Back when Jamie Gold was busy lucking into the $12 million prize pool in the 2006 World Series of Poker Main Event, the game of poker was rising into heights it had never experienced before.  Then came the dreaded UIGEA in October and poker players worst fears had come true.  The game they loved had become regulated and the money going towards it was being depleted. 

Last year’s top WSOP prize, which was won by Jerry Yang, fell down to $8.25 million and this was mostly the effect of less and less online players being able to get into the WSOP through satellites.  And clearly, just by judging from the top prize, things had fallen off a little bit in terms of overall buy-ins for the Main Event. 

However, this year the results are already in and the Main Event prize pool will be an enormous $64.3 million dollars with 666 players earning a share of it.  Even better news, the top prize this year is moving back up again to the tune of $9.1 million.  The 6,844 players who paid, or won, the $10,000 buy-in made this all possible.

But WSOP commissioner Jeffrey Pollack warns that, “The fact that we broke all of the records we set last year is terrific, but there may be years where we’re up, years where we’re down.”  But he did finish his statement by mentioning, “Bottom line is that we’re here for the long term and we’re not going anywhere, and I don’t know many poker properties that can say that.” 

Hopefully in the future the buy-ins will continue to be more towards the up side rather than the down so that the Main Event top prize, as well as other prizes, can climb back to the height they were at in 2006.