I walked into the Amazon Room at the Rio Hotel and Casino at 11:59am to play in the $1,500 buy-in Omaha/8 event at the 40th Annual World Series of Poker (WSOP). I’ve participated in 28 out of the 40 years that the WSOP has been in existence, and, as usual, I was filled with excitement at the prospect of winning another gold bracelet. As play began, I found myself thinking about how much the WSOP has changed since the first time I played in 1980. The first thing that came to mind was how easy the registration process is now. I dropped by the Rio the day before the event to register and was thrilled to be in and out with my tournament receipt in hand in less than 10 minutes. There is a room dedicated for registration with clerks standing by to sign up players using an efficient computerized system. The days of writing and recording everyone’s name by hand like they did in 1980 are gone. Next, I was happy to see the tournament start on time. Despite the fact that there was a record-setting 918 entrants (I didn’t know that many people even played Omaha/8) and it took a ...