Category: Poker

Three Men Who Robbed Poker Game Indicted

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poker robberyThere was an older report that came out about a poker game that was robbed in Ithaca, New York back on November 15th, and it seems that the three men who were involved with the robbery have finally been indicted for the incident.  The game was being played at the Hair Graphics East salon, in the East Hill Plaza in Ithaca, and it was said that the game typically drew in around 36 players on average.  The original report about the incident stated that it included a “$40 ante”, which most likely means that the buy-in for the game was $40.  The players were still playing after midnight on the 15th, but there were only about 12 still remaining in the game, and this is when everything went down.

Three men stormed through the back door of the salon, and came in with their faces covered by bandanas, and one player holding a handgun.  The men ordered everyone to get on the ground, and to hand over all money, their wallets, and cell phones.  Things didn’t exactly go to plan from that point on though, as one of the men held a gun to one of the players’ heads, and then player then went on to tell him to “shoot me, I’m not scared to die”.  This odd response apparently worked, as the men seemed a bit confused by what was going on, and one of the players then sprinted out of the back door yelling for police.

The three men then took off into a silver Nissan, but the players got the license number and called it into the police.  The men were caught about seven miles down the road, and were eventually arrested.

This is where the story concludes, as the three men were indicted this week for robbing the game.  The three men were Eric R. Cruz, Antonio C.J. Padin, and Robert J. Johnson Jr.  Cruz is 23 years old, Padin is 25 years old, and Johnson Jr. is 26 years old, and all three were indicted on charges of First Degree Robbery, Second Degree Robbery, Second Degree Burglary, and Fourth Degree Conspiracy.

The amount of time that these three men could serve in jail could range between 12 to 59 years, and the arraignments are set for January 6th of this coming year.

WSOP Main Event Winner Gets Robbed

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In some shocking news, a former World Series of Poker Main Event winner is in the middle of an alleged assault on Wednesday morning.  Jonathan Duhamel is one of the best up and coming young stars in the poker world, and is best known for winning the 2010 WSOP Main Event, and taking home the $8.9 million grand prize for it.  On top of the alleged assault, his home was also the target in a home invasion as well.  No one has made statements about it except for Duhamel’s agent, Phillipe Jette, who made a few remarks that help prove the truth in this story.

Jette said that Duhamel was injured during the incident, and made statements like that his “Christmas photos won’t be the prettiest”, and also that “getting out of bed will be particularly hard tomorrow”.

There hasn’t bee anyone specifically named  in this assault yet, but the story is that two men went to a house on Wednesday morning at 9:15am in Boucherville.  The two men then rang the door bell and this led to them assaulting the man who opened the door.  It was an armed assault, and no one has stated if there was anything taken from the house by the two men who were involved.

Duhamel has had quite a bit of success in the poker world, which obviously all starts with his $8.9 million payday.  After winning the Main Event, he went on to travel around the world and play in many different poker tournaments.  He won over $600k on his trip, and is also a part of Team PokerStars Pro roster as well.

You never want to hear a story about any type of assault, but this is not the first time that a poker player has been in the midst of a situation like this.  Doyle Brunson wrote about his run in with a home invasion and assault, and Greg Raymer was also once nearly robbed at the Bellagio as well.  Obviously before any final conclusions are made, we’ll have to see what exactly happened, but this is a story that is definitely worth keeping your eye on.

Chris Klodnicki Wins EPLs Mix-Max Main Event

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Epic Poker LeagueThe Epic Poker League’s Mix-Max Main Event drew in some big names in poker, and also paid out a very nice first place prize to the eventual winner.  It took a bit longer than many people expected to get to that winner though, as the fifth and final day of play took an incredible 15 hours for a winner to be crowned.  Even more surprising is the fact that the first two eliminations came in a pretty timely manner, leaving three players to duke it out for longer than you could imagine.

The first player sent home was the shortest stack of them all to start the day, Scott Clements, who found himself with only about 130k to start the day, and his Kc-9c ran into the K-10 off suit of Andrew Lichtenberger.  A 9 did come down on the flop, but the ship was righted when a 10 came on the turn and sent Clements home in 5th place.  The second elimination was quite a bit more shocking though, as it was Michael ‘The Grinder” Mizrachi, who started the day in 2nd place, eventually finding himself going home in 4th place.  Mizrachi lost two big pots, and then was forced to go all in, but was outdone by Joe Tehan in the end.

Play then completely took a 180, and the next three players went at it for longer than you could imagine.  It took 100 more hands before another player went home, and that was Tehan, who shoved his pocket nines in, but they could not hold on against the A-7 off suite of Klodnicki.  He went home in 3rd place, and now we were set on our heads up match for the Championship.

It was Klodnicki against Lichtenberger, and it was a best of three series to decide the winner.  The layout of the best of three featured the first two matches with the players starting with their chip stacks that they had at the end of three handed play.  This left Klodnicki with 3.47 million and Lichtenberger with 1.526 million.  If there was a third match, then the two players would go to even chip stacks for the last match.

It never got to a third match though, as Klodnicki held off a push by Lichtenberger in match one to get the win, and match two featured Klodnicki being ahead throughout and getting the job done.  This gave Klodnicki the Championship ring, and also the first place prize of $801,680 for his incredible run.

Randy Lew to Attempt to Break World Record at PCA

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2012 Pokerstars Caribbean AdventureMany people in both the online poker world and the live poker world know the popular name Randy “nanonoko” Lew.  He is an online juggernaut and has brought in some incredibly impressive results in recent years.  In a bit of interesting news, Lew will attempt to become a Guinness World Record holder, by breaking a poker record at the 2012 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure tournament.  As far as the world record goes, no one, not even Lew knows exactly what world record that he will be looking to break.  The reason for this is that both PokerStars and Lew have decided to let the poker world make the decision for them.

The decision will be made on the popular online poker forum, Two Plus Two.  PokerStars VIP Manager “PokerStarsCaleb” posted that they were looking for a world record for Lew to break this upcoming January.  It can be a wide range of things, but the general idea behind the record has to be something simple and straight forward that even someone who doesn’t play poker could understand.  They also are hoping that it can have something to do with online poker in some way, which will be interesting as it is a live poker tournament.

While there have been many different ideas coming out for the world record, PokerStars and Lew are looking for something that stands out above the rest.  PokerStars has offered to give the person who comes up with the best suggestion a free entry into the $215 Sunday Million on their site this upcoming weekend.  When all of the world record options are up, both PokerStars and Lew will make the decision in the end.

Lew is incredibly popular in the game of poker, and has hit Supernova Elite status four years straight up until 2011.  His streak came to an end when Black Friday hit unfortunately, but he is back in action after he moved to Vancouver to continue playing on PokerStars.  Now, the action at PCA will kick off at the Atlantis Resort and Casino in the Bahamas on January 5th.  This event is a part of the always popular European Poker Tour, so keep your eye out for Lew in it!

Epic Poker League Grants Lifetime Exemption to Doyle Brunson

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Epic Poker LeagueThe Epic Poker League has been surrounded by scandal at a few of its events to this point, but this news about the EPL is what many would consider good news.  While all players have to meet certain requirements to even earn entry into any EPL event, the news that came out today is that Doyle Brunson has earned a lifetime player card to any Epic Poker League event.  What this means is that Brunson can play in any EPL event, at any time that he feels, regardless of the entry requirements and whether or not he meets them.

It’s news that may not blow many people away, but it is definitely well deserved for one of the greatest players in the history of poker.  Brunson is known by almost any poker player or fan in the world, and his results speak for themselves.  This decision was made by Jeffrey Pollack, who is the Executive Chairman for the company who owns the EPL, Federated Sports & Gaming.  Pollack said that the decision was essentially made because of contributions that Brunson has made to the game in his career.

The membership cards that are given to players vary by their earnings and results throughout the years, and Brunson was currently holding a 2-year Category A card, and this means that his eligibility goes through the year 2013.  In order to get this card players have to have at least $2 million in lifetime poker tournament earnings, and a maximum of $1 million can come from a single poker tournament.

Now, it’s important to note that just because Brunson has received this lifetime exemption, it doesn’t mean that he will participate in any of the events.  Brunson has stuck with the cash game tables in the recent years, stating that poker tournaments are simply “getting too hard to come through”, and that he doesn’t plan to partake in many tournaments for the remainder of his life.  All EPL events feature $20k buy-in’s, which is definitely one of the largest buy-ins for a poker event out there today.

All in all, if anyone deserves this type of honor, it is definitely Doyle Brunson.

$1 Million WSOP Event Has 22 Confirmed

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One of the most talked about events for the upcoming World Series of Poker is the $1 Million buy-in event, which will not only be a gold bracelet event, but it will give the winner a platinum bracelet when all is said and done.  The talks of this event have became more and more in-depth over the past few months, and the main thing surrounding the event is that it could potentially be the largest first place pay day for the winner of any poker tournament in history.  The event currently has 22 players confirmed for it, and is called the “Big One for One Drop”.

The name comes from the charitable organization called One Drop, who will receive one ninth of the players’ buy-in’s to go towards the charity ($111,111).  The remainder of the buy-in will go straight into the prize pool, and there is no rake taken from it either.  The idea was started thanks to Guy Laliberte, who is not only the Chairman of the organization, but is also the founder of Cirque du Soleil.  The organization was created to help solve the problem of a lack of access to clean water for close to a billion people.

Out of the 22 players who have confirmed, the first two to do so are well known poker pros Jonathan Duhamel and Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier.  Both made their announcement at this past years’ November Nine, and Duhamel stated that out of any of the winnings that he takes from the event, that he will donate an additional 5% to One Drop.  This number, 22, is exactly the number that was needed to be confirmed in order for the tournament to be an official bracelet event, and the tournament will work a bit differently than other events.  Instead of the top 10% making the cash, the top 20% of players will make money, and the field will cap at 48 total players.

As far as the players who will be joining Duhamel and Grospellier, you’ll find names like Daniel Negreanu, Patrik Antonius, Johnny Chan, Gus Hansen, Tom Dwan, Laliberte, Phil Ruffin, Bobby Baldwin, Tony G, Dan Shake, and Andy Beal.  There will also be qualifiers from satellites such as the Loto-Quebec satellite, the European satellite, and the Caesars satellite, as well as a seat awarded for the Montreal Group.

Game Show Network Cuts High Stakes Poker

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high stakes pokerThe Game Show Network offers many different types of shows, and one of the many includes different poker action.  GSN definitely took notice of the boom that occurred from both live and online poker over the recent years, and they run a show called “High Stakes Poker”.  This show has been running for six full years now, and drew quite a bit of attention especially with the always popular World Series of Poker picking up steam.  The news was brought on as the site reported that their lineup for the January season will not include this show after the 2nd.

Unfortunately, this is not the first show to be axed from TV, as we have also seen shows like PokerStars Big Game cancelled, as well as the NBC Heads-Up Poker Championship.  The main reason for this is the large amount of revenue that was brought in from advertising from the huge poker sites Full Tilt and PokerStars, which completely stopped after Black Friday occurred back in April.

While these other two shows were cut due to the loss of online poker in the United States, there had been rumors spreading about High Stakes Poker for the past few seasons, as the ratings took a bit of a hit when they made a change to the host.  The original host of the show was the well-known Gabe Kaplan, and he was replaced by Norm MacDonald.

But what does this all mean for the life of live poker cash games for the future?  Well, it’s not looking good, and it seems that the only poker that United States poker fans and players will be able to get for the near future will be live poker tournaments such as the World Poker Tour, and of course the always popular World Series of Poker each Summer when it is played.  The main issue was of course the revenue, but players were not able to wear the patches for the sites that they represented while playing the games either, as online poker in the United States is completely banned.  We’ll keep you updated if any new live poker action comes to light for the fans to keep their eyes out for in the offseason of the poker tournaments.

Introducing The Deep Stack Poker Tour

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There have been many new poker tours jumping into the mix since Black Friday sent the online poker world under, and many of them have aimed to hit different specific audiences.  This one will give all different types of players the chance to compete in a tournament which should be incredibly popular from the word go.  With the likes of the World Series of Poker, the World Poker Tour, and many other various poker tours taking in the online poker players who are looking for action, the Deep Stack Poker Tour is the newest of them all to be released.  The tournament will kick off in early 2012, and gives players the chance to compete in large poker tournaments with big named players, and outstanding prize pools guaranteed as well.

The action will start in February, and will have many stops all across North America.  The buy-in’s are fan and player friendly, and will also be televised so that poker fans can keep up with the action and the big names in the events as well.  It has yet to be released about which TV station that the tournaments will be aired on, but it has been said that the commentators for the action will be Tristan “Cre8ive” Wade, and Joe Stapleton.

The first tournament in February kicks off on the 15th and will run until the 19th.  It features a $1,500 buy-in and will take place in Niagara Falls, New York, at the Seneca Niagara Casino.  The guarantee for the event will start with at least $200k in the prize pool.  The poker pros who will be included at the event could be a major selling point to players and fans though, as they are already expecting many of the “Team DeepStack Pros” to be taking part.  This list includes players like Mike “The Mouth” Matusow, Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi, Adam “Roothlus” Levi, Karina Jett, Randal Flowers, Justin Smith, and Jennifer “Jennicide” Leigh Matt Graham.

As far as the additional destinations for the tour go, there is nothing locked in yet, but there has been chatter about events being played in California, Nevada, Oregon, New York, Canada, and Quebec for starters.  We’ll keep you updated on the information as it is released, but this should definitely be a great option for players across North America.

Doyle Brunson to Skip EPT and EPL for High Stakes Cash Game

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Doyle BrunsonWe all know Doyle Brunson.  The “Texas Dolly” is one of the most popular names in poker, and has some of the most impressive results among poker players today as well.  His overall winnings in his lifetime of poker playing are astronomical, and he has won over $2.8 million JUST from the World Series of Poker.  Brunson has hit quite a bad streak in terms of live poker tournaments recently though, and it seems like it has been since around Black Friday occurred.  With all of this being taken into account, Brunson has decided to skip some big time poker tournaments, in order to play in high stakes cash games.

Brunson has a seat at the $20k buy-in Epic Poker League Main Event, but has chosen to stick with high stakes poker instead.  Even more interesting is the fact that he was also offered to be the guest of honor at the European Poker Tour’s Prague Main Event, and that he chose to go with the cash game option there as well.

This may not come as a shocker to other players in the game, as Brunson has always been big at the high stakes cash game tables, and he also never really travels much in order to compete in poker tournaments.  Brunson did play in the European Poker Tour’s London event earlier this year, but soon after that he decided not to compete in the World Series of Poker Europe.

Doyle Brunson and his partners recently sold his namesake poker room Doyles Room to the up and coming America’s Cardroom.

Brunson tweeted that he would not be attending the Epic Poker League’s Main Event, but that he did “like the format, and will support it when possible”.  He went on to say that the reason for missing it is that he has an opportunity to play in a “very high stakes cash game”, and that “any pro would understand”.

This could potentially have something to do with Brunson hitting a bad run on the live poker tournament circuit as of late, but only time will really tell.  Regardless though, you can bet that Brunson will be on the high stakes poker cash game tables somewhere!  We’ll keep you updated on this story as more is released.

Ladies International Poker Series Releases New Ladies Poker Tour

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Another live poker tour has been released, but this one has a twist to it.  It is a Ladies Poker Tour, and has been set up by the same people who organized the Ladies International Poker Series.  The tour is called the US Ladies Poker Championship Circuit Tour (USLPCC), and will feature 12 different events, as well as a Main Event Championship at the end of the season.  The idea behind this Ladies Poker Tour which will make it different from other events, is that it will feature huge prize pools, larger buy-in’s than the standard events, and also the Championship with a higher buy-in at the end of the season.

For starters, the opening events will feature $300+$40 buy-in’s, and will give players a starting chip stack of 10,000 chips.  Players will also have the option to purchase a $10 add-on that will add 2k in chips to your start from the word go.  These events will run different than most live poker tournaments though.  Typically a poker tournament is set up over a three day span in most situations, but these will run over certain weekends.  The layout is set up so that events will start on Saturday, and there will be 12 hours of play until a break occurs until play on Sunday.  The play on Sunday will then go down to the end and a winner is decided.  The final table will also be streamed online live for fans to watch.

While it is currently a full slate of 12 events, there have only been six released to this point.  The schedule to this point looks as follows:
  • Choctaw Casino in Durant, Oklahoma on December 3rd
  • Golden Nugget in Atlantic City, New Jersey on January 7th
  • Venetian Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada on February 4th
  • Thunder Valley Casino in Lincoln, California on March 17th
  • Orange Park Kennel Club in Jacksonville, Florida on April 14th
  • Bicycle Casino in Los Angeles, California on April 28th
Then Championship Event will feature a buy-in that is a bit larger, and is set at $550, and will be played on September 1st at a location in Las Vegas.  There are satellites offered for the Championship at each single event, and they will be for buy-in’s of $150+$25, and the $10 optional bonus will also be offered for this.  If you are able to win the prize package at the Mega Satellite, you will not only win a seat to the event, but also a $100 Premium Seating ticket for the Women in Poker Hall of Fame, as well as a nice $850 to help cover the expenses of getting to and from the event.