No VIP Treatment for Patrik Antonius

We're pretty sure that Patrik Antonius hasn't gotten much sleep the past few nights thinking about his lost chance at the 2009 World Series of Poker.  It's not that he busted out early.  Patrik Antonius was among a few hundred who got shut out the final day.

"We went through a wide range of very creative solutions, but couldn't find any that didn't affect fairness or integrity," WSOP Commissioner Jeffrey Pollack said on Tuesday in reference to failed attempts at accommodating everyone. "The last thing we want to do is deny people entry into our events.  We simply hit our operational capacity. It was unfortunate, but it was a reality."

Initial reports of "favoritism" were widely unfounded.

Proof of this was popular player, Antonius, not getting in along with a few other big names.

"Patrik Antonius, T.J. Cloutier, Captain Tom and many other notable players were left out," said Pollack. "Has there been a system of VIP customer management at the WSOP? Absolutely. Did somebody get in after we announced a sellout yesterday? Not to my knowledge."

And he was offering no apologies either.

"I'm not going to apologize for what we did," he said. "We had four start days with plenty room in all of them. Preregistration has been available since March. You've been able to register at the Rio since the last of March. Many of the players that got turned down had plenty of opportunity to register weeks ago."

In fact, Saturday's entry field featured the lowest number of attendees since 2003.