More poker on TV

When I saw this news, I groaned inwardly…ESPN is showing even more televised poker next year. I know this gem of knowledge because I got the press release straight from Harrah’s, along with a 2005-6 poker season schedule. Yeah, I just typed “2005-6 poker season” with a straight face.

From Harrah’s:

Harrah’s Entertainment, Inc. today said ESPN will provide television coverage of the 2005-06 World Series of Poker (WSOP) Circuit.

The second season of the WSOP Circuit features an expanded schedule of 12 stops at Harrah�s casinos around the country, up from five Circuit events in the inaugural season. The 2005-06 Circuit begins this month at Grand Casino Tunica and includes events at Harrah’s casinos in venues such as Las Vegas, Atlantic City, New Orleans, Biloxi, Miss., and Lake Tahoe.

Each stop on the 2005-06 Circuit will offer several tournaments with buy-ins ranging from a few hundred dollars to $10,000 for the no-limit holdï’em Circuit Championship. The winner of the final event of each Circuit stop will qualify for the tour’s grand finale, the 2006 World Series of Poker Tournament of Champions, which also will be telecast by ESPN.

“No one produces poker better than ESPN and weï’re thrilled to have it provide enhanced coverage of the expanded 2005-06 World Series of Poker Circuit” said Jeffrey Pollack, vice president of sports and entertainment marketing for Harrah’s.

The schedule for the WSOP Circuit follows:

Grand Casino Tunica Aug. 11-25
Harrah�s Las Vegas Sept. 6-16
Grand Casino Biloxi Sept. 29-Oct. 12
Caesars Indiana Oct. 19-Nov. 2
Paris/Bally�s Las Vegas Nov. 9-22
Showboat Atlantic City Nov. 28-Dec. 9
Grand Casino Tunica Jan. 5-26
Harrah�s Atlantic City Feb. 7-17
Caesars Atlantic City March 21-31
Caesars Palace Las Vegas April 3-14
Harrah�s New Orleans May 18-28
Harrah�s Lake Tahoe June 6-16
2006 TOC at Rio June 28-29
2006 WSOP at Rio Summer 2006

If that isn’t enough poker news for you, there’s an interesting article from The Motley Fool’s Jeff Hwang, who is rapidly tiring of poker metaphors in financial analysis:

I gotta tell you: The general level of journalistic creativity in the financial market is astounding. When 71-year-old poker legend Doyle Brunson may or may not have led a group of investors in making an unsolicited and unconfirmed $700 million bid for WPT Entertainment last month, writers from no less than three different financial news services cleverly labeled the bid to be a “bluff.”

One wisenheimer went as far as to say that “The bid turned out to be a complete bluff; WPT management couldn’t get Brunson’s group to reveal its hole cards, and the deal was folded away in days.”

I mean, come on.

“Makes me want to swerve my car into a bridge abutment,” remarked Bill Mann.

Poker Writers: Please Curb Your Enthusiasm