There is a lot of talk regarding this tournament, with players and poker fans wanting to know all of the details, as well as speculating on the overall field-size, future of the tournament, and what this tournament may do to poker going forward.

How many players will enter?

The number on everybody’s mind (besides the prize-pool and the unprecedented amount of cash the winner will walk away with) is how many people will enter the tournament? Well as it now stands there is close to 40 confirmed participants in the event:

1. Guy Laliberté

2. Phil Ruffin

3. Andy Beal

4. Montreal private citizen group (Sean O’Donnell)

5. Cary Katz

6. Paul Newey

7. Richard Yong

8. Erik Seidel

9. Anonymous – U.S. venture capitalist

10. Anonymous – European hedge fund manager

11. Anonymous – U.S. hedge fund manager

12. Anonymous – French businessman

13. Caesars Entertainment seat

14. Caesars Entertainment via June 30 $25,300 satellite at Rio

15. MGM Mirage satellite seat

16. Bobby Baldwin

17. Patrik Antonius

18. Gus Hansen

19. Daniel Negreanu

20. Johnny Chan

21. Tom Dwan

22. Tony Guoga

23. Jonathan Duhamel

24. Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier

25. Daniel Shak

26. Justin Smith

27. Bob Bright

28. Arnaud Mimran

29. Paul Phua

30. Andrew Robl

31. Sam Trickett

32. Carlos Nahas (Grand Tournoi de Poker Loto-Quebec satellite winner)

33. Jens Kyllonen

34. Phil Hellmuth (80% likely)

With this many players already known it seems reasonable to believe the event will come near or reach the 48-player cap set.

Will this be a recurring event at the WSOP?

The WSOP hasn’t ruled out any possibility when it comes to the $1,000,000 One Drop tournament being played at future WSOP’s. Anything from a yearly, to a bi-yearly, to every four years has been kicked around, but in the end they want to wait and see how the inaugural event goes before making any long-term commitments.

My guess is that after the WSOP the people whose opinions matter will sit down and decide to make the One Drop event (or something similar) a once every four or five years occurrence. Although I fully expect to see a $100k event added to the WSOP schedule next year.

What kind of exposure will the winner receive?

The question I’m curious about is whether or not the winner of the One Drop tournament overshadows the Main Event? With the richest prize in poker history expected to be handed out to the One Drop winner, coupled with the remarkable bu0-in and the charity aspect of the event, it’s a real possibility that the 2012 WSOP Main Event winner gets overshadowed.

Tags: Andy Beal, Caesars Entertainment, Cap Set, Citizen Group, Daniel Negreanu, Daniel Shak, ElkY, Erik Seidel, Gus Hansen, Hedge Fund Manager, Loto QuéBec, MGM Mirage, phil hellmuth, Phil Ruffin, Poker Fans, Private Citizen, Prize Pool, Richard Yong, Term Commitments, Tom Dwan

This entry was posted on Saturday, May 26th, 2012 at 1:32 pm and is filed under Poker News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

One Response to “Countdown to the 2012 WSOP: Big One for OneDrop”

1. Don Bright says:

   June 5, 2012 at 11:56 am

   Curious as to viewing the event. Will there be “friends and family” type seating available? Anything special for the 3 different days?

   Please advise…..

   Don Bright (Bob Bright is entrant).