Shawn Rice's 2007 Recap

Early in 2007 I was out in Vegas a lot playing many of the Ultimate Poker Challenges. I was lucky enough to win a couple of these and made several final tables. These were not really big fields but had some really good players. Many of your top pros would play them and with good long levels made for some good televised final tables.
It looked like I was going to be in Vegas for a long time as the UPC was planning on lasting through October, So me and Mike "MaddMike" Foley who also had some great success in the UPC got a condo in Vegas with a 9 month Lease/Option as soon as we signed the lease the UPC folded. I hope this Ultimate Poker Challenge kicks back up again. It was a fun tourney and a good structure.

Being as I was living in Vegas for the first time ever, I did play some of the daily tourneys at the Wynn, The Bellagio and  The Venetian Casinos. I didn't play these very often but I did well, making a Final Table with Poker Ho at the Wynn. At the Bellagio I had a win and also made a final table there, not bad for only playing it 3 times. Once, Amarillo Slim was in town and asked me to go play the Bellagio and we were lucky enough to be at the same table with each other and Orel Hershiser. That was very interesting as I have been a baseball fan all my life. We played at the same table for a few hours and I was really impressed with his poker playing. I remember feeling really weird when a couple of people wanting to have their pictures taken with Slim and I and we are standing next to Orel and he is the one not getting asked, kind of unreal. I guess in a card room people go to see poker players and don't even notice the real celebrities.

In April downtown Vegas had its own Las Vegas Grand Prix where the roads were blocked off for a few days so they could race through downtown Las Vegas. It was very exciting to watch and Binions had it's own Las Vegas Grand Prix of Poker tourney where Mike Foley and myself were lucky enough to make the final table. I get down to heads up with a gentleman and have a really big chip lead over this guy and as they are doing a television interview on the 3rd place finisher they dealt our hand and ask us to wait. During the wait, I look down and see 2 eights in the hole and I was on the button and was 1st to act and I raised it. My opponent didn't know that I had look at my hand yet and asked me if I had looked before I raise it. I said "What makes you think I need to look?" he said he was all in and I called, he turned over 2 sevens and the eights held up and I was lucky enough to win the first ever Las Vegas Grand Prix of Poker in one hand heads up. The tourney was sponsored by the Grand Prix of Champ Car Racing World Series. It was a nice honour and really nice crystal trophy. Todd Brunson won the Las Vegas Grand Prix Celebrity Invitational and a nice crystal trophy as well.

Later in April I played in the WSOP Circuit Event 1K buyin and was about average in chips when James Woods came to the table and it was not long before he told everyone at the table he never bluffs because of who he is and people are always wanting to beat him so they can say they beat him, so, he never has a reason to bluff. I thought this was so funny because I have played with him for several hours on the Professional Poker Tour and trust me he is famous for loving to bluff, but I never said a word. It was not long before he raised in early position and I was across the table on the button with QQ and decided to just smooth call cause I know he would bet any flop, the flop came 9 4 2 all rainbow, He looks at me and asked me if I have any $1000 chips, I said "no, not yet" not in a cocky way,  but that was just my response. He makes a statement to the table that Shawn is just trying to intimidate me with that statement. I know by me saying something and acting strong he will perceive me as calling with a week hand, as acting strong usually means weakness. So he leads out for almost a pot size bet, I call. The turn card is a 3 of clubs bringing 2 clubs on the board, he again bets almost a pot size bet. I took a while before I called to get as much information as I could from him and the longer I took the more he tried to act strong, Leaning forward and really trying to convince me he had a big hand. I could of raised there but I think he was a lil tilted by my comment. I thought I was trying to be humorous but I guess he didn't think so, the river was the Q of clubs, bringing 3 clubs on the board now and he immediately said he was all in. This Q on the river makes me trips and I am asking myself why would he bet just over a pot size bet with a flush? I know he plays well enough to sell his hand off for a cheaper price if he made the flush and the 2 3 4 on the board was not scary for me as he raised from early position, I didn't put him on A5 or 56, to my surprise he had 78 both diamonds and flopped no pair no draw. A few minutes later Shannon Elizabeth sat at our table and I congratulated her on getting deep into the National Heads Up Poker Tourney on NBC and told her about James saying he never bluffs and why, she just laughed. I end the day as the chipleader and I have a few players I know at the final table, Surinder Sunar and Mike Beasley are two world class players. I was very disappointed as I took 8th in this tourney as my hands seem to just find bigger hands in odd situations. I was very proud of my play and sick of my results being chip leader and all.

It was a big honour to be asked by Bluff/ESPN Radio to do 4 of the WSOP final tables coverage live as it was aired over an 45 minute to an hour delay. The players played in a tent inside of the WSOP main poker room and were sequestered from anyone on the outside world with a guard and all. The most exciting for me was when my good friend Hoyt Corkins won his 2nd WSOP bracelet (first since 1994) in the 5K NL 6 handed event. He really played super and I had to apologize several times as I could not help myself and not root for Hoyt in the broadcast as I knew it meant a lot to him and was super excited when he won it. Later I told Hoyt to watch the broadcast as I was giving away some of his tells as well as others at the table. Hoyt called me this past week and we talked for about two hours about his Bellagio tournament and he said he got to play with one of the person's at his WSOP final table, and Hoyt got to use some of my tells on him, I guess the guy should of watched his own video also, lol.

Before P0ker H0, Debo and I headed to Costa Rica in November we all headed to Wisconsin to go to H0's bar called Players in Madison and see the Badgers play in Saturday and Packers on Sunday. Many online player got word we were going to be there and showed up, Suzie Q, her boyfriend Scout, Beanie and his friend Anthony, Jon Green, Victor Bigio, Cunningham, Brad "Blackhat" whom got 3rd in Aruba and won over a quarter of a million for himself and H0, Basebaldy, Mike "WiscoMurray" and many others. I know I am forgetting many names, sorry. This was a blast as we got to play poker teams Friday Night and a poker tourney Saturday. I busted out Mama H0 , P0ker H0's mom, and H0 the said "Now it's on" lol. I hate doing that, I love her to death. We all rented a limo bus to go to the Packer game and its was the experience of a lifetime. They beat Minnesota 34 to 0 as Debo told the Vikings fans in front of us "Boy, the Vikings sure look a lot better on TV". It really was a great time and will have lots of fun memories.

Costa Rica was exciting meeting all the people behind the scenes at UB. I can't wait to go back, they wore us out getting us up early and keeping us up late and they used our time well. I see many great things coming and it's exciting to be involved with a group of people with the same common goals.

The Best Damn Poker Show will air in late January. It will be entertaining and educational for anyone who takes poker serious, Watch it, it will be on Fox Sports. Was great meeting Jennifer Tilly, Sully Erna, and Scott Ian again as well as working with Annie as her coach. She is such a great person when you get to know her well and Phil is Phil, always entertaining. Love him or hate him it's just hard to ignore him. They both deep down have their priorities in order, both are all about their family and everything else is a distant second. You gotta respect that.

Phil your party in Vegas was the best, you my man know how to do it right. You can catch some clips on www.rawvegas.tv.  Many people were there and they all had a blast.

I want to give a SPECIAL Thanks to Joanne (she is the best) and Victor for your true inner passion, It was their vision to help create a need for online team UB a couple of years ago,

Leggggggggggy is no longer a team member but still like a brother to us and no one had more passion than him. We (P0ker H0, Debo, KrazyKanuck and I) do a lot of behind the scene work in trying to help UB customers, and higher management in trying to create the poker site we all wanna see. Thanks to everyone I deal with for making this very fun for me. You are all superstars. This site has allowed me to form some very fond friendships. I could list them and bore you all, but trust me, it's been a fun ride and I hope it never ends. You all mean the world to me and can't wait to see you all soon.

I am very proud to be a Team Member.

Shawn Rice