World Series of Poker, Day 4

This has the makings of a truly incredible story in the poker world. As play began today, the chip leader was none other than last year's winner, Greg (Fossilman) Raymer with just over a million chips. Should Raymer win again this year, that would almost certainly rank as the greatest achievement in poker history. Three players in history have won back to back WSOP main event championships: Johnny Moss in 1970 and 1971, Doyle Brunson in 1976 and 1977, and Johnny Chan in 1987 and 1988 (and finished second in 1989). But when Johnny Moss won it the first time, the title was voted on by the players, not won in a freezeout. And when Doyle Brunson and Johnny Chan won it, there were far fewer players. In 1988, when Chan won the second of his two titles, only 167 players entered the event. Last year, Raymer beat out over 2600 players for the title and this year there were 5619 entries. If Raymer wins again, or even makes the final table with those two huge fields, that probably goes down as the greatest achievement in poker history.

Contrary to the way ESPN portrayed him last year (as the online qualifying amateur from nowhere), Raymer has been playing serious tournament poker for a long time and his name was not unknown in the poker world. And with his aggressive style, there are few players more dangerous with a big stack of chips in front of them. He plays an aggressive, pressing, high variance game, similar to Gus Hansen. With that style, you'll bust out early in many tournaments. But if the cards fall in their favor early in a tournament, they build up a huge stack and can use it to dominate a table the way few players can. They've taken Doyle Brunson's blueprint for no limit hold em - attack, attack, attack - and taken it to another level. They put enormous pressure on their opponents with a big stack and keep them off balance constantly. So with 185 players left and about 1/50th of the chips in play, there's no doubt that Raymer is a force to be reckoned with in this tournament.

There are dangerous players lurking about, however. Phil Ivey began the day in 7th place with over $700,000 in chips. Ivey is widely considered the best player in the game today. In the last couple years, he has torn through the biggest cash games in the world like a freight train through a cardboard box, racking up wins in the 8 figure range, in addition to being a 5 time World Poker Tour finalist and 3 time bracelet winner at the WSOP. And he's not the only one. Lurking with close to half a million chips are both Howard Lederer and Mike Matusow, and both Russ Hamilton and John Juanda are in the top 1/3 in chip count.