By
Dan
PocketFivesLive.com launched in 2006, just before the World Series of Poker. Designed to bring poker enthusiasts everywhere coverage of online players in the biggest live tournaments, PocketFivesLive.com has turned into a staple of World Poker Tour and WSOP coverage. This year, we sent a crack team of six reporters to the Rio with the assignment of covering hundreds of players who they’ve never met or even seen a picture of in their entire lives. One of the six was Brett bertminatti Collson (pictured), a long-time PocketFiver with a knack for writing. Collson joined the PocketFives.com Podcast this week to talk about his WSOP experience after six weeks in Sin City.
Covering online poker players creates an entirely new set of challenges. Not only are there no faces to put with the screen names of those you follow online, there are also thousands of people to comb through at the Rio. You have to hunt down that one player who is seated in the Red section, Table 14, Seat 2 (assuming he didn’t get moved or bust out of the tournament, in which case he could be anywhere in the Western Hemisphere). Collson commented, “The biggest challenge was trying to get coverage to everyone who wanted it and deserved it. There were only two or three of us on the floor at any time, so it was really tough in the larger tournaments. I feel like we did as good of a job as we could and I hope that the players were happy.”
The PocketFivesLive.com crew was also responsible for typing up detailed reports online and contributing to daily feature articles on the site. Several of them also continued to work on their “real world” jobs after hours, meaning every day was a 20 hour workday.
To give you an idea, there were 6,844 entrants in the $10,000 buy-in Main Event. Over 60 PocketFivers cashed and one – Scott r_a_y Montgomery – is still in as part of the November Nine. Collson describes the opportunity to meet and follow some of the most popular names on the site, along with a few of his friends: “These are the guys that I watch all the time online. To be able to watch them in a live scene is really an awesome experience. They’re so happy to be there and it’s great to watch these guys come in and make a name for themselves in the live poker scene.”
Collson describes the scene surrounding Matt mattg1983 Graham’s win in the $1,500 limit shootout event (#53), the last bracelet won by a PocketFiver and one of his most memorable evenings in Las Vegas: “It was the longest day for us and Matt fought so hard for the entire World Series. He played the final table about 30 minutes after his first table ended and basically folded his way to heads up play against Jean-Robert Bellande. They started with 300K chips and Matt never got above 350K. He started heads up play as a 6:1 chip underdog. Once Matt got even in chips, we knew it was over.”
On the break day during the Main Event, which occurred between Day 1-D and Day 2-A, the staff was given the day off to take a moment and experience Las Vegas. In 2006, we trounced around Red Rocks in the pouring rain and hit up Deal or No Deal slot machines at Green Valley Ranch. Collson played in the media freeroll at the Rio that day, running over some of the top press minds in the industry. He talked about his win and the charity he picked, the Wounded Warrior Foundation: “The tournament played like a $2 turbo online. When we got down to three tables, everyone was short-stacked, which gave me an advantage. Nobody really had any idea how to play a short stack in that tournament. I decided to choose the Wounded Warrior Foundation, which helps wounded soldiers returning home from war. It hits home with me because my brother is in the Army. He did two tours in Iraq. He has friends who were injured in the war and I thought it was a great charity to choose.”
Listen to the rest of Brett bertminatti Collson’s interview this week on the PocketFives.com Podcast. Don’t forget: The Podcast is also available on iTunes.