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Had all sorts of busy dreams last night, where I was constantly running around, having to be in two (or three or four) places at once. Probably because there’s a damn lot going on these days, poker-wise.

The PokerStars Caribbean Adventure — the first leg on the new North American Poker Tour — is finally winding down in Nassau, Bahamas. Harrison Gimbel (aged 19) took down the Main Event, earning a head-spinning $2.2 million. And last night another youngster, William Reynolds (aged 21), took down the High Rollers event, winning $526,240.

Meanwhile, the Aussie Millions has gotten underway down in Melbourne and will be running for the rest of the month, with the Main Event happening Jan. 24-30. Follow the action at the Aussie Millions over at PokerNews’ live reporting page.

Another bit of news came out yesterday, via Daniel Negreanu’s blog. The presence of 441 Productions at the PCA — the crew ESPN uses for its WSOP coverage — had suggested the possibility that ESPN would be carrying the NAPT, and according to Negreanu that indeed is going to be the case. Stephen A. Murphy gives us a good summary of that story over on the Card Player site.

The news that ESPN will be there at the Venetian for the next NAPT event — the main event of the Deep Stack Extravaganza series (Feb. 20-24) — certainly will attract a lot of folks to the Venetian who might not have been there otherwise. Will be interesting, too, to see whether this next NAPT event will affect the numbers at the World Poker Tour L.A. Poker Classic, also going on in February, although if I am reading the schedule correctly the Main Event over there doesn’t begin until Feb. 26. Many will play both events, I imagine, although a large number of players may only have the bankroll to choose one. (Links to schedules: NAPT Venetian; WPT L.A. Poker Classic.)

So it’ll be the NAPT vs. the WPT. The Venetian vs. the Commerce. ESPN vs. Fox Sports. And PokerStars vs. PartyPoker (sort of, as Peerless Media, Ltd., a division of PartyGaming, acquired World Poker Tour Enterprises late last summer). And, er, Vanessa Rousso versus Kara Scott? (Scott signed this week as a PartyPoker pro.)

Speaking of conflicts, while we’re all distracted by these other stories, most of us have taken our eyes off of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 after the deadline for the implementation of the law’s final regulations was delayed for six months to June 1, 2010. In what appears a bit of petulant politicking, Senator Jon Kyl (R-AZ), one of those involved in authoring versions of the bill that would eventually become the UIGEA, has discovered a way to respond to the delay. He’s currently blocking the appointment of nominees to fill various Treasury Department posts, apparently as a kind of payback for the decision to delay the UIGEA’s enforcement.

Maria Del Mar gives a good summary of the situation over at Poker News Daily, including some references to comments by various observers, such as Former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker, who are marveling at how Kyl can find it worthwhile to delay the filling of key positions in the Treasury Department while the U.S. continues to try and find its way out of financial crisis. Specifically, Kyl is preventing the appointment of six key officials, all of whom would help manage tax policies and international finance, posts which, as Del Mar points out, “even for the most hardcore poker fans, it should be clear that they ought to have a much higher priority than the UIGEA’s implementation or repeal.”

Among other folks, Del Mar points us to the political blogger Matthew Yglesias for more commentary. Seems more than a little unreasonable for Kyl to hold up the functioning of the Treasury this way in order to make known his grievance over the UIGEA delay.

But then, every single step of the legislative history of the UIGEA has been characterized by such self-serving, dysfunctional applesauce by its authors and backers.

A bill punted around in various forms for nearly a decade gets attached to another and passed into law without debate. Regulations get drafted, failing to clarify even the most rudimentary aspects of the bill (e.g., what constitutes “unlawful internet gambling”). A lame-duck administration finalizes the regulations, scheduling the sucker to go into effect on its last full day of its government. Banks and financial institutions, charged with enforcing the law, continue to plead they don’t know how to do so other than by “overblocking” all suspect transactions, and so a further delay is granted to revisit the issue, and perhaps entertain other legislation related to online gambling in the U.S.

Of course, all of these stories are connected pretty closely, as the fate of the UIGEA will directly affect that of the NAPT, the WPT, the online sites connected with those tours, and more. So, as I say, it will be interesting to see what happens in February in L.V. and L.A. And after that in D.C.

Meanwhile, go check out my interview with Victoria Coren over on Betfair about her book For Richer, For Poorer: A Love Affair with Poker. Coren was nice enough to take a little time out from her PokerStars Caribbean Adventure to answer my questions.

Have a good weekend!

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Spent most of yesterday running around seeing family and doing some last minute shopping. I did, however, try to monitor from time to time what folks were saying about the PokerNews interview with the still-unidentified Isildur1 that appeared yesterday. You know that name “Isildur” is a Lord of the Rings thing, right? This sucker is turning into a regular triple-feature.

I saw threads continuing to lengthen on the forums as the debate persists regarding what indeed might have happened prior to Brian Hastings’ huge $4.2 million winning session versus Isildur1 on 12/8/09. Still a lot of energy among the posters going back and forth with arguments over whether or not Hastings unduly benefited from information about Isildur1’s play prior to the session.

For most, the issue concerns Full Tilt Poker’s admonition, listed in its “Site Terms,” against players gaining “an unfair advantage” by “accessing or compiling information on other players beyond that which the user has personally observed through his or her own game play.” Statements by Hastings following the session alluded to his having seen reports on Isildur1’s play that had been compiled by his friend and fellow CardRunners pro Brian Townsend. (See yesterday’s post for more specifics.)

Adding to the intrigue, Full Tilt Poker’s Fraud and Security Team conducted an investigation of the matter, including interviewing Hastings, Townsend, and Cole South, and determined that neither Hastings nor South were guilty of any violations of FTP’s terms. Townsend, however, was found to be guilty of “datamining,” and has thus been stripped of his Red Pro status on Full Tilt Poker for one month.

Not the first time Townsend has violated FTP’s rules, incidentally. You might recall how late last summer (2008) Townsend admitted to having created and played under multiple accounts (though not simultaneously) on both Full Tilt Poker and on PokerStars. For that transgression, Full Tilt revoked Townsend’s Red Pro status for six months.

Interestingly, Townsend’s explanation at the time concerned the fact that he had been experiencing a downswing and was thus forced to play lower stakes games than he normally did. “The reason why I created these accounts,” wrote Townsend on his blog, “was because I enjoy anonymity when playing smaller and am very prideful in what I do.” (Townsend also spoke with PokerNews’ Gloria Balding at the time regarding the issue.) In other words, it was a desire to remain anonymous and not have players whom he faced know that he was Brian Townsend — a.k.a., the former phenom “sbrugby” who a year or so before had suddenly turned up at the high-stakes games to take on the big boys (much like Isildur1) — that motivated him to create and use the additional accounts.

If you’ve read the interview with Isildur1 from yesterday on PokerNews, you saw that the unknown Swede is considering filing a “formal complaint” with Full Tilt Poker regarding the session with Hastings. It almost sounds as though he hadn’t contemplated doing so until after having been told of Full Tilt Poker’s policies and their potential application to his session with Hastings. He also notes in the interview that he does not plan to play on Full Tilt Poker until he hears back regarding his complaint.

Not sure how far Isildur1 will get with his query, but I’m most certainly intrigued to watch what happens next. As I noted yesterday, the “Site Terms” at Full Tilt Poker as well as similar terms that exist at other online poker sites certainly include a number of essentially ungovernable prohibitions, thus creating a lot of ambiguity among many regarding their efficacy. It is interesting to think how a person’s voluntary publicizing of information regarding his play (e.g., Hastings’ post-session interviews) can invite such scrutiny — not to mention the potential for punishment.

In other words, as many poker players already know full well, it usually pays to keep quiet.

Such was Isildur1’s strategy until yesterday. Like most, I’m curious to hear more from the Swede, and apparently more is to come over on PokerNews. However, I wouldn’t blame him should he decide to resume his former policy of keeping mum. The safer path, it seems.

(I’m not big on Tolkein minutiae, but I guess his Isildur was finally taken down by a group of attackers after taking a less safe path.)

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It was about two weeks ago that the Rembrandt painting “Portrait of a Man, Half-Length, With His Arms Akimbo” from 1658 sold for a record $33.2 million at Christie’s in London and now the identity of the once-anonymous bidder is reported to be Las Vegas Hotel and Casino mogul Steve Wynn.

The Rembrandt portrait received a single bid the day of the auction, an anonymous telephone bidder for the amount of $33.2 million including fees to Christie’s. It turns out that the Las Vegas real estate developer made the call from his bathroom at 2:00 a.m. and became the new owner of the Rembrandt painting.

This purchase by Wynn exceeds another Rembrandt purchase from 2003, for which he paid $11.3 million. Wynn stated that he was going to add this painting to his collection because he wanted “people to see Rembrandt in relation to the Impressionists, post-Impressionists and early Modernists”

The Rembrandt painting hadn’t been seen in public in over 40 years, belonging to an heir of the Johnson & Johnson fortune during this time. The painting was first shown publicly in 1847, then sold at Sotheby’s in 1930 for around $89,000.

Steve Wynn is one of the most high-profile bidders at auctions these days with works from Rubens, Picasso Vermeer, Cézanne and others in his collection. During his career, Wynn has refurbished or built some of the most iconic properties in Las Vegas including the Golden Nugget, Treasure Island, Wynn, Encore and The Mirage.

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It was just over a week ago that the Playtech online slot game, “Beach Life” passed the $4 million jackpot mark and yesterday it was finally hit for a sum of $4,248,572. In the last few days before the jackpot was hit, it was increasing at an incredible rate of around $30,000 per day in Playtech casinos such as the “green” online casino Casino Del Rio.

The main draw at Playtech online casinos in the last year has been their hugely successful “Beach Life” progressive slot game. Over the course of the last year, “Beach Life” has paid out an amazing $8.2 million in three separate jackpot hits, at an average of $2.7 million per hit.

The jackpot hit yesterday was the largest in the history of the slot game, beating out the previous highest hit by around $10,000.

After yesterday’s hit, the “Beach Life” jackpot was reset to $50,000 and now begins it climb to the top of the jackpot list once again. Another Playtech jackpot to register a hit shortly before “Beach Life” was Gold Rally for a jackpot hit total of $617,737.

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“Beach Life” can be played at Casino Del Rio

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ull Tilt pro Erik Seidel began his career playing backgammon at the Mayfair Club in New York, where he and other famous players, including  fellow Full Tilt pro Howard Lederer, Steve Zolotow  and Dan Harrington, were first introduced to poker. After a few years playing backgammon, Seidel developed some interest for the stock market, and eventually moved to Las Vegas to play poker full time.

His professional resume includes eight WSOP bracelets in five different games (No Limit and Pot Limit Hold’em, NL Omaha and 8 or better, and Deuce to Seven Draw and  Lowball), along with one WPT title. As 2009, Seidel has earned over $9.2 million in tournaments winnings, and currently sits in 10th place on the All Time Money List.

Seidel played his first World Series of Poker in 1988, finishing in second place at the WSOP Main Event  in a legendary heads up match vs. Johnny Chan. The famous knockout hand against Chan was featured in the movie “Rounders”. Seidel continued playing large tournaments, wining his first WSOP bracelet in 1992 ($2,500 Limit Hold’em event) and taking two more bracelets in 1992 ($2,500 Omaha 8 or better) and 1993 ($5,000 Limit Hold’em)

In 1998 he scored his fourth bracelet and more than $130.000 in winnings in the $5K Deuce to Seven Draw event. His fifth bracelet came in 2001 WSOP $3K No-Limit Texas Hold ´em event for over $400K. Two years later he gained his sixth bracelet in the $1.5K Pot-Limit Omaha event, and in 2005 he made four final tables at the WSOP, and won his seventh bracelet in the $2K No-Limit Hold ‘em tournament.

Erik’s eighth bracelet came in 2007 at the No-Limit Deuce to Seven Draw Lowball. So far, only four players in the history of the WSOP (Phil Hellmuth, Doyle Brunson, Johnny Chan, and Johnny Moss), have won more bracelets than Seidel.

Erik’s record also includes a victory at the 2003 $2.5K No-Limit Hold ´em event at the Festa al Lago II,  a WPT Championship at the Foxwoods Poker Classic and a 2nd places in the 2007 and 2008 Aussie Millions Main Event.

Seidel is part of Team Full Tilt Poker, and represents the poker site at  the biggest and richest tournaments around the world. Watch for Erik playing online at Full Tilt Poker. To learn more about Team Full Tilt Pro Erik Seidel,  visit his poker profile on Full Tilt Poker or Erick Seidel Official Pro Site.

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