2008 WSOP Gold Bracelet Winner Event #31

2008 World Series of Poker
Event #31 Final Report
$2,500 Six Handed
No Limit Hold'em

Tournament Notes

WSOP GOLD BRACELET WINNER
EVENT #31 – Dario Minieri

The $2,500 buy-in Six-Handed No-Limit Hold'em championship attracted 1,012
entries, creating a prize pool totaling $2,327,600. The top 108 finishers
collected prize money.

The number of entrants increased over last year, when 847 players
registered for this same event. These figures represent an increase of 19.4
percent.

The tournament was played over three consecutive days. The final table was
played on the ESPN main stage and was broadcast by Bluff Media on
ESPN360. There was no other final table played on this day, which was one
of the few days on this year's schedule with only one scheduled final table.

Six-Handed Hold'em emphasizes short-handed poker skills. Rather than a full
table of nine players, each table is played six-handed (or less, as players
bust out). This generally requires competitors to play cards out of the
standard range of starting-hand requirements. It also makes post-flop skill
paramount to victory. The game was included on the WSOP schedule as a
concerted effort to measure as diverse a range of poker skills as possible.

Six-Handed No-Limit Hold'em made its WSOP debut in 2005. Three Six-
Handed events were included on the 2006 schedule. Last year, there was
only one Six-Handed event. Former champions from these events include
Isaac "The General" Galazan, Dutch Boyd, Bill Chen, Jeff Madsen, and Jason
Warner. Rep Porter won the event held earlier on this year's schedule.

This is the second of three Six-Handed No-Limit Hold'em events on the 2008
WSOP schedule.

Last year's winner was Hoyt Corkins. He did not enter this year's
tournament, because he was playing in another event when this tournament
started.

The winner was Dario Minieri, from Italy. He is a 23-year-old professional
poker player.

Minieri collected $528,418 for first place. He also earned his first WSOP gold
bracelet.

This was Minieri's fourth time to cash at the WSOP. Previously, he was best
known within the poker world for being one of the chip leaders at the end of
Day One in last year's WSOP Main Event. Minieri went on to cash out,
finishing 96th in the 2007 world championship.

Minieri has made it to three final tables at the Italian Championship of
Hold'em (Capionato Italiano di Poker) since 2005.

Minieri becomes the second WSOP gold bracelet winner from Italy at this
year's WSOP. Max Pescatori, from Milan, won his second WSOP victory last
week.

The second-place finisher was Seth Fischer, from Atlanta, GA. Prior to taking
up poker, he played college basketball and attended Emory University.

Third-place finisher Justin Filtz, from Stevens Point, WI nearly tied a record
once thought to be unbreakable. In 2007, Steve Billirakis became the
youngest WSOP gold bracelet winner in history, at the age of 21 years and
11 days (at his time of victory). Had Filtz managed to win this event, he
would have tied Billirakis, with the exact same age. Note: The record set by
Billirakis last year was eclipsed at WSOP-Europe last September.

Former WSOP gold bracelet winner (1997) Kevin Song made it to the final
table and ended up as the fourth-place finisher.

1998 world champion Scotty Nguyen finished in seventh place. This was his
first time to cash at this year's World Series. He now has 35 career in-the-
money finishes.

French poker pioneer Bruno Fitoussi cashed, finishing in 11th place.

Two-time WSOP gold bracelet winner Bill Chen took 19th place.

Other former WSOP gold bracelet winners who cashed in this event included
Shankar Pillai (31st), Ian Johns (33rd), Max Pescatori (41st), Mark Vos (82nd),
David "Devilfish" Ulliott (94th), and Brandon Cantu (106th).

Avery Cardoza, the owner of Cardoza Publishing (which published Doyle
Brunson's famous "Super/System") finished 77th.

Through the conclusion of Event #31, only one player has cashed six times –
Nikolay Evdakov, from Moscow, Russia. He is best positioned to challenge
the record set for "Most WSOP Cashes in a Single Year," shared by four
players -- Michael Binger (2007), Chad Brown (2007), Phil Hellmuth, Jr.
(2006), and Humberto Brenes (2006), with eight in-the-money strikes.

The current Milwaukee's Best Light "Player of the Year" standings shows Erick
Lindgren on top of the points list, with one gold bracelet win and four
cashes. However, Daniel Negreanu and Barry Greenstein are now close
behind.

Through the conclusion of Event #31 at this year's World Series of Poker, the
gold bracelet count by nations and states reads as follows:

8 – Nevada
5 – California
4 – New York
2 – Canada
2 – Italy
2 – Missouri
1 – Germany
1 – Holland
1 – Maryland
1 – Michigan
1 – Pennsylvania
1 – Russia
1 – South Carolina
1 – Wisconsin

So far, this WSOP has been deemed "The Year of the Pro." Professional
poker players have reasserted their dominance in tournament play by
winning a vast majority of gold bracelets (76 percent), especially over the
first half of the schedule. However, it is important to note that amateur
poker players have dominated WSOP tournaments since 2005. Here is a
listing of the "pro versus amateur" scoreboard each year since 2000 (Note:
The Casino Employees Event is not counted):

2000 – Pros 14 to Amateurs 8

2001 – Pros 18 to Amateurs 7

2002 – Pros 18 to Amateurs 16

2003 – Pros 24 to Amateurs 12

2004 – Pros 21 to Amateurs 11

2005 – Amateurs 26 to Pros 18

2006 – Amateurs 27 to Pros 17

2007 – Amateurs 34 to Pros 20

2008 (through Event #30) Pros 23 to Amateurs 7

Since 2000, pros currently lead amateurs in the gold bracelet race by a
margin of 173 to 148.

It should be noted that the largest influx of new poker players to the WSOP
took place during the period when Amateurs won a majority of events. There
are contrasting interpretations of what this data means. Some suggest the
larger number of amateurs playing at the WSOP inflates their winning
percentages by sheer volume. Others (most pros) point out that the WSOP
has the best tournament structures of any poker event in the world and that
professionals have a much greater opportunity to prove their superior skill
under this format.

The Event #31 winner Dario Minieri is to be classified as a professional.
Accordingly, through the conclusion of Event #31 at this year's World Series
of Poker, the "Professionals versus Amateurs" gold bracelet scoreboard
reads:

Professionals – 24 wins
Amateurs -- 5 wins
Semi-Pros -- 2 wins

CORRECTION: This will address a previous tournament report, specifically
Barry Greenstein's victory in the Razz championship, which was Event #26.
Greenstein's background has been widely misreported for quite some time
and some confusion may continue due to the contents of that report. It
should be noted that Greenstein has been a professional poker player for
several decades. Many writers, reporters, and interviewers have latched on
to a widely-misreported notion that Greenstein first worked in the high-tech
industry, and then retired from that field to play poker. This is simply not
true. Greenstein has been playing poker professionally for many, many
years. While he was playing poker as a pro, he took a position with a high-
tech company for various reasons while he maintained his status as a
professional poker player. The WSOP Media Relations Team kindly asks that
all media correct written verbiage that makes any reference to Greenstein
leaving the high-tech field to play poker. As is the case with many multi-
talented poker pros, he has excelled at more than one occupation.

World Series of Poker Commissioner – Jeffrey Pollack

Director of Sponsorship and Licensing -- Ty Stewart

Director of Broadcasting and New Media – Craig Abrahams

Director of Communications – Seth Palansky

Regional Vice President of Specialty Gaming -- Howard Greenbaum

Tournament Director – Jack Effel

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Photo Provided By: IMPDI for the 2008 WSOP