The cards are in the air for the 39th World Series of Poker. The first event began on Friday and will run to July 14th when the final table of the $10,000 is seated. As I previously reported the final table play is being delayed until November to make it more of a media event. It will be broadcast on ESPN.

The official word from the WSOP is that many players are excited about the change and are looking forward to the added buzz for the final table, which will help get poker mainstream media attention. Most of the players I have talked with feel just the opposite about the four month delay. This has been confirmed by a poll conducted by Gaming Today News which reported that 93.5 percent of the respondents objected to the change and feel that it will hurt the event.

The WSOP is the longest running poker event in history since getting its start at Binion's Horseshoe casino in 1970. This year there will be 55 events with buy-ins starting at $1,000 and running up to the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E tournament.

Last year there were 6,600 players entered in the $10,000 main event. It will be interesting to see if there will be a decline this year and if so how much will be attributed to the delayed format of the final event.