An ambassador since 2010, ESPN Poker's sideline reporter was a patch wearing mainstay for the company but, according to Kara’s blog over on Cardrunners, as the company shifted focus her favorite part of the job, her on-camera work, had a diminishing role.

PartyPoker has gone through many changes and unfortunately as their focus shifted, there were fewer and fewer TV projects. As those shows disappeared, so did one of my favourite parts of the job and now my association with Party is ending. However, I’m not going anywhere. I still love playing poker and have made a lot of great friends in the industry.

Even though the sponsorship is coming to an end, Kara claims her time in poker is not. She says she still plans to be heavily involved in the poker industry both on TV, as well as on-the-felt.

Read Kara’s farewell statement in full: New Year, Big Changes

Party, party, party: “Mad” Marvin Rettenmaier Parts Ways With partypoker, Still Plans On Partying Hard

Mark your calendars and clear your schedule as this summer the WSOP returns on Wednesday May 27 and extends through the establishing of the 2015 November 9 on July 14th. Not only did the WSOP unveil the dates, they also pinpointed a few must-play highlights including the inaugural running of “The Colossus” – a $565 buy-in with a $5,000,000 guarantee that is going to make the opening weekend huge!

Here’s a few of the other announced dates for you to check out:

Friday May 29/ Saturday May 30 – “The Colossus” – Two starting days with two starting flights each day (re-entry format as well) for only a $565 buy-in and carries a $5M guarantee. Also, while being the lowest buy-in event in 35 years, it brings a $5K starting stack!

Friday June 6/ Saturday June 7 – “Millionaire Maker” – The Milly Maker is back and better than ever. One million guaranteed for first place for a $1500 buy-in, but this year players will get a stack increase to 7500 starting chips. There are two flights and if you brick the first, you can re-enter into the second. The new value should make this bigger and better than ever.

Friday June 12/ Saturday June 13 – “Monster Stack” – Easily the highlight of the 2014 schedule, the Monster Stack is back with two starting flights, a $1500 buy-in and a most superior 15K chipstack. With the new starting days on the weekend – this tournament will be crazy.

Friday June 19 – Seniors Championship – Grandpa’s got more chips as the WSOP is realizing what players, even oldies, want and that’s value. With a $1K buy-in and 5k in chips, one of the friendliest tournaments of the summer just got even friendlier. Sorry Daniel, this is one club you’re not old enough to be in yet as you gotta be 50. A 2nd Super Senior’s tournament will be added where the age limit is 65 and up! More details on that soon.

Thursday June 25 – Ladies Championship – Hey Ladies! The ever growing demographic also gets an ever growing stack enjoying the new 5K starter stack as well. Officials moved the starting day to allow the women to play both this event as well as one of the open events slated to start at a nearby time. No dudes allowed, unless you want to pay 10x the buy-in – which would be a waste and a pretty big dbag move.

Sunday June 28 – One Drop High Roller – The railbirds will be excited to see that all the Super High Rollers will be plunking down $111,111 to help benefit the clean water efforts of Guy Laliberte's One Drop.

Tuesday June 30 – Little One for One Drop – Sick of watching the high rollers get all that charitable glory? The Little One gives you a chance to give back as well. Here’s the deal this year: 5K starting stack, but you can get an additional 5K if you pony up the charitable donation of $111. Easy call. This one has unlimited re-entries so go busto all you want and buy back for more.

July 5/6/7 – The Main Event – It’s back of course with its $10k price tag and a $10M guarantee for first!

In addition to all these great tournaments there will again be the thrice a day Daily Deepstacks and 60+ bracelets to be given away 49 days.

WSOP 2015: Book it.

The young, energetic, manic Twitch livestreamer went on a sick heater while taking a shot on Bovada this week and in the process entertained the masses and made a name for himself with his hilariously brash commentary, his music picks and his sick sick dance moves.

The above video is destined to be one of the greats, joining online legend Jim Moran, as StickyRice1 finds himself in the enviable position of holding a monster and being bet in to.

Merry Xmas indeed.

Bookmark: StickyRice1’s Twitch Feed (not always poker being played)

Read: Official StickyRice1 Twitch Takeover Thread

Gene was one of the savviest marketing guys I’d ever met. He started by telling me that, unlike the original Casino Royale, the new film’s climactic gambling scene would be poker, not baccarat. Within just a few minutes, Gene and I were discussing with increasing excitement the possibilities that this presented for a partnership between PokerStars and Eon.

Of course, this led to unprecedented excitement from Dan and then owner Isai Scheinberg but just like all spy movies – nothing was as it seemed and someone was going to get double crossed!

Great read (as are most of his posts) about another near marketing miss from the yesteryears of PokerStars.

For Your Eyes Only: My Name Is Bond. My word, not so much.

Watch the iconic Bond poker scene:

For a while he’s been hosting his own bedroom videocast focused on all things PLO and now he’s launching his latest offering: “Monday Night High Stakes Poker.”

ChicagoJoey’s high energy style of hosting is bringing you everything in the world of high stakes ONLINE poker from the News, Views and Gossip of the Two Plus Two forums to the massive swings reported by HighStakesDB. Ingram wants you to tune in to go over strategy, look at sick graphs, rail the nosebleed action and talk a little shit. He’s into it. So, give it a quick watch and maybe you’ll have found a new weekly way to waste a little time.

William Hung, who has since put his pop ambitions to rest in liu of a job with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, defeated 70 runners – including commentator and poker televised personality Robert Williamson III – to drag a first place prize of $2,264 in the Aria nightly $125.

Winning a poker tournament is a little like getting featured on American Idol: both take a little bit of luck and a little bit of skill. Here goes the Hung one again – showing the everyman that you too, can succeed if you try.

Good on you William Hung!

Read the thread: New career for William Hung?

The 8-handed final table is packed full of poker’s best and brightest including Ole Schemion, Philip Gruissem, Griffin Benger, Bill “The Businessman” Perkins, partypoker’s Kara Scott and former PokerStars Pro and two-time EPT winner Victoria Coren Mitchell.

So, if you are stuck in your cubicle this week leading up to the Christmas holiday, take a break and relax for an hour while watching some PokerStars made-for-tv action.

Miss the last episode? No worries – Check out Episode 8 right here.

First up, in the Five Diamond Main Event it was Mohsin “chicagocards1” Charania who defeated the absolutely stacked final table to win his 2nd WPT title and $1,477,890 in cash. Sitting at the final table with Charania was a murderers row of pros including Tobias Reinkemeier, Ryan Julius, Ryan Fee, Brett Shaffer and eventual runner-up Garrett Greer, who took home a healthy $868,683 for his efforts.

While Mohsin was crushing the Main Event, the elite super-high rollers were mixing it up for massive money in the World Poker Tour Alpha8 Las Vegas.

Fifty-five runners posted the $100K buy-in, a record for the Alpha8 series, with only 6 seeing a return on investment. When it was all said an done, a disheveled, unshaved and incredibly talented Andrew “luckychewey” Lichtenberger walked away with the filthy first place money of $2,104,245. Right behind him was the third millionaire of the weekend as Tom Marchese takes home 7-figures as a runner-up banking $1,240,965. Brian Rast, Noah Schwartz, Jason Les and Bryn Kenney will all have incredibly happy holidays as they finished inside the massive money bubble.

Want the grizzly details of how it all went down? For the Main Event wrap-up check out the WPT Blog and for Alpha8 action let’s give Bluff Magazine a little love.