On Sunday the first of December, the $10,300 buy-in partypoker MILLIONS Online returns with the opening flight Day 1A of four day one's. This year's MILLIONS Online has a $20 million guaranteed prize pool. There's also a special $1 million bonus if the chip leader on Day 1A can go all the way and win the MILLIONS Online title.
Las Vegas pro Michael Trivett faded a field of 778 runners to win the $1,700 buy-in Main Event at the 2019 WSOP Circuit Planet Hollywood in Las Vegas. Trivett banked $215,943 for the win and earned his first WSOP Circuit ring. Meanwhile, the fifteenth season of the Heartland Poker Tour concluded with its year-end Championship event at the Hollywood Casino in St. Louis, Missouri. Chicago's Paul 'Walnuts' Bianchi outlasted 353 players to win the HPT championship and $181,874.
Adrian Mateos, a Winamax sponsored player from Spain, outlasted a field of 948 to win the 2019 partypoker Live MILLIONS World Bahamas. A three-way chop secured $1,162,805 for Mateos, who outlasted a final table that included Chris Hunichen and Peter Jetten. It's been a good week at the Casino Baha Mar for Mateos, who also shipped a Super High Roller event for two titles in the Bahamas.
Daniel Negreanu and PokerStars parted ways after 12 years together at the end of May shortly before the start of the 2019 WSOP. Six months later, Negreanu announced he will be joining GGPoker as their ambassador.
PokerStars recently added two new game variants called Deep Water Hold'em and Tempest Hold'em. Deep Water Hold'em is just like regular 6-handed hold'em except with deep stacks, a third blind, and escalating antes in non-showdown pots. Tempest Hold'em sounds like a lot of fun for because it's a simple concept: all-in or fold.
Canadian pro Daniel Dvoress outlasted a field of 51 entrants to win the $250,000 buy-in 2019 Super High Roller Bowl Bahamas during at the Baha Mar Casino in the Bahamas. Dvoress won $4.08 million for defeating Wai Leong Chan heads up for the title. The tough final table also included Kathy Lehne, Erik Seidel, Seth Davies, Steve O'Dwyer, Jason Koon, and Justin Bonomo.
James Holzhauer, a former online poker enthusiast and sports betting pro from Las Vegas, made waves when he went on an epic run on Jeopardy! earlier in the year with a 32-game winning streak. Holzhauer recently won the annual Tournament of Champions. He will also appear at the 2019 partypoker LIVE Caribbean Poker Party in the Bahamas with a special trivia event at the Baha Mar Casino.
American pro Sam Soverel dominated the 2019 Poker Masters at the Aria Casino in Las Vegas with two event victories and seven final tables during the ten-event high roller series. He won Event #7 $25,000 PLO and took down Event #10 $50,000 NL Main Event for $680,000. In total, he banked $1.4 million including the coveted Purple Jacket.
Two more well-known pros are no longer sponsored players and members of Team PokerStars. Igor Kurganov and Liv Boeree are no longer with PokerStars as the online poker giants shifts away from traditional sponsored pros. Meanwhile, PokerStars is also pulling the plug on Power Up Poker, one of the many new formats they introduced in the last few years that was more like a video game than old school poker.
Phil Hellmuth lost a prop bet worth $20,000 when he could not return a tennis ball hit by tennis pro Ellis Guernsey. Hellmuth had 20 attempts and could not return a single one.
The World Series of Poker issued a statement today to recognize Australian pro Robert Campbell as the 2019 WSOP Player of the Year and not Daniel Negreanu. They incorrectly awarded 2019 WSOP POY to Daniel Negreanu at the conclusion of the WSOP Europe because of a error in their database. After an investigation, the WSOP discovered Negreanu got awarded POY points in an event he did not cash. Campbell wins the 2019 WSOP POY with Shaun Deeb finishing in second place and Negreanu finishing in third place.
Daniel Negreanu secured the 2019 World Series of Poker Player of the Year with a strong performance at the WSOP Europe at King's Casino in RozVegas that included seven cashes and a final table. Kid Poker caught Australian pro, Robert Campbell, who went into the WSOPE as the POY leader. Negreanu, a 6-time bracelet winner, won his third Player of the Year title, but became the first player to win POY without securing a bracelet victory.
Pennsylvania, now the fifth largest state in America after edging out Illinois with 12.8 million residents, officially has online poker again when PokerStars PA went online during a soft launch on Monday. The official launch will be Wednesday, November 6, 2019.
The 2019 WSOP Europe concluded with the 15th and final event at the King's Casino in RozVegas. French pro Bertrand Grospellier, otherwise known as 'ElkY', won the Event #15 €550 Colossus NL for his second career bracelet. Elky faded a field of 2,738 runners to win €190,375. Shaun Deeb finished in 11th place but missed out on catching Daniel Negreanu for 2019 WSOP Player of the Year.
Nova Scotia's Geoffrey Hum outlasted 1,109 runners and an insanely difficult final table to win the 2019 WPT Montreal at the Playground Casino in Montreal. Hum defeated Colorado's Adedapo Ajayi heads-up to win $500,000 CAD. The rest of the stacked final table had over $46 million in career cashes including Joseph Choeng, Mike Watson, Kristen Bicknell, and Swedish pro Martin Jacobsen. Hum also won a seat into the season-ending TOC in Las Vegas in 2020.
Paul Schrader (Taxi Driver, First Reformed) will write and direct a new revenge-thriller film titled "The Card Counter" by HanWay Films. The new poker movie features Oscar Isaac (Rise of Skywalker, A Most Violent Year, Inside Llewyn Davis) as a professional poker player named William Tell with a dark past.
Greece's Alexandros Kolonias outlasted a field of 541 players to win the 2019 WSOP Europe Event #14 €10,350 Main Event. Kolonias outlasted a final four that included Italian pro Dario Sammartino, American pro Anthony Zinno, and Germany's Class Segebrecht. Sammartino, the runner-up at the 2019 WSOP Main Event in Las Vegas, finished in fourth place. Anthony Zinno busted in third place. Kolonias knocked out Segebrecht to win the bracelet and €1,133,678.
