Hello, I’m Sean Gibson and welcome to the Daily Deal by Poker News Daily.

Recently, the Commerce Casino, Bicycle Casino, Hawaiian Gardens, Hollywood Park, and the California Gaming Association joined in opposition Congressman Barney Frank’s HR 2267, which would create a full licensing and regulatory framework for the internet gambling industry in the United States.

The four casinos have found themselves in a war of words against the Poker Players Alliance, which has launched an online petition at PlayersBeforeProfits.com to reverse their stance against the groundbreaking legislation. Poker News Daily sat down with card room coalition spokesperson Waltona Manion to explore the coalition’s resistance.

Manion argued,

“We’re looking for Federal enforcement of the same strict licensing and regulation for online poker as U.S. land-based casinos abide by. This means that they have to license all of their employees and the physical operations should be in the U.S. In addition, the hardware and software should be tested and certified.”

She added, “Frank’s bill provides fewer industry regulations and player protections. It imposes lower taxes for foreign online companies than what U.S. casinos pay. It would enable illegal offshore companies to export significant money from our economy.”

We’ll keep you posted as this story develops.

888 Holdings, the gaming operator that owns 888 Poker, announced Tuesday that it will be cutting costs in order to address a loss in profits for the first half of 2010. The company has also decided to scrap its dividend in order to pay for acquisitions after the weak economy and World Cup caused a decline in poker revenue.

888’s first half financial results showed revenues were up 10.5% to one-hundred thirty million dollars, but pre-tax profit dropped by 56% to four point three million dollars. Poker revenue dropped 25% to nineteen point six million.

The WSOP Main Event continued airing on ESPN on Tuesday night with Day Two-B. Two one-hour episodes were devoted to the second Day Two and the feature table included Dan Harrington and Jeff Shulman, who were seated next to each other. Prahlad Friedman and Allied Network Solutions CEO Ted Bort tangled in a hand in which Bort called the clock after pushing all in. Friedman waited until the count reached one and quietly said, “I call,” but floor officials ruled that the clock had expired. Bort turned over top two pair and Friedman mucked.

A maelstrom of yelling ensued. ESPN aired a replay clearly showing that Friedman had called at the one-second mark and the dealer promptly said, “He called.” Nevertheless, another floor supervisor was summoned who also said the hand was dead. Don’t forget that Friedman was also involved in “Ante-gate” with Jeffrey Lisandro.

Finally, the nominees as voted by the fans are in for the Poker Hall of Fame. This year’s class is a who’s who of the poker world, all of whom have distinguished careers warranting their nominations. This year’s class of nominees, who will be voted on by the 16 living Hall of Fame members and a 17-person media panel. Only these 33 individuals cast votes for induction. The nominees are:

1. CHRIS FERGUSON
2. BARRY GREENSTEIN
3. JENNIFER HARMAN-TRANIELLO
4. DAN HARRINGTON
5. PHIL IVEY
6. LINDA JOHNSON
7. TOM McEVOY
8. DANIEL NEGREANU
9. SCOTTY NGUYEN
10. ERIK SEIDEL

Well, that does it for today’s edition of The Daily Deal, and we’ll be back with you on Tuesday of next week. Be sure to visit Poker News Daily every day for the latest poker headlines, and be sure to check us out at twitter dot com slash poker news daily. I’m Sean Gibson, thanks for tuning in, and we’ll see you next time. Now go crush those fish at the tables!

In this scenario, what would you say might be the very worst thing that could possibly happen to you?  You get stacked?  You get cheated?  You get into a drunken brawl with a guy nicknamed “Fancy Fists”?

What if I told you the very worst thing that could possibly happen to you that night is that you win?  And win big?

It seems counterintuitive, but there’s a very good reason why it might be dangerous for a budding poker player to have a wildly successful first session: the Primacy Effect.  The Primacy Effect is a cognitive bias – a psychological tendency for us to draw incorrect conclusions based on the ways our brains are wired rather than on the objective evidence.

This particular bias is the tendency for the first items presented in a series to be remembered better or more easily, and for them to be more influential than those presented later in a series.  For instance, if someone rattles off a long distance phone number, you’re most likely to remember the first few digits.   Job applicants seen early in the hiring process are often given higher marks than those in the middle, and all applicants are best remembered by their “first impressions.”

Opening scenes are critical to the success or failure of a movie or book.  And you probably have strong memories of and a special fondness for your first girlfriend or boyfriend.  Thanks to the Primacy Effect, anything that comes first in a series serves as a powerful anchor in our memories, indelibly etched and coloring our perceptions of everything that comes after.

There’s even evidence now that the Primacy Effect has considerable power over the results on “American Idol”-style shows that rely on votes from the at-home audience.  Over and over again, the contestants who appear first (and last, thanks to a different bias, the Recency Effect) get more votes than those appearing in the middle of the program.

Fans of these shows have occasionally voiced concern over potential voter fraud or judging biases, but if research on the Primacy Effect is correct, then results could actually be rigged in an even more diabolical way.  All the producers would have to do to make sure their favorites are well-received by the voting audience is put them first or last in the evening’s lineup.

And isn’t a poker career just a long series of individual sessions?  If we have this tendency to be overly influenced by the first item in a series, isn’t it possible that our entire perception of the game of poker could be distorted by what happens in the first few sessions?

The first time you played poker, you sucked.  We all did.  But thanks to the element of chance built into the game, there’s a very real possibility that you won in spite of your suckitude.  And if you won big, the Primacy Effect will make sure that you remember that session and let it influence your perception of the game for a long time to come.

You’re likely to believe that the game is easier than it really is, and that it requires less work than it really does, and that you’re naturally more talented than you really are.  The Primacy Effect will cause you to weigh the results of that first session more heavily than subsequent sessions, so even if you go on a long losing streak, you’ll constantly be comparing your results with that first success.

“How can I lose ten sessions in a row if I destroyed the game the first time I played?  I’m a great player with natural talent.  I must just be getting unlucky!”  And you may find it more difficult to accept the brutal realities of poker: the game is hard and to master it, you must put in a lot of time and effort.  What a glorious world it would be for the professional player if everyone won big the first time they played!  The experience would likely stunt the growth of their abilities and yet get them hooked on the game itself – a recipe for long-term donations.

What about the players who lose their shirts the first time they play?  They’re probably more likely to believe the game is more difficult than it really is – perhaps even unbeatable.  For many people, a big initial losing session is enough to make them quit forever.  But ironically, these players might be better situated for long-term success since they’ll likely have a better grasp of the amount of work necessary to master the game’s strategies.

There’s another way that the Primacy Effect skews our thinking on a daily basis.  After all, isn’t each individual session a series of hands?  So, by the same token, the results of your first big pot might influence your perception of the entire evening.  Personally, I have an irrational tendency to get into a very negative and self-destructive mindset if I lose a big pot early in a session.

And how often have you heard players say, “I can tell it’s going to be a great night” after raking a massive pot soon after sitting down?  Even though each hand is an independent, random event, psychologically speaking, we’re susceptible to letting our first impressions affect us long after the first hand has hit the muck.

Whether you won or lost in your rookie season, be aware that your perception of the game has likely been distorted by your initial experiences on the felt.

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Hinkle’s reward for winning the Circuit Championship was $88,000 in cash, a diamond and gold ring, $10,000 to buy into the 2011 WSOP Main Event at the Rio in Las Vegas, and a seat in the Circuit National Championship in Sin City, the brand new $1 million tournament. The latter event is capped at 100 players and awards a WSOP bracelet to its winner. The price tags of the Main Events at each Circuit stop have been lowered to $1,600 and four Regional Championship sites feature $10,000 finales.

Hinkle’s bracelet came in 2008, when he took down a $2,000 No Limit Hold’em event to the tune of $507,000. He became one-half of the first set of brothers ever to win bracelets in the same year after his sibling Grant landed in the winner’s circle of Event #2, a $1,500 No Limit Hold’em tournament. Grant faced some stiff competition at the final table of his bracelet event, including former November Niner James Akenhead, Full Tilt Poker pro Chris Ferguson, Theo Tran, and 2009 WSOP HORSE champ David Bach.

In the defining hand of heads-up play, Shiva Dudani bet 400,000 with the board reading 10-9-5-9. Hinkle called and the river was a benign deuce. Both players checked and Hinkle tabled A-8 of spades for ace-high, enough to take down the pot against Dudani’s king-high. Then, Dudani committed his chips on a board of 9-6-7-4-K with J-8 for a busted straight draw, while Hinkle made the call with K-6 for kings-up. The pot earned him $88,000 in cash and his first WSOP Circuit title.

The final table bubble boy at Council Bluffs was Poker News Daily Guest Columnist Bernard Lee, who moved all-in pre-flop with A-K. Dudani looked him up with a wired pair of kings and the better pre-flop hand held. Lee, a sponsored pro of Foxwoods, walked away from the Midwestern casino with $6,500 for his 10th place finish.

Thirty-three events played out at Council Bluffs with a total attendance of 4,056 players, a 12% growth year over year. The last time the WSOP Circuit came to the Iowa casino was in February, when the $5,150 buy-in Main Event drew a crowd of just 46 players for a total prize pool of $212,100. This year, attendance increased five-fold, with the prize pool mushrooming by 70%.

Also making an appearance at Council Bluffs was Doug “Rico” Carli, who has a ridiculous 42 Circuit cashes, the most of any player. Carli recorded five in the money finishes on the big stage during the WSOP in Las Vegas this year, including a $42,000 haul for taking 259th in the Main Event. He has nearly $900,000 in WSOP and Circuit Event earnings spread across 64 cashes, an average of $13,000 each, and is a two-time gold ring winner.

Here were the final results from the WSOP Circuit Championship at Horseshoe Council Bluffs:

1. Blair Hinkle – $88,555
2. Shiva Dudani – $54,715
3. Dwyte Pilgrim – $39,531
4. Matthew Lawrence – $29,092
5. Charles Moore – $21,795
6. Jack Do – $16,608
7. John Wakeen – $12,867
8. Daniel Biddle – $10,131
9. Kevin Calenzo – $8,103

Next up for the WSOP Circuit is a trip to Horseshoe Southern Indiana, located on the Ohio River just downstream from Louisville, Kentucky. The festivities get underway on October 2nd, with the Circuit Championship kicking off on October 10th and crowning a champ two days later. The buy-in for the Main Event is once again $1,600.