By the PokerStars blog team at the World Series in Las Vegas...

We thought we might go our entire life without seeing Wayne Newton.

We were almost certain we wouldn't ever hear him accompanied by a marching band.

We would've placed good money down on Newton never uttering these four famous words: "Shuffle up and deal!"

We would've lost.

That's how Day 1A of the 2008 World Series kicked off Thursday. Nearly 1,300 players came in today to fight in this, the first of four Day 1s of the Main Event. While the numbers of the first day don't suggest a huge World Series main event, the word on the street is this weekend is nearly sold out. So, any judgment on what the final prize pool will be this year would be premature. Regardless of any statistic, one thing remained sure today. Every one of these players would start with 20,000 chips. Around half of those people wouldn't have any by day's end.

Las Vegas legend Wayne Newton introduces day 1

Wayne Newton nor anyone else in the room heard "danke schoen" from a number of Team PokerStars Pro players who didn't make it through the day. Tuan Lam, Ray Rahme, Marcin Horecki, Chad Brown, Katja Thater all made an earlier-than-predicted exit from the Amazon Room and will have to wait until next year to fight for the bracelet.

The worst of it, though, fell on Team PokerStars Pro Luca Pagano. His day had been one of a slow and steady rise. It ended in the last level of the night when he lost set-over-set for the whole of his stack.

Team PokerStars Pro Luca Pagano with team mates Joe Hachem and Isabelle Mercier

It's better news, though, for Team PokerStars Pros Barry Greenstein and Noah Boeken They made it to Day 2, starting five days away from now. Boeken was the biggest mover on the day, getting his stack up to 85,000 at one point before losing a tough hand to two pair and dropping back down a bit. On the last level of the night, he once again lost half his stack and then promptly doubled up. He finished the day around 41,000.

Day 1B begins Friday and we'll see another flood of PokerStars qualifiers and Team PokerStars Pros. Scheduled to appear at the tables are Pros Victoria Coren, Tom McEvoy, Daniel Negreanu, Greg Raymer, and Vanessa Rousso. We'll also welcome PokerStars-sponsored players Alexander Kravchenko and Kathy Liebert.

This is not the only place to get your fix for World Series news. Our video blogging team is working tirelessly and turning out some great stuff at the freshly-launched PokerStars.tv. Be sure to head over there and watch a few videos. You will also get the password for the PokerStars.tv freeroll on PokerStars.