World Poker Tour Season Two on DVD

So, you think you've seen all of the second season of the World Poker Tour? You haven't. Sure, you may have watched every episode and maybe seen reruns. Perhaps, like many, you even recorded the whole season or it's all on your TiVo. You still haven't seen it all.

I recently watched most of the eight-DVD WPT Season Two set, and it has so much more. Everyone with a DVD player knows how wonderful DVD movies are, with all the extras that are a standard part of the package. You get voice-overs by the director and actors. You get supplemental documentaries. Well, many special extras of special value to poker players are available on this great set, too.

What do most players say when they watch WPT episodes? "How could he play that hand that way? What was going through his head?" Now you can find out from the players who made those plays.


Daniel Negreanu and Erick Lindgren do commentary on two events they played. Negreanu finished third in the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure tournament, and he and Erick together talk us through the whole event. And remember, they battled heads up in the PartyPoker Million tournament. They analyze every play and explain what was going through their heads as they tangled with each other, often with less-than-stellar hands.


Not only do Negreanu and Lindgren discuss hands and their play and that of others in great detail, but they give us a lot of insights into what makes the WPT so big. Negreanu talks about early conversations with Mike Sexton about Sexton's vision for the future of poker. They talk about the "younger generation who play so much better at that age than we ever did." They point out celebs in the audience.


Negreanu and Lindgren agree that one of the best learning tools for playing championship poker is to get these DVDs and study what every player does. And the two champions provide great analyses of the thought processes that went into their decisions. They discuss the importance of math.


In the PartyPoker event, they critique people's moves, and describe the differences in how many hands would be played in no-limit versus this limit event.


Antonio Esfandiari and Phil Laak discuss plays all the way through Commerce Casino's L.A. Poker Classic event. I remember one hand when Esfandiari was heads up with Vinny Vinh. Esfandiari came in for a moderate raise from the button with the 106. Vinh raised a large amount with A-X (small). Esfandiari went all in. I remembered thinking at the time what a move that was and wondering how he could do it. Vinh made him sweat, but finally folded. Esfandiari explains exactly what was going through his mind when he made the play, and what he did to induce Vinh to fold. And this was a harder task than you might think from just seeing the original event, because, as Esfandiari explained, for the entire tournament, he had raised preflop every single time he had the button and the betting was passed to him.


You might remember early on in this event that Esfandiari folded a 7-2 offsuit and the audience just cracked up. You couldn't tell why that was so funny, but watch the DVD to hear Esfandiari's explanation, because the reason was edited out of the final cut.


Esfandiari and Laak also talk us through Laak's win at the WPT Celebrity Invitational, and discuss his unusual wardrobe and behavior. On both commentaries, they talk about other hands they've played together and with other notable players.


On their segments, in addition to play analysis, Esfandiari and Laak trade poker stories that really help us to know these two champions and give us insight into how they got to where they are today.


When you listen to the commentaries, you learn the real sequence of hands compared with how they ended up being shown. You might not know the correct order if all you've seen is the original broadcasts.


Disc eight is the real treasure in this collection. It contains all the "Poker Corner" segments from every show. And then, as an added bonus, it has an "Extended Poker Corner" in which Sexton, Negreanu, Annie Duke, and Phil Hellmuth give expert analysis of critical plays in the WPT Championship. They show us exactly what contributed to Martin de Knijff's win, pointing out masterful plays on his part and also showing how inexperience on the parts of some of the players improved de Knijff's chances of prevailing, and how that inexperience was their undoing. Want to know what the mistakes were, so you won't make them? Don't miss this documentary.


There's another documentary called "Poker Takes Over Hollywood," which shows us the stars and their games, with interviews and great comments. And you get still another bonus, player profiles of Negreanu, Hellmuth, Jennifer Harman, Gus Hansen, and Howard Lederer. These discs contain 22 hours of viewing time. Turn on the voice-overs and you get close to 30 hours. And, there are no commercials.


Michael Wiesenberg's The Official Dictionary of Poker is the ultimate authority on the language of cardrooms. Order from the Card Player Bookstore or online at CardPlayer.com. And look for The 1,000 Best Casinos in the World this summer.