WSOP Main Event: It's a small table after all

As a child living in the mountains of Laos years ago, Jerry Yang didn't have toys - not even a ball or a marble. Instead, when his parents butchered a pig they would blow up the animal's bladder for their children to bat around.

Today the 39-year-old father of six sits at the final table of the richest poker tournament in existence, in a position to win the $8.2 million first-place prize at the World Series of Poker Main Event.

Yang was formally introduced in a WSOP press conference Thursday morning, prior to taking to the table to compete against eight other hopefuls for the title of world champion.

But he hasn't forgotten his humble beginnings, as he publicly pledged to share 10% of his prize winnings from the tournament among four different charities: the Make-A-Wish Foundation, Feed the Children, Ronald McDonald House and the university where he attended graduate school.

Though he's in a better place now - an American citizen who works as a psychologist and social worker - Yang said having such a large family has seen him go without luxuries such as buy-ins for poker tournaments. Consequently, he is not a regular player and has only been competing for two years.

"As a father of six you don't have a lot of money, so I just play when I have a little change here and there," he said at the press conference.

Luckily he managed to scoop up enough scratch to buy in to a local casino's satellite tournament to win a 2007 WSOP Main Event seat. The cost - all $225 - was his only investment in the Series, he said.

Final tablemate Lee Watkinson also qualified through a satellite to the championship - though this one took place online at Full Tilt Poker. Because the 2006 WSOP bracelet winner qualified through the site, talk began to surface that Watkinson was eligible to win an additional $10 million if he took down the Main Event title, thanks to an exclusive agreement between the poker room and its winners.

"It's no rumor," Watkinson confirmed to the media this morning.

Sadly, the 40-year-old wasn't to pocket the potential $18.2 million prize after Yang knocked him out in eighth place. But expect good things to come of his $585, 699 in prize money: In addition to his 17-year career as a poker player, Watkinson is an animal rights activist looking to create a chimpanzee sanctuary to rescue animals used in the film industry and for laboratory research.

Also, in a surprise early knockout, initial final table chip leader Philip Hilm met with the wrath of Yang after introducing himself to the media and giving a shout out to his posse of Danish pals - 1623 Poker.

"We're like a Danish Hendon Mob - you could put it like that," he said when asked who had come out to support him at the final table.

Though he's half Danish and Polish, Hilm currently lives in Cambridge, England - one of two Brits at the World Series final table.

The other is John Kalmar from Chorley, U.K. The 34-year-old professional poker player told those assembled that he had almost given up on poker which was bleeding him financially. He decided to play one last event - a satellite to the Main Event in Las Vegas - before quitting for good.

He is now seated at the final table and, although his chances of winning the championship event at his third-ever World Series of Poker are as good as anyone else's, Kalmar won't be walking away with all the prize money. Friends have backed the Brit in the poker tournament so he could fly his family over and have a little extra spending money, he said, totaling about a 45% piece of him at the final table. Whoever bought it will have a nice chunk of change, after Kalmar was eliminated in fifth place for $1.25 million in prize money.

Alex Kravchenko also admitted to taking backers - though just a friend back home who has 2% of the unflinchingly stoic Russian.

The 36-year-old became his country's biggest poker star this year by winning a gold bracelet and final tabling the main event. Not bad for someone who considers himself a businessman first, cash game player second.

Kravchenko, who has been playing the game for 10 years and lives in Moscow, was one of the players asked if he would consider making a deal once the table was whittled down.

"We didn't make any deal at this moment," he said, seeming not uninterested. "Is that allowed?"

Also on board for chopped pots in Tuan Lam, a 40-year-old professional poker player from Toronto, Canada who emigrated from Vietnam at the age of 19.

Though he's played poker for 10 years and made a living as a pro for the past four, Lam almost didn't make it to this year's Series. He had planned to go visit family in Vietnam during the series, but at the last minute switched flights and hopped on a plane to Las Vegas.

Not such a big journey from Ontario, but for player Raymond Rahme, the distance was far greater. As the first African player to ever final table a WSOP Main Event, Rahme made the trek from Johannesburg, South Africa and dragged along his personal cheering section.

At the press conference, fans in bright green t-shirts that read, "All In for Africa - Everybody Loves Raymond" snapped photos of the friendly 62-year-old.

The retired bed and breakfast owner said he has been an amateur Hold'em player for two years now (he won his seat at a local tournament) but not to count him out.

"I'm playing for the gold now," Rahme said.

So was Lee Childs before he was eliminated in seventh place. Like Yang and Rahme, Childs has been an amateur player for the past few years. Unlike the men, however, he turned pro exactly one month before making the final table of the World Series Main Event.

The 35-year-old Restin, Va., man thanked God, his family and friends for coming to support him, and credited the tournament with having an excellent structure for players. But, still, one reporter posed to Childs, is the Main Event really just a lottery?

"In any tournament, it's that mixture of luck and skill that's going to get you there," he said, laying claim to some sick beats throughout the event.

Notably absent until the end of the press conference was Hevad Khan. Never one to shy from the limelight, the multi-table king didn't take the microphone or receive an introduction to the media but was camera-ready and standing in the hot television lights in his PokerStars.com shirt at the wrap of the event. But no amount of media attention or crazy antics could save the man they call RaiNKhan, as he succumbed to the talents of Yang.

courtesy of Erin Warner

News Added: 17 July, 2007

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