The world’s largest gathering of people trying to read each others minds, the World Series of Poker (WSOP), happens May 28 to July 17, 2024.
This is the 55th annual World Series of Poker, a collection of contests known for grown men getting excited to win jewelry. Yes, it’s mostly men. The participation of women in the WSOP hovers at around 4%, mainly because women have better things to do.
The 2024 WSOP will be held at Horseshoe and Paris on the Las Vegas Strip.
There are so many different events at the World Series of Poker, the schedule won’t fit on the Internet, so they stuffed all the information into a .pdf.
The grandaddy of WSOP events is the WSOP Main Event. In 2024, the Main Event starts July 3. The Main Event is so popular, the starting “flights” are done in four rounds, staggered to accommodate all the players.
Last year, there were 10,043 entrants in the Main Event. It’s $10,000 to enter. The $10,000 buy-in, unlike every other price in Las Vegas, has been the same since 1972.
In 2023, Daniel Weinman won the Main Event, winning $12.1 million. Which is about enough for a fancy dinner for four at In-N-Out after taxes.
Daniel Weinman is the 2023 World Champion!
Daniel takes home the largest payout in Main Event history, $12,100,000, by outlasting the record-breaking field of 10,043 players.
A huge congratulations to @notontilt09, your 2023 Main Event Champion. pic.twitter.com/EsU7x6MZOa
— WSOP – World Series of Poker (@WSOP) July 17, 2023
This year’s Main Event Final Table happens July 16-17, 2024.
The history of the World Series of Poker is absolutely fascinating, so obviously we won’t be sharing it here. We are very busy and important and that means we have little time for “research” or “exerting effort.”
Here’s the lazy version: The WSOP started at downtown’s Binion’s Horseshoe in 1970. Harrah’s, now Caesars Entertainment, owned the place for 15 minutes and snatched the WSOP and Horseshoe brands. WSOP happened at Rio for many years, but moved when Rio was sold to Dreamscape. Bally’s was rebranded to Horseshoe, so WSOP is back at Horseshoe.
In a freaky twist, Binion’s no longer has a poker room.
Everyone said the WSOP would move to the Caesars Forum, but that’s because they don’t follow the right Twitter accounts.
More on the future home of WSOP: Look ye not unto Caesars Forum, but rather Bally’s. Romans said “ye,” right?
— Vital Vegas (@VitalVegas) June 6, 2019
For most people, watching poker is akin to watching paint dry, but for the players, it’s also a lot like watching paint dry.
Still, poker is the rare game of chance where skill actually plays a part in the outcome.
We should probably include a personal anecdote here to show this story isn’t being written by ChatGPT.
While we have never played in the World Series of Poker, we did play live poker one time. We’re pretty sure it was in Reno. Or Laughlin. In our world, there’s Las Vegas and “everything else.” Anyway, it was a low limit game, so we figured we’d give it a go and just have some fun seeing what it’s like to play poker.
It didn’t take long for us to figure out a lot of poker players aren’t really in it for the “fun.” We learned this after having some incredible luck and winning a good number of “pots,” despite having virtually no idea what we were doing.
We got the impression the other players thought we were some sort of con man, trying to take their money by playing stupid. Well, rest assured, we do not need to “play” stupid.
As our stacks of chips grew, the other players seemed to be less patient with our constant questions like, “Aren’t aces only worth one point each? Two points doesn’t seem like a lot, what’s a good bet?” We kept showing everyone our cards to prove we weren’t bluffing. They didn’t seem to like that, either.
We had a pretty good time playing poker, and won a lot of money, but we still prefer video poker due to the lack of human interaction.
One of the players at the table had a Super Bowl ring, and the dealers seemed to feel our life was in danger. We only picked up on that because one of the dealers said, “Your life is in danger.”
At which time our poker career came to an abrupt and inauspicious end. We don’t wear jewelry, anyway.
You can find all the details about the 2024 World Series of Poker on the official Web site.
While poker doesn’t make a lot of money for casinos (it’s an amenity like sportsbooks or spas), it’s still woven into the culture of Las Vegas. The folks around a poker table are guaranteed to be some of the most interesting characters you’ll ever meet in Sin City.
We wish all the entrants in this year’s WSOP good luck, even the surly ones who think gambling is about money rather than fun. Shuffle up and chill, 96% dudes.
