see tonight,” even though James performed second out of the seven contestants.

But what did America think?

Dial Idol, a website that has successfully predicted the winner of Idol all nine seasons by tracking the volume on which they get the busy signal when dialing in user votes, thinks that Scotty unequivocally was the #1 vote getter from last night’s show:

The key is to look at Scotty’s “Dial Idol Range” where you see that he is predicted beyond any shadow of a doubt to have received the most amount of votes based on Dial Idol’s statistical analysis.

So let’s recap for a moment. Scotty puts up a total duck of a performance singing a song not many people are particularly familiar with or fond of. The judges berate him for not being adventurous enough in his song choice. James gives an awesome performance of a Muse song that compels one judge to preemptively say that it will be the best performance of the night while five contestants were still yet to sing. And how did America vote? They unequivocally voted for the teenage country singer despite his performance being a.) lame and b.) criticized by the judges.

What this tells me is that Scotty McCreery is not going to lose Idol. Even when he has a bad week, and even when there is a clearly superior performance put out by a main rival, Scotty still gets America’s vote far and away.

At odds of 9/4, Scotty is just too good to pass up. He has been #1 on Dial Idol every week and should be more like even money or better to win this competition. It’s worth noting that Scotty was 2:1 to win prior to last night’s competition. It doesn’t make sense that his odds would get even longer after he is the #1 vote getter, does it?

I’m rooting hard for James, but this week my money is going in on Scotty at 9/4. In a couple of weeks, he’ll be even money or better to win. In the wake of a weak performance I’d say he’s very likely to bounce back from, now is the time to take the +225 on a guy that seems unstoppable no matter how hard his popularity is to understand.

I hope I lose this bet. James Durbin is by far the best act on Idol this year. But as we saw two years ago when Adam Lambert lost to a vanilla ice cream cone, America goes for the safe and comfortable choice. James Durbin is not that.

Now I just have to hope that insufferable country-bumpkin Lauren Alaina doesn’t win.

Enough about my love of the Super Bowl. Here are the bets I’ve taken on tonight’s game. I actually have no financial rooting interest in which team wins the game, but I suppose I’m rooting for Green Bay. Aaron Rodgers is my favorite player in the league (and has been for a few seasons now, long before he really reached his current level of fame) and I dunno… I just like GB. But I’ll take the Steelers winning if it means a majority of these bets come in.

Biggest Bets

Under 45.5 (-110)
Steelers to commit the most turnovers (-115)
Heath Miller under 42.5 receiving yards (even)
Brandon Jackson over 15.5 receiving yards (-110)
Mike Wallace NOT to score a TD (-160)
Aaron Rodgers NOT to score a rushing TD (-215)

Medium-Sized Bets

Ben Roethlisberger Under 14.5 yards rushing (+105)
Heath Miller Under 3.5 receptions (+110)
Aaron Rodgers Under 2 TD passes (-125)
John Kuhn Under 17.5 rushing and receiving yards (-125)
Donald Driver Under 45.5 receiving yards (-105)
Donald Driver’s first reception Under 9.5 yards (-125)
Clay Matthews total tackles and assists Under 4.5 (-130)

Small Bets

Rashard Mendenhall Under 1.5 receptions (-105)
Hines Ward Under 42.5 receiving yards (-115)
James Starks Under 1.5 receptions (-150)
Ben +4 completions vs. Rodgers (-105)
NO score in the first 7:30 of game (+135)
Green Bay to commit first penalty (+110)

And a couple of dollars on…

James Farrior to win MVP at 45:1 because why not?

Hopefully it’s as close of a game as Vegas predicts. The past few Super Bowls have just been awesome in terms of how exciting they are at the end. No one likes a blowout. Thankfully, I don’t think this game will deliver one.

Postgame update: What a game! I really thought Roethlisberger was going to cement himself as an NFL legend with a winning two-minute drive there. The best team won though, that’s for sure. Green Bay is so solid on both sides of the ball. They could easily win 2-3 of the next ten Super Bowls. A prediction I made prior to Week 1 of the NFL season was pretty close to being spot on:

As for my bets, I think I lost around 7-10% of the total money I wagered on the Super Bowl which isn’t bad at all. I thought I fared much worse after Mike Wallace caught a TD to ruin that bet and dash any hopes Under 45.5 had of coming in, but I guess I chipped away at those big loses by winning a lot of the smaller bets. Overall, not an awful game from a betting standpoint and a really entertaining game from a fan standpoint, so I’ll take it.

Sometime in 2008, when I was balling a lot harder than I am these days, I was at L’Auberge du Lac casino in Lake Charles, Louisiana with my roommate Michael and maybe a couple of other random people. A two hour drive away, L’Auberge is the closest casino to Houston, so we go there a fair amount. They don’t have a poker room, so when we go it’s to play craps and blackjack and to just generally get away for a night on the cheap (they comp us like crazy). It’s worth noting that L’Auberge is a really nice property. We would probably visit far less frequently if it was a dump.

On this particular evening, I had been enjoying some drinks and winning some money at the craps table. Like most people who have been winning money while drinking, I was in a very good mood.

My cocktail waitress on this particular evening was in her mid-30s. She was mildly attractive (most cocktail waitresses are at least that), but by no means gorgeous or anything. She seemed like a down-to-earth gal who was grinding out tips to make ends meet and was just looking forward to her shift ending. After ordering another Miller Lite from her, (gross, I know; I used to suck at drinking beer), I decided to tip her in a bit more of an interesting manner.

I set aside nine red $5 chips and one purple $500 chip. When she came back to the table with my drink, I told her she would be receiving one of these ten chips as her tip. She was immediately engaged. I don’t think the snowflake (which is what they call the purple $500 denomination chips) grabbed her attention as much as a break in the monotony of her shift. I concealed the chips between my palms, shuffled them, and stacked them. While keeping them concealed, I told her to pick a number 1 through 10. Whatever number she picked, that would be the chip she got (1 being the chip on the top of the stack, 10 on the bottom). She wasted little time saying, “six!”

“Alright, are you sure?” I asked her, making her sweat the moment a little bit.

She didn’t relinquish. “Yup… six.”

“Okay, six it is,” I said as I slowly revealed the stack of chips hidden between my palms.

One…

Two…

Three…

Four…

Five…

…

Six!

“OH MY GOD!” She exclaimed. She spiked the snowflake. All I could do was laugh and flip it onto her drink tray. She was in disbelief. “Are you serious?!”

“Hey… a deal’s a deal. Nice pull.” I said with a smile.

She thanked me profusely and walked away. Needless to say, I didn’t feel too bad taking drinks from her the rest of the night without tipping.

While tipping someone $500 for a beer might sound outrageous, as it does to me somewhat looking back on the incident, it’s a lot easier to do when you’ve been drinking and have a pile of those purple chips in front of you that you didn’t have when you walked into the casino that night.

As any smart person will tell you, all I really did was tip her $54.50 for the beer which, while generous to say the least, really isn’t that big of a deal when she’s been serving you dutifully throughout the night and you’re up several thousand at craps.

I don’t think I’ll ever forget that story and I definitely don’t think she ever will!

There are really only six awards that generate a significant betting market: Best Actor/Actress, Best Supporting Actor/Actress, Best Director, and of course, Best Picture. Usually in only a couple of these awards is someone a massive favorite. For example, last year, everyone knew Jeff Bridges was going to win Best Actor for his role in Crazy Heart so much so that no one was really betting on that award. People weren’t really interested in laying $300 to chase a $10 score. On the flip side, people felt like they’d just be throwing money away to bet against Bridges. In short: heavy favorites at the Oscars are bad for degenerate gamblers.

This year, every major betting category has a heavy favorite. The Social Network appears to be a huge favorite to take home Best Picture. I believe Colin Firth may have already received his Oscar in the mail for Best Actor. Natalie Portman is probably already working on her fake tears for the Best Actress speech as there is no drama as to whether she will win. Christian Bale is a runaway favorite for Best Supporting Actor, so the only drama there is if he’ll show up looking like a homeless person as he did for the Golden Globes. David Fincher is a stone-cold lock to win Best Director for his ability to make nerds sitting around typing code have the feel of a heist movie. That leaves Best Supporting Actress as the only category that might possibly come with a good sweat. But it might not either. Someone could be a huge favorite for all I know because who gives a s&*$ about Best Supporting Actress?

tl;dr: There’s no drama as to who will win the major awards at the Oscars this year which makes me mad because I can’t bet on anything.

A while later, I checked the page again to see how much the line moved or if they fixed their error. The line for Rangers team total was just totally gone. I found that pretty shocking since I figured, if they even noticed the error in the first place, that they would just move the line down to 3. Since the line went totally missing, I checked my “open bets” page just to verify that I still had action on the game. The Rangers bet wasn’t there! It went totally missing from my open bets page as if I had never bet it in the first place.

Tilted, I emailed Bodog’s customer support to ask them what happened to my hockey bet. I told them that if they just decided to void the bet, which seems like a pretty bush-league thing to do, that they could have at least dispatched an email informing me before I spent my evening sweating some huge bet that I thought I had. They responded saying the line was an error and that according to their T&C they reserve the right to void bets when there is an obvious line error. I was and still am pretty annoyed, but what can you do? Their policy is their policy.

Later in the evening, I checked hockey scores out of curiosity. It turns out Bodog did me a huge favor. The Rangers had me drawing dead to a push with 5 minutes remaining in the first period! They went on to tally 7 goals against the lowly Maple Leafs. Phew… not such a bad little policy you have there after all, Bodog.

So while the best way to bet NFL futures at playoff time is to parlay moneylines, there do seem to be three offerings on Bodog at the moment that could be +EV bets. I’ve determined this by looking at the lines on Pinnacle Sports, a low-vig sportsbook whose lines are considered to be the most accurate in the industry. In other words, whatever line Pinnacle has is probably the truest indicator of the team’s actual chances.

So what three lines on Bodog might merit a bet?

1.) The Patriots to win the Super Bowl at 2:1. At a glance, I would never have thought this might be good value, but it turns out it’s actually a pretty competitive line. Pinnacle’s line for the Patriots to win the Super Bowl is +184 while their line for them NOT to win the Super Bowl is -205. If you average these out, the “vig-free” line on the Patriots is around +195, so taking +200 from Bodog is probably, at worst, a break-even play.

2.) The Bears to win the Super Bowl at 12:1. Pinnacle has the Bears at 10:1 and -1500 to NOT win. The average of this is +1250 (ie: 12.5:1), so Bodog’s offering might not exactly be +EV, but I’ll show below why 12:1 is still probably about as good as you’ll get even if you parlay Bears moneylines throughout the playoffs.

3.) The Saints to win the NFC Championship at 4:1. The spread on Pinnacle for this prop is +376 and -438 against, so it’d be pretty hard to say that this bet is +EV, but compared to the rest of the NFL futures on Bodog, most of which are god-awful in terms of value, this one is surprisingly decent and a cheap way for people inclined to root for the Saints anyway to increase their overall fanboyness.

Now, to demonstrate why the Bears at 12:1 might not be a great bet but could be better than what you can expect to get parlaying moneylines. Their first game will be at home against the Packers or the Eagles. I think no matter who they play, that line will be close to pick’em, so let’s say the Bears have a 50% chance of making it to the NFC Championship where they will either be on the road against Atlanta or home against the Saints. Technically, they could wind up hosting the Seahawks, but the chances of that happening are negligible enough that we’re going to ignore it to simplify this example.

Let’s say there’s a 67% chance it’s in Atlanta, a game in which we’ll say they have a 35% chance of winning, and a 33% chance they’re at home hosting the Saints, a game in which they have a 55% chance of winning. We could argue about those lines some, but I think they’re pretty reasonable. Assuming there are no major unforeseen injuries to any of the teams and that the Bears move past the Packers/Eagles in unremarkable fashion, the Bears will probably be around a 4.5-5 point dog in Atlanta, and around a 1 point favorite in Chicago hosting the Saints.

Based on those odds, the Bears have a 41.6% chance of getting out of the NFC Championship and into the Super Bowl (for an overall chance of 20.8% of getting to the Super Bowl).

12:1 only needs to hit 7.7% of the time to be +EV, so if the Bears have an 20.8% chance of getting to the Super Bowl, they only need to have a 37% chance of winning it once they get there for 12:1 to be a decent bet. In order to have that good of a chance, they would need to be “only” about a 3.5 point dog in the Super Bowl.

So let’s break down the Bears likely Super Bowl opponents and what the line is likely to be if they are playing that team. If we come out to an average of 3.5 point underdogs or less, 12:1 is getting bet by this guy (realistically though, I’ll probably just bet it anyway because even if it is marginally -EV money-wise, I’ll derive enough entertainment out of the bet to justify the small expense):

SB Opponent – Likelihood – Bears Line
Patriots – 53.5% – +6.5
Steelers – 24% – +3.5
Ravens – 8% – +3
Colts – 6.5% – +3
Jets – 5.5% – +2
Chiefs – 2.5% – -1

Based on those estimates, the Bears are, on average, a 4.8 point underdog in the Super Bowl. This means we technically can’t quite justify a bet on them at 12:1. We need more like 13.5:1 for it to be +EV, but if you’re going to bet on them anyway, 12:1 might be better than you end up getting by parlaying moneylines.

• $100 buy-in (I need to have received this money before Sunday kickoff for you to be officially in).
• Each week you select one team. You cannot select the same team twice. This introduces more of a strategy element since otherwise it would be pretty easy to just take this year’s 2007 Patriots or 2009 Colts/Saints every week.
• Once your pick loses, you are eliminated from the league.
• In the event that the final 2, 3, 4… players are eliminated in the same week, they will either chop the prizepool or all advance to the following week. This will be determined by player consensus and factors like number of weeks left, etc. I’ll lean towards rolling it over for the next week when settling any possible disagreement.
• Payouts will be determined prior to Week 1 Sunday kickoff. It will be very top-heavy, but might give some money to 2nd place if there’s, say, 12+ participants.
• I must receive your pick in sufficient time prior to kickoff of the first game of that week’s schedule. If I don’t receive a pick, you will be given the Rams by default. If you have already used the Rams, you’ll get the Bills by default. If you’ve already used them too, you’re out of the league. For this reason, please don’t wait until 2 minutes prior to kickoff in the week’s first game to make your pick so there are no headaches.
• I will keep track of everyone’s picks on a Google spreadsheet that all league members will have access to.
• I know the season technically starts tomorrow, Thursday, with the Vikings-Saints game, but since that’s unlikely to be a game anyone would want to pick anyway, we’re just going to pretend the season starts Sunday.
• For managers who want to change their pick, that’s fine, but just to avoid any possible misunderstandings or confusion, no changes allowed within an hour prior to kickoff for that week’s first game.

That sums it up for the rules. I anticipate that we’ll have, at minimum, 8 participants. But it could be substantially more depending on how much I’m able to promote this between now and Sunday. If you want to play, I need your $100 (and your pick, naturally) prior to Sunday kickoff. Sorry, no IOUs. I don’t want to deal with the headache of having to track down people who haven’t paid yet. If I haven’t received your money by Sunday kickoff, you’re not in the league.

Here’s how you can submit your $100 entry:

PayPal: This is the preferred method of payment. Send $100 to fakekramer [at] gmail [dot] com. ***When sending payment via PayPal, please select the “Personal” tab (default is “Purchase”)***. Leave the radio box on “Gift”. This ensures I receive the full $100 rather than $97.20 or whatever. I’m happy to run the league, but I don’t want to supplement the prize pool in addition to that, even if it is just a few bucks or whatever.

PokerStars: My screenname is Ozone23. City is “Houston”.

Full Tilt: My screenname is OrangeBoy. City starts with an H. Clown avatar.

When you submit payment, contact me at the above email address letting me know that you submitted payment. This will also let me know which email address to share the league spreadsheet with.

Alright, I think that about does it for all of the formal stuff. This should be a really fun and competitive league and hopefully result in lots of sick sweats later in the season for some of the participants.

It’d be tough to make an argument against the Padres being the best team in the NL right now. Yet for some reason, they’re 7:1 to win the pennant on Bodog. If we assume they have about an 75% chance of reaching the playoffs, which I think fair if you put faith into the Baseball Prospectus season simulation, then they should be more like 5:1 to win the pennant and that’s just if you think they’re a flip in any postseason series once they get there. But for a couple reasons, I think they should be given credit to do better-than-a-flip in the playoffs (even though the MLB postseason is unfortunately just a crapshoot).

1. They’ll have home field advantage (probably). At the moment, the Padres have the best record in the NL. If they can finish the season strong, it stands to reason that the road to the World Series goes through San Diego. This certainly gives them a slight edge and would even make 5:1 on them to win the pennant start to seem like a decent bet.

2. They’ve got the secret sauce. Baseball statistician turned political analyst extrodinaire Nate Silver developed a formula for determining a team’s postseason success. He dubbed this forumla the “secret sauce” for doing well in the postseason which includes a combination of three things: a.) a team’s pitching staff’s strikeout rate, b.) it’s quality of defense, and c.) strength of their closer. In these ways, the Padres are nearly second to none (in fact, they were second to none a few days ago, but I see that the Giants have since taken a slight lead on the current secret sauce standings). Basically, in the metrics most predictive of postseason success, the Padres rule.

Since the strongest teams in the league (Rangers, Rays, and Yankees) are all in the AL, the path to the NL pennant is fairly soft for San Diego. Despite this, betting markets seem to be giving them very little credit. In fact, Bodog lists the Giants, who currently trail the Padres in the NL West, as bigger favorites to win the pennant. Also being given shorter odds to win the pennant on Bodog are the St. Louis Cardinals who Baseball Prospectus predicts as being barely more than a coinflip to even reach the playoffs. Who else does Bodog think has a better chance of winning the pennant? The Atlanta Braves, which might not be too unfair, but at nearly doubly more likely than San Diego, 3.75:1, is a joke. Even if you knew they’d be in the playoffs, which is far from certain at this point, you would be hard pressed to expect them to be better than 3.75:1 to win.

In short, betting markets have no love for the team that should probably be considered favorites to win the NL right now, so I’ll give them some love and hope they return the favor this fall.

Gooo San Diego!

I’ve had a crazy last 36 hours during which I went from being almost entirely certain I wasn’t playing the Main Event to bagging up chips for day two.

4:00 pm Wednesday

I put $100 on a 7-team baseball parlay to win $10,500. I was already up a bunch from betting Spain against Germany, so figured I’d give a bill back and try to luckbox my way into the Main Event. I text a couple of friends telling them which seven teams I need to run hot with, including Ray Coburn (Exitonly), who asks me why I don’t just sell pieces of my action on the 2p2 marketplace. “Hmm… I actually hadn’t thought of that, but I have no way of getting a bunch of Stars money into the Rio cage on such short notice anyway.”

“No worries,” he says, “I’ve got plenty of cash and need money online. I can give you an instant cashout.”

Huh. You don’t say?

5:00 pm

When my baseball parlay seems to have no legs, I text a couple of friends to see if they’d buy any Main Event action at a rate of 1% for $125. I get an overwhelming response and even sell a few shares to 2009 Card Player POY Eric Baldwin (basebaldy). “Hmm… maybe this could actually work,” I think.

5:15 pm

I call a friend and dictate a post to make on the 2p2 marketplace (I was away from computer). He tells me I can’t post in that forum until I get moderator approval. Dang, big snag. I text Ray wondering if he has any advice on how to get around that. “PM the forum mod,” he says. My friend does that on my behalf.

5:45 pm

After a short wait, my friend texts me to say that I’ve been approved to post in the forum. Sweet! The post is up and strangers from all over the world are checking out my Hendon Mob database and contemplating whether or not they have any interest in buying my action.

9:00 pm

I’ve sold a lot of action and playing in the tournament is starting to look quite viable. My friend Sebastien Sabic (Seb86) offers to buy a decent-sized chunk. Sold. Only need around $3,500 more. That’s doable, right?

11:30 pm

I get home from dinner with a friend and sell a few shares to my roommate. Only need to raise about $2,500 more to play, but there’s just 12 hours left to get the money and I’ve hit up most of my go-to sources. I go to bed totally uncertain if I’ll be playing the next day and hoping to wake up to emails about Stars transfers.

8:30 am Thursday

I wake up fairly early knowing there’s work to do in order to get into the tournament. I raised $500 while I was sleeping. Okay, just $2,000 more to go. It would be a shame to get this close and not play. I leave for the Panorama Towers to pick up some cash from Ray while continuing to hit up potential investors.

10:00 am

Ray hooks me up with two $5,000 Rio chips in the parking lot of Panorama. I thank him profusely for everything he’s done to help get me into the tournament. He’s still half-asleep and heads back upstairs. I wonder if he’ll even remember giving me $10k.

Another $1,000 sold to two friends.

10:30 am

I get to the Rio and head to the cashier’s cage to register for the Main Event. Even though I have about $1,000 more I’d like to come up with, I figure there’s no way I’m going to get that close and not play, so I go ahead and register.

11:15 am

While eating a salad wrap in the poker kitchen, I field posts on 2p2 and PokerTips and sell off more action. $9,625 raised. That’s good enough. I close the sale.

12:00 pm

Emmitt Smith announces ‘Shuffle Up and Play’. What? It’s ‘Shuffle Up and Deal’, Emmitt. Five yard penalty.

1:00 pm

My table is absurdly tight and passive.

3:00 pm

Table breaks. Bad beat.

Oh but wait… new table is just as tight and passive, if not moreso. Everyone, and I mean everyone, is playing tight and all pots are really small. This is fine by me – I can push them around in small pots and know that I won’t be in any spots where it makes sense to play a big pot light.

6:40 pm

Lebron James announces he’s going to the Miami Heat and the room erupts with chatter. A few guys at my table begin to hypothesize with significant confidence what Lebron’s reasons for going to Miami are. “Like they really have any clue,” I think.

7:00 pm

I leave for dinner break with 27k (from a 30k starting stack). Not ideal, but hard to expect to have a ton of chips at a table where no one is making any mistakes in big pots.

9:45 pm

I spot ESPN commentator Norm Chad walking by our table and get his attention to ask him if it ever gets boring just wandering around the WSOP all day. “Yes, but I self-medicate,” he tells me. He makes small talk with a couple people at our table and asks me if this is my first Main Event. “Nah,” I tell him. “Do you remember Michael Carroll catching a three-outter in 2008?”

“Yea, AJ vs. KJ or something like that.”

“Yea, exactly! I was the anonymous victim in that hand.”

“I remember that. Brutal!” He says with a surprising amount of empathy.

12:00 am midnight

Disappointed, I bag up 18.4k after losing several small pots in the last hour. I was the most aggressive player at the table, but it just never paid off for me; I never flopped any big hands that people paid off light because of my image. For that matter, I didn’t hit many flops at all and, apparently, everyone was hitting flops against me. That or maybe they were playing ABC poker against each other all day but coming out of their shells and out-playing me.

2:30 am

I go to bed utterly exhausted from a wild 36 hours feeling slightly agitated at the number of chips I’ll take into day two on Saturday but mostly grateful and appreciative that the stars aligned in order for me to play as well as optimistic about my chances for turning things around in a tournament where there’s certainly ample time provided to do just that.