Finally! Nearly five years after the bitter and demoralizing events of Black Friday (in April 2011), PokerStars will return to U.S. soil when they officially launch PokerStars New Jersey on March 21st. The site will only be open to New Jersey residents only and they will not be able to play with the global pool of players. PokerStars NJ will now compete with other legal gaming entities in New Jersey like 888poker, WSOP.com, Borgata Poker, and Party Poker.
The Global Poker League completed their inaugural draft in Beverly Hills. Draft Day kicked off when the Rome Emperors made Mustapha Kanit their #1 pick. The Paris Aviators, managed by Fabrice Soulier, picked ElkY, in the first round with the #11 pick, then completed the roster with Davidi Kitai, George Danzer, and Mike Leah.
The Paris Aviators picked two local heroes for their team in the inaugural Global Poker League draft. Paris team manager Fabrice Soulier had the #11 and the #14 overall picks in the 12-team GPL. Soulier selected fellow Frenchman ElkY with their first round pick, then picked up Belgian Davidi Kitai with an early second round pick. Paris Aviators still have two more picks, so will they stick with French-speaking players, or will they go for the best available player?
It's Draft Day! The Global Poker League's inaugural draft is underway. The Rome Emperors had the first overall pick and team manager Max Pescatori selected fellow Italian Mustapha "lasagnaaammm" Kanit. Also, ElkY was a first-round pick by manager Fabrice Soulier for the Paris Aviators. Watch the rest of the GPL draft, hosted by Daniel Negreanu and Phil Hellmuth, via Twitch here.
Online poker in California a pipe dream? Just when it seemed like attempts to legalize online poker would roll over and die for the 2016 legislative session, at the last second Assemblyman Adam Gray introduced AB 2863, which featured a guaranteed subsidy of $60 million to the cantankerous horse racing industry opposition. AB 2863 definitely marks a step in the right direction, but it's still a long road ahead if Californians want to play on legal, state-approved online poker rooms.
It's finally here. The 2016 WSOP schedule has been released. The 47th incarnation of the most-prestigious tournament in all of poker and it kicks off on May 31 at the Rio Casino in Las Vegas. The 2016 WSOP added 8 events and has now swelled to 69 total bracelet events. The 2016 schedule included a few tweaks and changes along with a couple controversial decisions like a 15% payout percentage. The 2016 WSOP schedule is not even 24 hours old and the news is already stirring up drama among combative forum denizens and the highly-opinionated Twittreverse. One thing is for certain… once again the WSOP is on pace to be the biggest and richest tournament in history.
888poker announced that Kara Scott will be joining them as a brand ambassador. The Canadian TV presenter and poker player is most known for her fabulous sideline reporting for various events like the EPT, EPT, WSOP, and High Stakes Poker.
888 Live returns to Aspers Casino at Stratford City. The £220 buy-in re-entry event has a £50,000 guarantee. Starting Thursday, March 3, there will be three Day 1 flights with a single re-entry available for each flight. Qualifiers are running now on 888, plus every Wednesday night at Aspers Casino.
At 20-years old, Poland's Dzmitry Urbanovich is the fastest rising star in Europe. After making a gigantic splash by winning 4 side events at the EPT Malta, Dzmitry Urbanovich finally shipped an EPT event by winning the EPT Dublin Main Event Championship at the historic RDS. Dzmitry Urbanovich won €561,900 and pulled off such a remarkable comeback multiple times in the main event, his opponents started to wonder if he had the supernatural ability of immortality because no one could knock him out.
Dzmitry Urbanovich went from the outhouse to the penthouse. The 20-year old Polish Phenom is looking to build upon that Day 5 momentum and go wire-to-wire and take down the EPT Dublin. Native son Patrick Clarke is the lone Irishman at the final table and he'd second overall trailing big-stacked Urbanovich.
Another crazy prop bet. This one is a whopping $600,000 and invloves a bicycle ride to Las Vegas. Bill Perkins bet Dan Bilzerian that Dan could not ride a bicycle from Los Angeles to Las Vegas in under 48 hours. The distance is 278 miles between Bilzerian's house in Los Angeles to the iconic "WELCOME TO LAS VEGAS" sign. Can Bilzerian complete the 278-mile bike ride in under 48 hours for $600K?
The EPT Dublin is trying to play down to a final table but there's two more days to go. Day 4 commenced at the RDS in Dublin with 40 players remaining from a field of 605 runners. Alex Goulder ended Day 4 as the chip leader with 1M. First place pays out €561K. James Ankenhead, Luca Pagano, Dzmitry Urbanovich, Jamie Staples, Antoine Saout, and Pierre Neuville are all still alive. Watch the live stream for Day 4 at the EPT Dublin via Twitch here.
The poker world never has a shortage of broke-dick degens and grifters who will do anything to scam good people out of money. After getting stiffed on a 250K loan for a high-stakes European player, Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond penned a detailed op-ed in which he asked his peers in the poker community to be more vocal about known-scammers and thieves. Will Galfond's call to justice work? Or is he just screaming into the void?
The Rome Emperors were awarded the first pick in the inaugural Global Poker League draft. Who will team manager Max Pescatori pick as the #1 selection in the upcoming GPL draft (hosted on Feb. 25th)? The Paris Aviators took a tough beat with the 11th overall pick. Luckily the GPL draft adheres to a snake format, so the Aviators head coach Fabrice Souiler also gets the #14th overall pick as well.
Who is getting the #1 pick? According to the Twitter feed from the Global Poker League: "The 2016 GPL Draft Order Selection Show will be presented live on Tuesday Feb 16 at 7pm CET / 1pm ET / 10am PT." The actual draft is next week, but the order in which teams will draft will be determined today. The GPL draft order will be presented shortly via Twitch. Find out which teams gets the first pick and watch the Draft Order Selection Show here.
The €5K Main Event at the EPT Dublin started the other day and Day 2 is off and running. Only 341 players made the cut for the start of Day 2...plus a couple of last-minute entries. In all, 605 total runners took a shot at this EPT title event hosted at the RDS in Dublin. The top 87 places pay out with €561,900 set aside for first place. Early on Day 2, American Anthony Zinno is among the chip leaders along with France's Pierre Calamusa and Fabrice Soulier. Watch the live stream via Twitch here.
Another weird and wild week in the gaming world…. PokerStars introduced Duel, a new way to play specific heads-up matches, with the hopes that a highly-influential social media element will make the game addictive and lucrative… When in doubt, default to a bag of cash! The quickest way to resume discussions for online poker legalization in California is to dangle a boatload of cash in front of a crumbling institution barely clinging to power… The DFS world got taken behind the shed with a searing expose by PBS Frontline. Uh oh, real journalists digging underneath rocks makes everyone uncomfortable in the gambling world. As expected, there were a few absurd quotes from DFS execs, including one slagging poker.
After three days of high-stakes jousting at the legendary Royal Dublin Society, Italian Mustapha Kanit picked off American Chance Kornuth to win the €25K High Roller at the EPT Dublin. Kanit prevented Kornuth, fresh off his Aussie Millions 25K High Roller crown, from winning another big one. The stylish Kanit earned a little more than €501K for tonight's victory in Dublin. The winningest player in the history of Italy now has shipped almost $6 million in live tournaments.
Irish eyes are a little bleary on Valentine's Day. Down to 8 at the EPT Dublin €25K High Roller. Italian Mustapha Kanit ended Day 2 as the chip leader. First place is a cool €501K. Still left in hunt are: Anton Bertilsson, Charlie Carrel, Keith Johnson, Jeff Rossiter, Ivan Luca, and a pair of Americans -- Chance Kornuth and Nick Petrangelo.
Erik Seidel's introduction to poker? Stu Ungar. Yes, that Stu Ungar. It was the legendary wild man Ungar who introduced a young, shy and innocent Erik Seidel to the high-paced world of professional poker in Las Vegas. At the time, Seidel was a professional backgammon player, but there was zero money on the backgammon circuit. Ungar let Seidel tag along with him at the Stardust Casino and Ungar gave Seidel a glimpse into the lucrative poker world. And... the rest is history.
Hangover time in America. It's the day after the Super Bowl but the poker world keeps humming along… The gang at the 2+2 Pokercast podcast announced the new Internet Pokers Wall of Fame (a.k.a IPWOF)… Last week, the CEO of Amaya declared his intentions to buy-up the rest of Amaya's stock and take the company private… Meanwhile, Full Tilt's traffic is down and its numbers continue to spiral… British pro Liv Boeree gave a great long-form interview and sounded off on why women in general do not play poker.
Chris Leong won the first WPT stop of 2016. Leong faded a field of 1,171 players at the Borgata Casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey to win $816K and a seat into the WPT TOC. When the final table began, Leong was last in chips but he went into alligator mode and fought and clawed his way into a grueling heads-up with Rafael Yaraliyev, who was trying to go wire-to-wire. Alas, Leong came from behind to win the WPT Borgata Winter Poker Open. 2015 WSOP Champion Joe McKeehen was dunzo in fourth place.
Six players left at the Borgata's Winter Poker Open and the WPT final table is set. Brooklyn's Rafael Yaraliyev leads with almost 10M. Also still alive… Main Event champ Joe McKeehen, Yevgeniy Timoshenko, Matt Wantman, Liam He, and Chris Leong. Live stream starts shortly...
The latest stop on the WPT is the Borgata Winter Poker Open in Atlantic City. At the end of Day 3 of the Man Event, Kane Kalas bagged up as the chip leader with 3.2M. Only 34 players are left vying for the first-place payday worth $816K. On Day 4 they will play down to a final table. WSOP Main Event champion Joe McKeehen and Cate Hall are still left in the hunt.
Annette “Annette15” Obrestad was hired by the Venetian to be a poker room ambassador. The former Norwegian online wunderkind notoriously won an online tournament when she was only 15 years old, yet she's now on the payroll of a casino owned by a notoriously anti-online poker billionaire. Yes, it's baffling move that irked online forum denizens and spurred a bit of debate in media circles. Then again, Annette15 has always been the center of controversy since the moment she splashed onto the scene at the apex of the poker boom.
The Main Event for the Winter Poker Open at the Borgata Casino in Atlantic City, NJ is in full swing. This year's event has 1,171 runners. Cong Pham ended day 2 as the chip leader and only 150 players survived the cut. First place pays out $816K and only top 110 places get paid out of the $3.7M prize pool. Day 3 started and the money bubble should bust shortly. Follow the WPT's live updates....here.
Phil Ivey had shipped the 250K Challenge at the Aussie Millions the last two years, but this year it was Steve O'Dwyer who took down the big one down under. With a four-way deal, O'Dwyer still took home $951K (AUD) and added another High Roller trophy to his collection.
The final event at the Aussie Millions is the 250K High Roller Challenge. American Byron Kaverman ended Day 1 as the chip leader with the usual cast of High Roller characters taking a shot like Fedor Holz, Steve O'Dwyer, Phil Ivey, and 100K High Roller champ Fabian Quoss. At the start of Day 2, there's currently 13 players left out of 16 entries and they intend to play all the way down to a champion. Jason Somervile is hosting the live stream on RunItUp.tv starting Sunday night at 8pm Vegas time or 11pm ET or 5am Paris time (Monday). Watch the live stream... here.