What Happened to the Red Jacket?

[lwestatbus]

Flipping channels the other day and caught the final two hands of the 2002 WSOP Main Event. I'd never seen this before (had Lon McCaren (sp?) and Gabe Kaplan commenting). Robert Varkony was the winner and they put on a red jacket as a big part of the performance, like the Green jacket at the Masters' Golf tourny. (The jacket didn't fit very well--it looked like there was only one available and it was pretty large.)

Has the jacket been a part of the tourny that disappeared in 2003 and later?

Oh, not sure the background but they started shaving Phil Helmuth's head as part of some side bet.

[wEbMaStEr]

I could be wrong, but I don't recall seeing the red jacket before this, certainly not since. JC Mortensen won it the year befor and I don't recall a red jacket.

As for Phil's head shave, Phil said before the final table that Verkonyi played so bad thatif he won (i think he was chip leader going in?) he would shave his head.

The rest is geography

[groton]

Verkonyi is one of the Bigger fish at Foxwood Turnys when he does play them which ant much.

[xDiamond_CutteRx]

Varkonyi wasn't chip leader going on, but he was pretty big chipped when Phil made his "Well, I don't want to... but I'll just say that if Robert Varkonyi wins this thing, I'll shave my head" comment when they had like 5 or 6 left.

As for the red jacket, that may have been a one-time thing.

[MasterShake]

Ferguson had one on when he won, but I think he was wearing it during the tournament.