I was up against a table full of players I had never seen before,  and most of them had come to gamble.  I hadn’t.  I was there to win,  and in Omaha/8 you don’t make your money by splitting pots;  you make quantum leaps by scooping pots and that was my intention from the beginning.  I was there to play hands that stood a chance of winning both the high and low end of the pot.

The first hand I played was T-J-J-K with two hearts.  While it’s not a hand that will ever win the low end of the pot,  it’s a hand that can make a straight,  a flush,  or a full house if you get really lucky.  The flop,  however,  was A-2-5 with no hearts,  and when someone bet,  I folded.

A half-hour later I was in the big blind with Ks-4s-3d-2c and flopped 7-6-5 of mixed suits.  It was a mixed blessing.  I had a low hand but it wasn’t the best possible low,  and I flopped a straight too,  although it was the bottom end of it,  not the top.  Poker players call it the  “idiot end”  of a straight,  and not without reason.  It’s not a hand you can really bet aggressively because if someone has the top end of that straight it will cost you some chips.  A nine came on the turn and the river brought an Ace.  Now I liked my hand.  Although I did not have the best possible straight,  I had a chance at the best high hand,  and I had the best possible low hand to go along with it.  But all I managed to do was win half the pot and the guy sitting to my immediate left took the high end when he made a bigger straight with an 8-4 in his hand.

This guy was playing almost every hand and catching the cards he needed too.  He entered one pot with K-J-4-2 of different suits and flopped a straight to scoop the entire pot.  Other players were getting involved in far too many pots too.  Some players were showing down hands with nines in them,  a card that’s generally death in this game. My undoing came on what began as a great hand,  but of course it didn’t finish that way.  I was dealt Ah-2h-Ts-Qc in the big blind.  It was precisely the kind of hand I wanted to play.  If I got lucky I would make a flush,  either a high or a low straight,  or both  --  and a low hand too.  I got lucky;  or at least I did for a little while.  The Jd-9d-8c that flopped gave me the best possible hand at that point,  a queen-high straight.

Now I was hoping for a low card on the turn,  which would keep anyone drawing to the low end of the pot in the hunt,  and if I had my way,  I wanted a king on the river too.  A king would ensure that no one could make a better high hand than mine,  and would also dash the low draws’ hopes on the river’s shoals,  but not until they paid a high price to draw fruitlessly for half the pot.

But I was picky too;  I wanted it all.  If a low card and a king were to jump out of the deck,  I didn’t want either of them to be a diamond,  since a third diamond would plop a nice,  juicy flush right in the lap of anyone who might be sitting there with two diamonds in his or her hand.  I didn’t want to see an ace or a deuce either,  since any of the three remaining aces or three remaining deuces in the deck would counterfeit my low and promote someone else’s low hand to primacy.

The turn card was just what I wanted,  an inconsequential four of spades.  Anyone who took the long odds on catching two running low cards in order to win half the pot would be trapped in their draw.  I bet and was called in four places,  and I knew just what they were calling with too.  Someone was drawing to a low hand that was probably not as good as mine,  and I’m sure there was at least one player in there who had a flush draw too.

The fifth and final card proved my undoing when the ace of diamonds jumped out of the deck.  It ruined my low hand and probably answered someone’s prayers by giving him a flush.  I checked,  realizing that the only way I’d win that pot was for everyone to check after me,  a sure sign that no one was hoping for a flush and no one was drawing for a low hand either.  But that hope was short-lived.  Someone bet after I checked,  and the next player to act raised him.  When it was my turn to act,  I did the only sane thing I could do under the circumstances.  I threw my hand away.

I managed to hang around with very few chips for the next two hours.  I went all-in with the best hand I was dealt all day,  Ac-As-2s-Kc,  scooped a pot with three aces,  and survived another all-in encounter a few hands later.

I went all-in for the last time with Ac-2d-4c-6h,  and was happy to see Qs-7h-8c fall.  I had a draw to the best possible low hand along with a four of clubs to provide some protection against an ace or deuce.  Another seven came on the turn,  which was no help to me,  and made the chances of my winning the high end of the pot somewhere between slim and none.  But I still had hopes of capturing half the pot.  All I needed was to see a six,  five,  four,  or trey fall on the river.  Even an ace or deuce would give me a chance of winning the low end,  but none of those possibilities came to fruition when a king popped out of the deck,  putting an unceremonious end to a day that had all but ended two hours earlier.

But there are other,  bigger stories than mine at this year’s World Series and results from the early going are listed below:

Event #2
No-limit Hold'em
Buy-in: $1,500
Number of entries: 2,305
Total Prize Money: $3,180,900
1.	Allen Cunningham	Las Vegas, NV	$725,405
2.	Scott Fischman	Las Vegas, NV	$352,125
3.	David "Devilfish" Ulliott	Hull England	$232,205
4.	Can Kim Hua	Rosemead, CA	$200,395
5.	Liz Lieu	Los Angeles, CA	$177,000
6.	Charlie Huff	Geneva, OH	$136,780
7.	An "The Boss" Tran	Las Vegas, NV	$104,970
8.	Randy Edmonson	Columbus, MS	$73,160
9.	Heath Boutwell	Atlanta, GA	$54,075

Poker entered a new age on June 5,  2005 when 2,305 players  --  the second-largest field in the 36-year history of the WSOP  --  jammed the Rio Pavilion to enter the first open event of this year’s World Series of Poker.  Only last year’s championship event,  with 2,576 entries,  attracted more players.  The total prize pool amounted to a whopping $3,180,900,  more money than was awarded in the main event of the 1998 world championship.

Four of the finalists were former gold bracelet winners:  Allen Cunningham with 3 wins;  Scott Fischman,  the defending champion in this event with 2 wins;  and David "Devilfish" Ulliott as well as An "The Boss" Tran with one win each.

Based on the starting chip counts,  it looked like the final table might end with a Cunningham-Fischman showdown,  and that’s exactly what happened.  When heads-up play began Cunningham held a 2,200,000 to 1,600,000 chip lead and it took only five minutes for him to destroy the defending champion’s aspirations of staging a comeback by repeating in this event and winning a third bracelet.

On the final hand of the tournament,  a raising war ensued.  The board showed 10-6-3-5 and Fischman had a pair with an outside straight draw.  Cunningham was delighted to call Fischman’s all-in raise with 6-3,  a hand that was good for two pair.  A harmless ace fell on the river,  securing gold bracelet number four for Allen Cunningham.

Event #3
Pot-Limit Hold’em
Buy-in: $1,500
Number of entries: 1,071
Total Prize Money: $1,477,980
1.	Thom Werthmann	Bloomfield Hills, MI	$369,535
2.	Layne Flack	Las Vegas, NV	$185,855
3.	Hieu ‘Tony’ Ma	S. El Monte, CA	$118,240
4.	Martin Green	Brighton, England	$103,460
5.	David ‘Gunslinger’ Bach	Athens, GA	$88,680
6.	Mario Valenzuela	Temecula, CA	$73,900
7.	Pierre Nasr	Vancouver, BC (Canada)	$59,120
8.	Arash Ganehian	Marina Del Rey, CA	$44,340
9.	Ernest Patrick	Birmingham, MI	$29,560
10.	Gavin Smith	Guelph, Ontario (Canada)	$16,260

Thom Werthmann,  a 35-year-old owner of a high-tech telecommunications company in Detroit,  MI,  staged a memorable comeback and won a stunning upset victory over one of poker’s most enigmatic personalities.  When play became heads-up,  Werthmann overcame a 3 to 1 chip deficit vs. the always-unpredictable Layne Flack,  who was shooting for his 6th WSOP gold bracelet.  But after a two-day,  26-hour poker marathon,  it was the newcomer Werthmann who earned his first major tournament victory.