Andrew Feldman

  (1:58 PM)

Welcome to today's World Series of Poker Chat! Joining me today is Barry Greenstein and he'll be here shortly to answer all your questions! Send 'em in now, we'll get started in a few.

Barry Greenstein

  (2:01 PM)

Hey everyone.

Chuck (Chapel Hill, NC)

Barry, how come you quit doing your Bear Blog and Tips from the Bear podcasts? I got turned on to Poker Road while listening to The Poker Beat. Love it. But, neeeeeeeeed more content.

Barry Greenstein

  (2:05 PM)

I haven't quit doing either of those. We have the video Bear Blog and so there's no point to do the audio version as well. Some people are upset because you can't just listen to it on iTunes. It's not totally dead, just not as frequent. Tips for the bear - I have a few of them written, but not done. We have so much content on PR right now with the WSOP, like the PR Nation, it's just such a high content season for us that I figured I'd wait to put it up later when we don't have as much content. In tips I go over televised hands and I haven't made a WPT final table lately so I don't have hands to do lately and honestly, therevised programming, but if I do get on to play poker on TV, I'll get them up there.

Kevin Indianapolis Indiana

Barry how many events are you playing in this year in the wsop

Barry Greenstein

  (2:15 PM)

Its kind of funny, I won't name names, but a female poker player said that I'd play the $1,000 events, but I only normally play one or two of the NL each year and typically play the limit events because I have side bets and the fields are smaller. With the NL fields so big, its hard to make a final table and with the side bets I have, I need to make the final tables. I played over 20 events last year. Each of the year that HORSE has been there, I've made it deep each year, making the money all three times. I'll play 20, but hopefully I'll be successful and player fewer!

Chris Z: (Detroit, MI)

Barry, Do you have any interesting prop bets going on during the wsop?

Barry Greenstein

  (2:17 PM)

Yes. I have a lot of prop bets. The biggest one is that I have a team bet for player of the year points (me and Jeffrey Lisandro vs. Lindren and Negreanu).

Bill (Jacksonville)

Could this chat go any slower?..are you playing a few online games while chatting>?

Barry Greenstein

  (2:19 PM)

I'm just filling Andrew in on my table draw from yesterday. I have some bracelet bets, I have some bets where I'm taking the worst of it because my players aren't even playing yet!

Brian (LA)

You got "LOL Donkaments" and "Math is idiotic" on the TV, what phrase is next?

Barry Greenstein

  (2:23 PM)

Well. I'm not really sure. the LOL donkaments worked out really well. The timing and the surprise with everyone. People didn't know that I would do it and that I had done it. It worked really really well. People really embraced it adn it was great to see so much money to go to charity. The problem with math is idiotic is that the second time around it wasn't as easy. It wasn't a challenge, and a lot of people didn't feel inclined to donate. Charities are getting hurt in this bad economy. This one, instead of over $50,000, it might barely reach $5,000. It's still a plus that I did it as every little bit helps, but it hasn't had the effect it has before. What's next? I guess I would hope that someone else comes up with an interesting proposal where people would think its neat enough to get involved with and donate large amounts of money.

Rob - Altamonte Springs, FL

Which version of the WSOP do you prefer - WSOP 2009 with more tournies and bigger fields or (say) WSOP 1999 with fewer tournies and smaller field?

Barry Greenstein

  (2:29 PM)

I don't know if people realize, but I didn't play tournaments. I went ot the WSOP at the time (1991) was good cash games. I always used to play PL hold 'em. For all these years I did play the main event and maybe I played some others, but I didn't go there for the tournaments. The WSOP for the more serious poker players meant cash games. I didn't play with Doyle and Chip back then, but here's the funny thing -- the way it worked, the professional poker players, the good cash game players went and played in the cash games and then would put the people who were busted in the tournaments! We'd put players in and then bet on the side on our horses! The people who played then were the ones that couldn't buy into the cash games! The tournaments were the losers brackets. The cash games are down, the economy is down and we'll be pllying the tournaments more because the cash games are so slow. I used to make a lot of money during the WSOP in the cash games and look forward to it each year. Now, those games don't exist and now I hope like everyone else that I run good and win a bunch of money that way.

Lon (Tracy, CA)

Barry going into a WSOP season do you and your step son Joe talk tourney strats? Joe's got quite the rep for being able to amass chips in large fields.

Barry Greenstein

  (2:41 PM)

We have no talked about poker at all in a long time because Joe is working so hard on Poker Road. He had unbelievable results after playing a year and a half (won 4 tournaments, 2 WSOP final tables, deep runs in WPT - seventhbok and a nine-stein), but now he's just working on PR. We used to talk about hands, but now we just talk about things going on with the website. If he does play a tournament he'll bring up a hand where he lost a lot of chips or went bust on, and I'll get a call or text and he'll describe the hand and ask if there's anything he could have done.

Chris (Kansas City, MO)

Barry, any thoughts on where the most lucrative side games can be found during the WSOP? Is all the good action limited to the Rio?

Barry Greenstein

  (2:46 PM)

I really don't know and it's not the same every year. In Las Vegas the Bellagio is usually the central place for poker, but it tends to be slightly bigger games. I've heard different years that the juiciest games are at the MGM or someone else said the Venetian and then sometimes people just stick around the Rio. I think the answer a lot of people would give is to ask some of the regulars. They'll know where the good games are, but that doesn't usually work with poker since you want to find the live games. If there was some really juicy game, there's a good chance the regular won't tell you it exists, even! You have to do your homework and try and find out where the good games are. It's part of being a poker player.

DUSTAN SHEBOYGAN WI

Does your deal with pokerstars hurt your online earning potential because you cant play in the big games on full tilt?

Barry Greenstein

  (2:53 PM)

It definitely hurt me a lot last year and I didn't even know it. What happened was that before the WSOP, a lot of the young players were playing in the mixed games since they wanted to play in the 50K horse event. They were learning the game at the highest stakes. When the WSOP started, I heard how much some players who wouldn't sit down at the table with me made off of these young players learning the games. I missed that. Nobody wanted to tell me about these games b ecause it was so juicy and they didn't want to let me in on the action. PokerStars has really been good to me and treated me well so I never even look into the contract! I don't even know to this day that I can't play on Full Tilt, but the truth is that these games aren't that good anymore. Once those providers stopped playing, the real action is the eight-game on PokerStars. I probably missed the boat on a lot of money a couple years ago, but from a poker point of a view, I'd think the full tilt people wish they were on Pokerstars, not the other way around.

Brian (Augusta, GA)

With the record number of players so far, do you think this trend will carry over to the main event? You had the over/under at 188 for the 40K. What about the main event? Good luck the rest of the series.

Barry Greenstein

  (3:02 PM)

I thought that we'd set records in most of the events this year and I spoke to Jeffrey Pollack and Jack Binion and they seemed to agree. Now with the way the laws are, no online sites can get the players in and the player gets his money directly in his account. Its hard for a small-stake player who wins a satellite to take the $10,000 out of his account and play in the WSOP. Harrah's has been very accurate in their projections over the last few years. A month ago they said they were going to get 7,000 for the main event. Based on the numbers they've had and based on their projections, I don't have a reason to go against.

Larry Boynton Beach, FL

Barry, What have you the idea to give a copy of your book out to the person that knocks you out.

Barry Greenstein

  (3:07 PM)

That year, 2005, my book was going to come out during the WSOP, but when you publish the book, a lot of times they give you the pre-printed book but they're really test copies. I got about 20 test copies and the other thing I was doing with them was giving them to media and other people to read. I had a couple of books at the table and people were looking forward to my book when it came out and they asked me if they could ge ta copy. Finally, someone said, "What if I knocked you out?" I said "OK, if you knock me out, I'll give you this copy." Then of course, everyone else at the table said that's not fair, what if we knock you out! So someone knocked me out, I gave them a copy and it got written up in the tournament reports. The next day people asked the same thing! Phil Hellmuth came up to me and said how great of a marketing thing it was. So, I just continued to do it!

Barry Greenstein

  (3:11 PM)

Thanks everyone. Happy to answer these questions, but I was critical of the format because either the thing people like or hate about me during interviews is the digressions! I start on a topic and wander all over the place. Thanks for the questions!

Andrew Feldman

  (3:12 PM)

Thanks to Barry for joining us today! Tomorrow we'll have Matthew Parvis from Bluff joining us and more pros lined up for next week!