Poker rooms have long employed players to fill high-stakes games and keep the tables humming. However, with a near-constant influx of warm, cash-wielding bodies due to TV and Internet play, the card rooms need less and less "prop" players. That means the men and women in that line of work are finding times tougher and tougher. The L.A. City Beat looks at a few Los Angeles' proposition players, struggling to keep their P/L sheet in the black. E-Joe and Bobdini may be living the life may people dream of -- getting paid to play cards -- but you might want to read this article before filling out a job application at the Commerce Casino.

Yes, there are other tournaments running besides the World Series. Yesterday was the third event in the 7th annual Battle of the Bay, hosted by Lucky Chances Casino in Colma, California, just south of San Francisco. The "partners" event the day before attracted 139 entrants, perhaps due to the presence of celebrity poker celebrity Mimi Rogers. There were 172 players in Tuesday's $300 No-Limit Hold'Em event, which was eventually won by "S.K." Patel, a sharp young player who earlier this year put up an astonishing run at super satellites for the $10k Bay 101 Shooting Star, winning three tournaments on three consecutive days. Patel went into the final table yesterday as the short stack and through expert timing and some early luck built his stack back up and won $18k and a lovely Lucky Chances jacket. Don't be suprised to see him at the other big tournament this time next year, or possibly next month.

I'm going to go around the horn and offer a quick round-up of sources for WSOP news & gossip, with some commentary on what's new, what works, and what doesn't. Once I've made it through all the sources, I'll post a master list, bookmarkable for your browsing pleasure.

Card Player has video segments with Richard Belsky, which include some great interviews, plus the magazine's usual live updates and daily recaps. They seem to be going light on the photographs in favor of the video clips. They're also hosting Barry Shulman's blog, which may be good for some insider info, plus a new video production from Jesse May called The Poker Show. It's a bit cheesey, going for a Tonight Show meets poker kind of thing, but I'll watch anyway. Card Player recently redesigned the tournament section of their site and the new tabbed look is a vast improvement. They are looking sharp and certainly have a lot to offer for the news-hungry poker fan.

Poker Pages has video and audio clips from Amy Callistri, blogs from Mike Paulle, Callistri, Steve Hall, Daniel Lazerek, final table coverage by Sharla (?), and stats provided by Mark Napolitano. You'll also find photos and those trusty old pink-and-white results reports, which used to be the only way to follow these things. Kudos to Poker Pages for staying the course and incrementally improving their coverage. I like Amy's audio takes, but wish they were available outside of Poker Pages lame flash interface.

More sources coming later today....

Phil Gordon, poker author, pro, and cohost of Celebrity Poker Showdown is podcasting daily from the WSOP and it's pretty great. Gordon's got a great voice, is quick off the cuff, has a wicked sensibility, and obviously has no problem getting answers from any player he can corral. The most entertaining podcast so far was the one where he was actually playing in the event and posting on breaks. The feed is hosted by Phil's new DVD, which, according to an inside source, is truly eye-popping. The podcasts are available on the web or via rss.

I'm back from a week in Knoxville, Tennessee, the hometown of 2003 WSOP champion Chris Moneymaker, and I'll be honest with you, the explosion of coverage for the 2005 World Series of Poker is a little overwhelming. I remember last year, when you basically had one or two sites to check for updates at the end of every event. Oh, how things have changed! We've got video updates from Card Player, blogs all over the place, podcasts up the ying-yang. It's really exciting, to be honest. And theres's a lot to sift through. Forgive me if I take 24 hours to get my bearings. I'm also still trying to get back to Las Vegas as a player in the main event. Three-and-a-half hours into a double shootout and I run KK into AA. Frankly, I'd rather have that happen 10 minutes in. Oh well, tomorrow is another day...

It had to happen. Late last night, they finally managed to trim the field to six players. They are, in descending order of chips, Thang Pham, $1.7 mil; Chris Bell, $1.4m; Ted Forrest (pictured), $1.38m; Gene Todd, $763k; Gavin Smith, $687k; and Mark Ellerbee, $353k. Play resumes this evening under the bright lights of the World Poker Tour set. You'll be able to catch the abridged version as the first installment of the WPT's fourth season.

The bubble is never a fun place to put all your money in, no matter how good your hand is. Phil "The Unabomber" Laak had a feeling things were about to blow up in his face as he called all-in with pocket aces. When a second player, Jean-Robert Bellande, also called, he couldn't have felt much better. Laak's aces were up against Richard Tatalovich's pocket kings and Bellande's Tc8c. The flop came Ac-Qc-3, giving Laak three aces and Bellande four to the flush. No one likes to see a flush draw out there, but Phil was still abut 72% to triple up. The turn came jack, giving Bellande and Tatalovich a few more outs. Phil aces were still 2-1 to win. Of course, you know where all of this is going. The most unlikely out imaginable hits the river, one of the two remaining kings, giving Bobby Bellande an ace-high straight and all of Phil and Richard's chips. Both players are knocked out on the bubble and share the 27th place prize money of $18k.  guess if you have to endure that kind of hand to get knocked out of a tournament, a $9,000 rebate isn't the absolute worst thing in the world. Sorry, Phil.

The good news: The chips are clicking and and the cards are flying here on Day Three of the Mirage $10k No-Limit Hold Em Championship. Jean-Robert Bellande just made a big jump when his pocket aces went up against pocket 10s. Jennifer Tilly is quietly sweating Phil Laak, who is managing a healthy stack. Early exits today include Sheikhan Shahram and Greg Duros. The bad news for poker obsessives is that the Tournament of Champions, playing 11 handed last time I peeked, is on a closed set. Still, the Travel Channel is entitled to some exclusivity, I suppose. Everyone can use a good suprise from time to time.

We're down to 48 players, with Robert Mizrachi atop the leaderboard with close to $350k in chips. Gavin Smith (pictured) sits comfortably in second place with $318k, while Toto Leonidas and Mark Ellerbee are neck and neck for third and fourth with $258k and $256k respectively. Today's play will take us from four dozen to a half dozen, no matter how long it takes, and the Mirage will host something of a three-ring circus as the WPT Tournament of Champions runs simultaneously on the WPT's Season Four set. Look for photos and updates from both tournaments later today.

We're midway through level 8, with blinds of 600 and 1200 and $100 antes. About 85 players remain, including Chris Ferguson, Layne Flack, Phil Laak, Kathy Liebert, Paul Phillips, Robert Bellande, Gavin Smith, Toto Leonidas, Jeff Shulmna, and Hasan Habib. Today, the players will complete level 10 or play down to 27 players, whichever comes first, and the consensus is that level 10 will definitely come first. The average chip stack is approaching $80k and those players comfortably above that mark include Eskimo Clark, Ray Faltinsky, Chris Bell, and Asher Deri. Check Poker Wire and Card Player for knockouts and chip counts.

We have a winner. Hands down. Congratulations sir, you have the poker tournament Shirt of the Day.

Press row is abuzz. Shana Hiatt's replacement, Courtney Friel, is shooting some segments (her first?) among the featured tables here at the Mirage. The consensus so far, which is based solely on first impressions, is that Courtney is very different from Shana, yet has many redeeming qualities all her own.

We're well underway here at the lovely Mirage Casino, and the Day Two field has been cut from 149 to 117, with the average stack climbing to over $54k, up from the $20k in starting chips. Layne Flack looks like he's moved up from his Day  One chip count of $45,350. He's all smiles as he has just been moved to a table with Phil Laak, the Unabomber. The current level has antes of 75 and blinds of 400 and 800, which are set to go up any minute now. For chips counts, and blow-by-blow updates, check out CardPlayer.com.

WPT Reno champion Arnold Spee is out early into Day Two of the Mirage Poker Showdown, getting pot committed with pocket nines. He was facing pocket queens and was forced to call off the rest of his short stack. On the upside, Spee predicts that he'll win two bracelets during next month's WSOP, and he even calls his shot, saying he definitely win one of the events that are played six-handed.

This weeked was the big finale of the National Heads Up Poker Championship on NBC, with the quarterfinals airing on Saturday and the semis and the championship match on Sunday. All in all, I'd have to say that NBC got most everything right. The commentary was really first rate and it was great to see Gabe Kaplan back in the broadcast booth. His analysis was accurate and didn't rely on hyperbole to get the job done. I would eagerly anticipate any other contests narrated by Matt Vasgergian and Gabe Kaplan.

The matches themselves were pretty awesome all around, and as the show progressed the ratio of poker to filler seemed to ratchet up nicely. I particularly enjoyed the quarterfinal between Antonio Esfandiari and Scott Fischman, where all poker reality seemed to have left the building. And, in the end, the final heads-up battle was extremely compelling, with Chris Ferguson getting out-played and out-complained by Phil Hellmuth in the very same match.

My only recommendations for next year's tournament: More stats. I want to see chip counts and blinds on screen any time were looking at a table. Just like keeping the football score on the screen. We're visual creatures and I don't want to wait for the commentators to tell me how much each player has and how big the blinds are. I know this show isn't geared for the poker fanatic, but at least throw us a bone. I'd also love to see some statistics about who was being more aggressive preflop, who folded their blinds the fewest times, what hands people laid down in the small blind, etc. etc. These shows spend a long time in post-production, so it would seem to me that the stats keepers could come up with some really compelling numbers for the poker-tracker crowd.

Who knows, maybe some of those things will make it onto the DVD...