The 2008 WPT Legends of Poker tournament started late last month. So far they’ve played 24 events, and the $10,000 main event started on Saturday. It will run for four days, and wind up some time on Thursday. All the events before the big main event were $1000 or smaller buy-ins.

Behzad Teranie won the $1000 no-limit hold’em event #24, and took home $51,570 for his efforts. Second-place prize money of $25,270 went to Ian Kim. In the $1000 no-limit hold’em event # 21, Ablahad “Fast Eddie AS” Salim won first-place prize money of $97,620. Second-place money of $48,545 went to Tu Huynh.

Men “The Master” Nguyen added another first-place finish to his long list of cashes when he won the $500 Omaha High/Low event #15. He took home a modest $20,535 after outlasting second-place finisher John Bessent, who won $10,050 as the runner-up.

Having a poker nickname is important for one simple reason - table image. When people refer to you by your nickname it tells other people that you’re an experienced player that has been around for a long time. You don’t get a nickname that sticks when you’re a novice player. It tells everyone around that you know what’s going on at a poker table, and opponents should think twice before messing with you.

Having a nickname will also help you promote yourself. Players with nicknames seem to get more press than other players. The nickname offers a little more into the personality of the player, and sometimes even into the style of play that person may employ.

Besides, having a nickname is cool. If you’re lucky enough to be given one by an established player it can only help you and your table image. Even bad ones get noticed and remembered.

Poker tournaments give dedicated players an opportunity to show how they match up against other local players, and a chance to win a nice prize pool that could impact their lives. Everyone is playing; even that guy who said he hates to play cards now sits in regularly to try his luck and have some fun.

Before poker had its boom in 2003, Fremont St. was the place for poker action. It still has some great poker rooms, but they don’t compare to the new big rooms on the Strip. Poker was grown at Binion’s, and the WSOP was held there until Harrah’s bought it and moved it to the Rio.

The Golden Nugget has a mixture of locals and tourists floating around the poker room. The room is small, but you’ll find diverse action and a great poker atmosphere. The Plaza has a large poker room that will take you back a few decades. They offer daily sit-and-go tournaments, as well as the regular cash game action.

The El Cortez is the other downtown poker room. It has a limited number of tables, and is a favorite with the old timers because a spread-limit $1-$3 or $1-$6 Texas holdem game is played there.

The best tournament poker action in Vegas is still at the Bellagio. There are daily $540 no limit holdem tournaments, except on Friday when it’s a $1080 entry fee; plus a wide variety of smaller stakes events running every day. The MGM Grand has daily $60 no limit tournaments, and $125 no limit holdem events on Sunday, Wednesday, and Thursday.

The Venetian has $125 re-buy events on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday. On Wednesday it’s a $145 event, and Saturday is the big $540 no limit holdem event. Mandalay Bay has smaller tournaments ranging from $40 to $65 every day, plus a $157 dollar event on Thursday.

All these poker rooms will have special events on top of all these regular scheduled tournaments. Check out the casino websites for special events that may be going on. And get to the registration times early, as these events fill up fast.

23-year-old online poker player Dario Minieri won his first bracelet at the 2008 WSOP.

2008 was a big year for internet players getting more press and attention. Online poker rooms are giving more sponsorship deals to successful internet players, banking that these players will do well in the live tournaments. Since 2003, amateur players have made a big splash at the WSOP. But that didn’t work very well this year. The professional players made a comeback, with 11 big-name pros winning bracelets, and most events having one or two big names at the final tables.

Dario Minieri was one bright spot for the big-name internet players. He won his first bracelet in the $2500 No-Limit Holdem 6-handed event. Most players at the WSOP are internet players to some degree, but the big-name internet players were not a force at the biggest poker tournament in the world. I guess the new generation of player isn’dt ready to dominate yet.

Don Cheadle and poker pro Annie Duke hosted their second annual Ante Up for Africa charity tournament last Wednesday, hoping to repeat the success of last year’s event. They had 88 players turn out, each of them buying in for $5000. All money raised will be used to increase awareness of the humanitarian issues currently occurring in war-torn Darfur.

Final results of the 2008 tournament are:

John Hennigan $136,860
Michael Degusta $85,536
Dan Shak $54,529
Phil Hellmuth $38,491
Matt Calhoun $31,006
Jerry Cantrell $25,660
Jordanna Schutz $21,384
Ray Romano $18,176
Casey Affleck $16,038

The top finishing players are asked to donate half of their winnings to the cause, and this year they all donated 100%. Proceeds specifically go to the Not On Our Watch (NOOW) project, the group founded by Cheadle, George Clooney, Matt Damon, and Brad Pitt to focus attention on stopping atrocities that are committed worldwide.

Does the perfect Texas Hold’em strategy exist? I guess it does, but only to a degree. There’s no such thing as a strategy that will make you a winner every time you play. There’s too much luck involved in poker to make someone a consistently dominant force on the poker tables. If you play poker with any seriousness, you know that you can do everything right in this game and still lose.

The perfect strategy in Texas holdem takes years to learn. It’s a personal journey that one gains with experience; along with the help of whatever one can learn in poker strategy books along the way. The best strategy is being able to recognize how every opponent plays, and then being able to adjust your game to beat them at what their habitual weaknesses. That strategy can be studied, but will take tens of thousands of hands to learn to execute.

A very hot Annie Duke, poker pro

This year’s WSOP started out as one of the best in years for female players. With three women making four final tables in the first 25 events, it looked like it would be the best year ever.

Kathy Liebert was the first to advance to a final table, finishing third in the $10,000 world championship Pot Limit Holdem Event #1. Next was Vanessa Selbst winning the $1500 Pot-Limit Omaha event #19; she followed that up by finishing third in the $10,000 World Championship Heads-Up event #25. Jennifer Harman then made the final table of the $3000 HORSE event # 22.

It has slowed down for the women since then. There has only been one other woman to make a final table over the next 15 events. Annie Duke finished fifth in the $5,000 World Championship Seven Card Stud Hi-Low Split-8 or Better event #33, almost winning the second WSOP bracelet of her career.