WSOP is Drawing Nigh

The annual World Series of Poker (WSOP) begins next week. Currently, I've made plans to play four bracelet events: The Seniors Tournament ($1000; first year I'm eligible); the Little One/One Drop ($1111 buy-in); and two others ($1000 and $1500 buy-in). I am NOT going to be able to play the Main Event; not because of the cost ($10,000) but because I just can't take the time off work.

With a little luck, I might be able to put in some time at the cash games as well. Now, whether that aforementioned luck is good or bad is a matter of debate ... as tight as the scheduling is, probably the only way I'll get to the ring games is if I'm knocked out before I get to the cash.

This year I'm doing something I've never done before: I'm selling pieces of my action, in three of those four planned events. People have been asking me to do this literally for years, but I've always held off. I've swapped pieces in tournaments before, and I've run last-longer bets, but I've never gone to this extent before now. Frankly, I'm still conflicted about doing this, for many reasons. Here is some of my thinking on the whole process, both pro and con:

• This is EXTREMELY common in the poker community. Folks buy, sell, and swap pieces all the time in tournament poker. It helps to cut down on the overall variance. I can completely respect that.
• I don't need the money. I've been saving for this for over a year, and have plenty of money stored up to go the distance without looking for backers.
• The whole process of looking for backers strikes me as a bit ... unseemly, I guess I'd say. I'm not accustomed to it, outside the context of fundraising for a nonprofit or something along those lines.
• I really don't know what the added pressure of playing on behalf of a crowd of people is going to feel like. Will it take me off my A-game? I guess if I felt it would, I wouldn't be asking for money. Given the amount of experience I've got by now, I'm feeling better about this than I would have, say, even a year ago.
• It requires my backers to have trust in my integrity and honesty. I could literally just collect the money and skip the tournament, then report that I'd been knocked out early, and keep the funds. I've even heard of players who sell over 100% of their action and then skip the tournament. But my reputation being what it is, I doubt anybody believes that I would ever do something like that.

On the other hand, something like this did actually happen to me: I joined a bunch of other guys who backed one player, a major pro, in a WPT event. He got knocked out the first day. Or so he said. Then he re-entered the second day (with a different backer, according to him), went deep, and cashed for a big score ... none of which came my way, because I hadn't backed his re-entry. Shame on me for not investigating the details of this tournament, or putting conditions on his re-entry and my participation in it. But I probably won't back this guy again.