ESPN Announces WSOP Television Schedule

ESPN has announced its program schedule for the forthcoming World Series of Poker (WSOP). A total of four events will be broadcast on the network including the Champions Invitational, the $40,000 No Limit Hold’em, the Anti-up for Africa charity event and of course, the Main Event. The $50,000 H.O.R.S.E will not be broadcast this year.

The action gets underway on Tuesday, July 28th at 8:00pm ET with a two hour review of the $40,000 buy-in No Limit Hold’em tournament. The event is aimed to commemorate the 40th running of the WSOP and with such a hefty buy-in, should keep the field small and top-class.

The second event to be aired will be the Champions Invitational, a celebration of poker and its mega-stars. Past winners and top names are invited to pit their wits against their peers. The event will air on August 4th at 8.00pm ET. Former winners of this event include Annie Duke, Mike Matusow and Mike Sexton.

On August 11th from 8:00pm ET to 10:00pm ET, the Ante Up for Africa tournament will hit television airwaves. The $5,000 buy-in contest is held just before the Main Event and helps raise money and awareness for the crisis in Darfur.

Ante Up for Africa was founded by Duke, actor Don Cheadle, and Norman Epstein and has raised over $2 million for the cause over the past two years. With the likes of Ben Affleck, Matt Damon and Jerry Cantrell at the tables, it will be good eye-candy for the ESPN cameras.

The Main Event is the jewel and will garner the most television time. Starting on August 18th, the Main Event will air every Tuesday night. The first four days will each receive its own two hour coverage over the first four weeks. September 15th and 22nd will see days 2A and 2B hit the channel with the remaining days playing out over the week leading up to the November 9 final table. The final table itself will air November 10th on ESPN.

Unpopular with players, popular with TV, the 100 day delay between the final table bubble and the final table will happen again this year. The delay saw a 50% increase in viewing figures on the previous year. An added twist will be an extra three day delay when the final table hits heads-up.

31 episodes will be broadcast. 2 of the 57 actual WSOP events will be shown (along with the charity and invitational freeroll). It will all be No Limit Hold’em and focus almost entirely on the big money or poker celebrity.

The four events that ESPN will cover this year highlight the popularity of No Limit Hold’em and the networks avoidance for the other formats of the game. The non-inclusion of the H.O.R.S.E event is a major blip on the schedule and a pity for poker aficionados who see it as the truest test of who is the best player in the world.

Chip Reese famously won the event in 2006 after an epic nine hour heads-up battle with Andy Bloch. At the table that year (a final table that was exclusively No-Limit, again for TV purposes) were Ivey, Brunson, Antonius and TJ Cloutier.