God Bless Chris Moneymaker

A total of 8,773 players vied for the $12 million first-place prize money in this year's World Series of Poker main event, and an incredible number of those players earned their $10,000 buy-in at online poker sites.

With hundreds of online sites sending people to the WSOP main event this year, it's impossible to know exactly how many qualified online, but it's safe to say that more than 4,400 got in via online sites. To put it into perspective, that number is only 1,219 less than the total number of players in last year's main event, and dominates the 2004 figure of 2,576 players.

PokerStars, which the last three WSOP main-event champions represent, had the most qualifiers in this year's event with a little more than 1,650. PartyPoker was next with 1,023 qualifiers. FullTiltPoker qualified 423 players, Bodog qualified 396, ParadisePoker qualified 298, UltimateBet qualified 230, Ladbrokes qualified 95, and Pacific qualified about 150.

In 2003, Chris Moneymaker, with the perfect name and a down-home, everyman demeanor, won the WSOP main event after qualifying in a $40 satellite at PokerStars, and everyone who plays poker - from hobbyists to the hardened professionals - knows about it.

The massive Amazon Room at the Rio, which was filled with so many players and spectators during the entirety of the main event, owes much of its hustle and bustle to online poker's contributions.