Trading Up For WSOP

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Casino City reporter hits the headlines with quirky bid to reach World Series of Poker Main Event

Kudos to Casino City reporter Aaron Todd, who made the mainstream press headlines in Boston this week with an entertaining story that helped him attract attention to what he considers an ineffective law, the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act.  In pursuing a personal project to trade up from a 60 cent check to a $10 000 World Series of Poker Main Event seat, Todd was able to use his website Sixty Cent Main Event.com to criticise the UIGEA, saying: "It's like Prohibition was for alcohol. They should tax and regulate it, not prohibit it."

Todd's quest began when he received a check for 60 cents from an online poker site, which he turned into a discussion asking for advice on what to do with the cash. There were some amusing responses, but the one that caught his eye was from a woman who suggested he emulate a trade up from a red paper clip.

Intrigued, Todd did some research and found a gem of Internet lore concerning a Canadian man who wanted to achieve house ownership through barter, starting with a red paper clip. Through 14 online trades, each item increasing in value, Kyle MacDonald eventually struck gold, and now owns a three-bedroom home in Kipling, Saskatchewan.

Motivated by the tale, Todd decided to trade his way from that physical check to a main event seat in the World Series of Poker, so he wrote about the idea on Casino City.com, and within 20 minutes he had a response from the marketers at Golden Palace, offering him a trade of 500 poker chips embossed with past quirky GP deals like the grilled cheese sandwich bearing the image of the Virgin Mary.

With 500 chips in hand, Todd was ready to trade up again, and this time he was offered a basketball signed by the 1975-76 Pacers by an Indiana poker fan.

That deal clinched, Todd's next customer was Pete Sikov, a real estate investor from Seattle, who responded with an unusual story about how he had acquired a bit of legendary rasta singer Jimi Hendrix' s childhood home. Sikov had two pieces of Hendrix's home, a wooden shard about a foot long, from the roof, and a broken piece of asbestos siding...and he was willing to trade one of them.

Sikov was part of the James Marshall Hendrix Foundation, which bought the house several years ago. The city of Seattle demanded it be moved for a local project, so the two-bedroom home ended up in a trailer park in nearby Renton, across the street from the cemetery where Hendrix is buried.

"When it was moved, they had to cut the roof off, and these two pieces came off during the move," says Todd who did the trade after Sikov provided a notarised certificate of authenticity.

"I like to root for the underdog," Sikov states. "I don't know if Aaron will make his goal, but he is the type of person who sure could."

Todd posted his offer of the Hendrix relic May 22 and is currently mulling the responses. "Someone offered me a duck-hunt gun from an old Nintendo," he says. "I already have two of those in my basement."

Todd doesn't have much time: The No-Limit Texas Hold 'Em Main Event tournament at the World Series opens July 6. Last year's top prize was $12 million, and if Todd can get that 10 000 buy-in trade up he will not only have accomplished his goal, but given himself a crack at the world's richest gaming prize.

So, the question is "Who wants to trade?"  Does anyone out there want a couple of pieces of Hendrix's house?