2014 WSOP To Be Fully Integrated With WSOP.com

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Tuesday, May 20th, 2014 | Written by Shane Larson

Each year the World Series of Poker holds a pre-WSOP conference call in order to direct global media attention to areas of interest ahead of the prestigious tournament series in Las Vegas. This year’s media call subsequently focused on promoting the World Series of Poker’s legal online poker offering, WSOP.com, which currently accounts for two-thirds of the Nevada online poker market, and for the first time ever will be fully integrated into tournament poker’s showcase series. What follows are a few highlights as to what the public can expect from the live/ online poker crossover taking place this year at the 45th annual World Series starting on May 27th.

Deposit for WSOP.com at the Rio casino

The World Series of Poker is held at the Rio All Suites Hotel & Casino, and this year players will be able to deposit funds on the WSOP.com website via the live casino’s cashier desk. Likewise, players will also be able to cash out their online accounts at the cage, although not until the Series gets underway.

As a special incentive for players to deposit funds during the 45th annual WSOP, punters will receive a 100% deposit bonus on WSOP.com, good up to $1,000.

Satellites available for WSOP event

A total of 65 events will feature at the 2014 WSOP between May 27th through to July 7th, and this year WSOP.com will be running satellites everyday at 5pm and 8pm for these braceleted tournaments. Also included in the satellite schedule is the $10k Main Event, with 100 seats available to be won online, in addition to the 100 already awarded.

Play online while at the Rio

The Rio All Suites casino has set up a “Grind Room” in the Pavilion Room, complete with PC’s, WiFi, and other facilities to enable players to enjoy some online action between the times they spend competing in live events. To this end, WSOP.com has also tailored its online events to complement its live WSOP action, for instance, by lining up online turbo tournaments to coincide with the dinner breaks for its live tournaments.

In addition, players at live events will also be allowed to use their laptops, tablets, and other mobile devices to simultaneously play at WSOP.com during live tournaments, although only once the money bubble has burst. However, these devices must not allowed to interfere or otherwise slow down the live play, and as a result headphones will still continue to be banned throughout the competition.

The emphasis on fun

This year, the WSOP said it is looking to “bring the fun back” into WSOP tournaments by presenting a number of pre-event spectacles including a frisbee show involving dogs. This and other events should help relieve some of the day-to-day grind experienced by players as they spend endless hours competing for a gold bracelet.

The annual WSOP media conference call was held on May 13th by Executive Director Ty Stewart, WSOP Tournament Director Jack Effel, WSOP VP Communications Seth Palansky, 2013 WSOP Main Event Winner Ryan Riess, and WSOP Head of Online Poker Bill Rini. During the conference, other changes noted included moving evening tournament start times an hour earlier to 4pm, as well as the Rio refurbishing its decor with new chairs and carpets. Summing up the big changes announced, Lee Davy from calvinayre, commented:

“They believe there will be more people than ever, and as such have increased the number of cage windows and personnel. They also made a point of stressing the importance of bringing the fun back into the game and talked about the Rio’s new zip line attraction, new chairs, and a whole host of pre-tournament festivities designed to keep the players occupied. The dreadful food options have gotten slightly better with the introduction of a new Hash House A-Go-Go.”

WSOP.com background

WSOP.com has a presence in both the regulated poker markets of New Jersey and Nevada. In New Jersey, Caesars and its WSOP.com backed website is the chief rival to Borgata/PartyPoker, with the two brands currently accounting for 63% of the state’s online gambling industry.

In Nevada, Ultimate Poker may have been the first online poker site to launch in April 2013, but since WSOP.com entered the market in September 2013, the site has grown to represent two-thirds of the Silver State’s nascent market. According to PokerScout, market leader WSOP.com now enjoys 95 cash-game players over a seven-day period, with second place Ultimatepoker.com on just 55 players.