Tag: poker

Black Diamond Poker Open From Bovada

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Bovada is quickly becoming one of the more talked about online poker sites for United States poker players these days, and it’s for good reason.  They offer some great online poker action all over the place, including cash games and great poker tournaments as well.  One thing that currently stands out at Bovada poker is their Black Diamond Poker Open.  This is a tournament series that the site is running, and it is one that should dominate anything that has run on their site in the past as well!  It’ll be made up of some big prize pools and have two main events as well.

There are two different series at the Black Diamond Open, which include the Contender Series and the Championship Series, which are made up of different size buy-ins and different size prize pools as well.  The “Contender Series” features buy-ins that are more for recreational players to mid-level players, and it will have a  Main Event that features a $25k guarantee, which will be played in the middle of March on the 18th.  In total the guaranteed prize pools for this series are made up of around $100k in total prize throughout the series!

As far as the Bovada Poker Championship Series goes, this will start just after the Contender Series.  These events are for the mid-level to high stakes poker players, and the Main Event for this series features a $250k guarantee as well.  This event will give first place at least a $50k prize and a nice watch worth $5k as well, and the tournament will take place on the 1st of April.

One of the best parts about this event is the fact that people can also win their way into many of the events for as little as $1 through the many satellites that Bovada will be offering.  On top of that though, there are also things called “Super Satellite Days” that happen just before each of the two Main Events.  These are great ways to be able to get into the big time buy-in tournaments with huge prize pools, without having to pay the full buy-in for the event!

WSOP National Championship Adds Additional Players

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WSOPThe World Series of Poker’s National Championship is one of the events that they are hoping to boost up a bit this year in terms of overall interest in the event.  While the National Championship features a nice $1 million prize pool, and also features 100 of the players who have done the best during the WSOP Circuit for that year, they have decided to up the ante a little bit by including some of the best poker players in the world in it as well.

Typically, the event offers 100 guaranteed spots for players who get to play in the National Championship for free.  These 100 spots are made up of the 34 automatic qualifiers which are made up of 17 players who won a Circuit Main Event, and 17 casino champs, who are players that earned the most points at each of the stops on the Circuit.  After that the final 66 spots that are awarded will go to that players who earned the most points across all of the Circuit events throughout the year.

As mentioned, those players get to play for free, but the new addition will offer 100 additional spots for players to take.  These spots are awarded to the top 100 overall earners in terms of points from 2010 and 2011 between the World Series of Poker, and World Series of Poker Europe as well.  These players will NOT be given a free entry into the event though, as they will have to pay a $10k entry fee into the event, but that $10k entry will be added on top of the $1 million guaranteed prize pool.

This means that we could potentially be seeing players like Phil Hellmuth, Jonathan Duhamel, Michael Mizrachi, Ben Lamb, John Juanda, Shawn Buchanan, Chris Moorman, John Racener, Frank Kassela, David Baker, Jason Mercier, Bertrand Grospellier, Tom Dwan, Men Nguyen, Sammy Farha, and many other players in this event on July 6th.

Last year, Sam Barnhart brought in his first ever WSOP cash, and it was in the form of a win and a $300k pay day at the WSOP National Championship.  After that, Barnhart went on to finish in 17th in the Main Event for another nice score at the 2011 World Series of Poker.

World Poker Tour’s Shooting Stars Event Kicks Off

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The World Poker Tour’s Shooting Stars event is one of the most talked about events on the World Poker Tour schedule, mainly because of it’s unique format.  On top of that though, it also draws in some of the biggest names in poker consistently, and is also played in the wonderful state of California.  This event kicked off earlier today, and will feature two starting days for the players, both of which will have a group of “Shooting Stars” that have $5,000 bounties on their head if you are able to eliminate them.

The bounties will be spread out between Day 1A and Day 1B, and will feature big names on both days.  Another nice bonus for this event that other events don’t offer, is the fact that they pay out a bonus of $10,000 to the chip leader on both of the opening days.  So what this means is that if you are able to finish at the top of the leader board at the end of either of the days, you’ll be playing the event for free, since the buy-in is only $10k!

Day 1A will feature Shooting Stars like Joe Hachem, Jonathan Duhamel, Phil Hellmuth, Mike Matusow, Daniel Negreanu, Erik Seidel, Vanessa Selbst, Liv Boeree, Maria Ho, Kathy Liebert, and Christian Harder.  Obviously as you can see by these names, none of them will be easy outs by any means, and any of these players could seriously contend for the championship on any day of the week as well!

Day 1B will include a strong list of players as well, starting with Men “The Master” Nguyen, Scotty Nguyen, Barry Greenstein, Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier, Allen Cunningham, and Alan Sternberg as well.  Mike Sexton, who is a current member of the Poker Hall of FAme and is also a commentator for the Tour will have a bounty on him as well.  Sexton was actually a final tablist at this event last year as well, so he’s definitely had some success.

One last difference from this event that is worth pointing out is the fact that they will switch the action from nine handed play to six handed play with 36 players remaining instead of just at the final table like standard World Poker Tour events are.

Party Poker World Poker Tour Marbella Satellites Start

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The next Party Poker WPT satellite series has begun, and its for the World Poker Tour National Series Marbella main event, which takes place between April 20 and 24, 2012 on the exotic Costa del Sol of Spain at the Marbella Casino, Marbella, Spain.

Each Party Poker prize package into the WPT Marbella is valued at $4,000 and includes the $2,250 cost to buy in to the tournament plus $1k for expense money and a 4-night stay with hospitality while you’re there. Players are responsible for their own travel to and from the event and for acquiring all the necessary travel documentation.

The PartyPoker WPT National Series Marbella satellite series runs from March 5 to April 8, 2012. Prize packages are awarded at WPT National Marbella Satellite tournaments running weekly at the site on Sundays at 1:55 pm ET for a $225 direct buy-in. At each of these WPT Marbella Satellites at least 1 prize package will definitely be awarded although more than one prize package award is possible, with one package awarded for every $4k collected in buy-ins.

Players can avoid the $225 direct buy-in into the WPT Marbella Satellite through a satellite qualifier. These run every day at the site at 1:30 pm ET and additionally as a Turbo tournament on Sundays at 11:15 am ET for a direct buy-in of $25. One $225 seat in the next WPT Marbella satellite will be awarded for every $225 collected in buy-ins.

There are also two ways that players can avoid the $25 satellite qualifier buy-in by winning a seat through one of two different sub qualifier speed events, one with a $3 buy-in and one with a $1 buy-in and rebuy. There’s even a WPT Marbella Freeroll qualifier you can enter to win a seat in the event for no cost at all.

WPT Los Angeles Poker Classic Champion Crowned

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The World Poker Tour’s Los Angeles Poker Classic has finally come to an end, and one player found themselves standing above the rest when all was said and done.  Sean Jazayeri is one of the more seasoned vets in the poker game today, and he had a tough task at a final table that featured some of the most well-known up and comers out there today.  When the day started, the other five players at the final table included David “Doc” Sands, who was just behind him in terms of chip stack size, Noah Schwartz, Dan Kelly, Jason Somerville, and Jason Burt.  Somerville and Burt both had some work to do as they were the short stacks.

Both of them were not able to last though, as Somerville was sent home on the second hand, and Burt was sent home on the 12th hand.  Jazayeri sent home Somerville, was the knockout of Burt came at the hands of Dan Kelly.  This left four players to duke it out for the championship, and they played for quite a bit before anything else really happened.  Jazayeri then made a raise under the gun, and was called by Kelly.  Schwartz then pushed all in, which led to another all-in from Jazayeri, which couldn’t leave Schwartz feeling too great about his spot.  Indeed he was way behind, as Jazayeri turned over Kings, which held up against the A-J of Schwartz.

So the three final players remaining were Jazayeri with the chip lead of 9.8 million to 4.6 for Kelly, and 2 million for Sands.  Sand started working his way up though and eventually overtook Kelly.  It wasn’t long after that though that he sent Kelly home in 3rd place, and set up a heads up match that actually had Sands as the chip leader to start the action.  He even built his lead even larger (about 2 to 1) pretty quickly as well, but Jazayeri was able to turn it around in one big hand, when he was all-in with A-K against the Queens of Sands.  Jazayeri hit his Ace, and held a nice lead at this point.  Jazayeri got Sands all in, and was holding A-5 against the K-Q of Sands.  Sands hit a King, but Jazayeri also paired his 5.  The turn gave Sands a straight draw, but the river was another dreaded five to give Jazayeri the championship and the first place prize of over $1.3 million.  Sands took home over $860k for his efforts as well.

Latest 26-Day Endurance Challenge Launched at Intertops Poker

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Intertops Poker has brought back its 26-Day Endurance Challenge for another go-round. This time the promotional period is from March 1- 27, 2012. And as in events past, all a player has to do to win prizes in this incarnation of the Intertops 26-Day Endurance Challenge is keep accumulating FPP (Frequent Player Points) as they usually do by playing in cash games and real money tournaments at the Intertops Poker site.

Players can earn seats in one of three freeroll tournaments taking place on Sunday, April 1, 2012 at 22:59 GMT (or 18:59 EST): either a $750 freeroll, a $1,000 freeroll or a $1,500 freeroll.

After earning their freeroll seat, players can then earn cash prizes of at least $3 and up to $42 by meeting even higher milestones, either by earning more points per day on each of the days they play, or by earning the same number of points daily but for a greater number of days.

In either case, players have from 04:00 GMT on March 1 to 03:59 on March 27 to earn as many points daily over as many days as they can to earn the highest cash and freeroll prizes they can. Earn at least 14 points daily on at least 5 days of the challenge and get that $750 freeroll seat. Earn those 14 points daily for 10 days and get a seat in the $1,000 freeroll. And do it for at least 15 days and get that $1,500 freeroll seat.

To get the maximum cash prize of $42, you must earn 224 points daily for 20 days of the challenge.

World Poker Tour’s LA Poker Classic Has 18 Players Remaining

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The World Poker Tour’s Los Angeles Poker Classic has had a ton of hype surrounding it, and to this point it has lived up to that hype.  When Day 4 began of the action there were 54 players remaining, but when the day finally wound down we were left with only 18 top players remaining in the action.  These 18 players will head back today to the Commerce Casino to play down to the final table, which should be one of the stronger final tables in recent memory as there are still some heavy hitters left in this event.  The winner of the World Poker Tour’s LA Poker Classic will take home over $1.3 million as well!

A few players that are definitely worth noting that are still in the event are Noah Schwartz (1.77 million chips, first place), Dan Kelly (1.749 million chips, second place), and A.J. Jejelowo (1.57 million chips, third place).  To round out the players who are holding over 1 million chips heading into Day 5, we have Stephen Chidwick in 4th place with 1.42 million, Jason Dewitt in 5th place with 1.18 million, Sean Jazayeri in 6th place with 1.126 million, and well-known poker pro Jason Somerville in 7th place with 1.025 million.  Quite a bit of the hype has surrounded Somerville, as this past week he came out as the first ever openly gay male professional poker player, and it seems that his announcement hasn’t slowed him down at all from playing incredible poker and putting himself in a great spot to make a run.

A few other well-known players still remaining in the action are former World Poker Tour Champions Joe Hachem and Allen Carter, as well as Sorel Mizzi, David Pham, David Sands, and Nick Binger.  All in all, there are quite a few big names remaining, and this final table has the potential to be one of the most talked about out of many recent events as well.  After Somerville who is in 7th place, the above-mentioned Pham, Sands, and Hachem are all sitting in 8th, 9th, and 10th places in that order.  Binger and Mizzi both have a bit of work to do though, as they currently hold 565k chips, and 600k chips respectively.

The action today starts with the blinds at 10k/20k, with an ante of 3k.  The action goes until there are only six players remaining, and then this will set the televised final table.

888 Poker WSOP Main Event 2012 Qualifiers On Now

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888 Poker has begun its qualifier series for the 2012 World Series of Poker Main Event in Las Vegas, Nevada. The 888 Poker WSOP 2012 Qualifier Series features weekly qualifier tournaments every alternating Sunday, starting promptly at 20:05 GMT, for a direct buy-in of $500 + $25.

Players can avoid that $525 buy-in, however, by winning their way to that event through a series of smaller satellites with buy-ins as low as $1.10.

It starts with WSOP Step 1 qualifiers, with a player’s choice of $1 + $0.10 rebuy/add-on events, taking place daily every 2 hours and awarding one Step 2 qualifier seat for every $25 in the prize pool, or a $5 + $0.50 with no rebuy or add-on, taking place 3 times weekly and from which 1 of every 5 players will advance to Step 2.

The Step 2 qualifier has a $23 + $2 direct buy-in and also takes place thrice weekly and advances one 1 in 5 to the next step. That would be Step 3, with its own $105 + $10 direct buy-in, taking place three times a week and advancing 1 in 5 to the final WSOP Qualifier.

Each qualifier winner receives a prize package valued at $15,000 that includes the $10,000 WSOP Main Event buy-in as well as $2,000 for travel expenses, $500 in spending cash, 8 nights of hotel accommodations in Vegas, exclusive access to the 888 Poker player’s lounge, with pool table, XBox, TV, drinks all day long and breakfast, as well as an 888 Poker Live Event merchandise kit and a special invite to a VIP event.

Mickey Petersen Pulls in Nice Win at EPT Copenhagen

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The name Mickey Petersen might not be the most well-known in the poker world right now, but he definitely showed up in a big way by winning the European Poker Tour’s Copenhagen Main Event.  This event also featured one of the most entertaining back and forth heads up matches that I can remember as well.  The match came down to Petersen, who is only 22 years old, and one of the older players in the event in well-known Pierre Neuville.  Neuville is really well-known in the European Poker Tour for the fact that he has qualified for an incredible 23 straight EPT events by playing satellites online.

The heads up match between these two started with almost even chip stacks, with Petersen holding a very small lead at 4.7 million to 4.27 million.  The option for a deal was offered by Neuville, but Petersen apparently didn’t even take it into consideration as the match then kicked off with some fire.  This match literally went on for hours as well, with Neuville getting a quick lead, but Petersen gaining it back before long.  For hours on end these two took their turn holding the chip lead, and at one point Neuville actually gained a 2 to 1 lead on his opponent, and looked to be in an excellent spot to finish off the deal.  It wasn’t meant to be though, as Petersen fought his way back, and then got his own 2 to 1 chip lead!  It wouldn’t be exciting if Neuville didn’t make another push though, and he did just that, and the two went into the dinner break with their heads spinning from the constant changing of power.

The dinner break was when it all changed though, as Petersen came out looking like a force and took a 7 million to 1.9 million chip lead,  and he would hold onto his lead from here on out.  Neuville did his best to make one more push, but the two were all-in and he was behind.  Neuville turned over A-4, while Petersen was holding A-5.  To make it even worse though, the two were looking like there would potentially be a chop pot, but Petersen nailed a five on the river to give himself the championship.  This was his first ever live tournament win, and did quite a bit to help his career winnings.

For taking down the event, Petersen got a first place pay day of $444,595, while his opponent, Neuville, took home a nice consolation prize of $282,843.

Duhamel Gets His Gold Bracelet Back

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Jonathan Duhamel has been on one heck of a ride since the home invasion and robbery that occurred back in December of 2011, but one of his most prized possessions that was missing has now been returned to its rightful owner.  This is none other than the World Series of Poker Main Event bracelet that he took down back in 2010.  He was bent on trying to get this bracelet back, as it was one of the things that meant the most to him out of what was taken.  It was gone for around two months, but this past Wednesday it was found, but not quite in the same condition that he lost it in.

It was found by a street sweeper named Denis Theriault, who cleaning up the Ville-Marie tunnel, when he found the bracelet while emptying the sweeper out.  It was completely beaten up, and looked as though someone had just taken a hammer to it.  It was worse than that though, as it had actually been run over by a car unfortunately.  The bracelet has (had) a diamond mix in it as well, and no one is positive about how it ended up in this tunnel, but there are a few assumptions.  One of the most popular ones is that whoever had  the bracelet at the time decided that there was no way they could sell the bracelet without being caught, so they simply threw it into the tunnel.

The bracelet essentially has lost everything except for it’s main plate, but fortunately Seth Palansky, who is the Media Director of the World Series of Poker, told tournament director Mitch Garber to let Duhamel know that they would work with him to replace the bracelet.  The current bracelet has Duhamel’s last name scratched off, but his first name, the date of the event, and the name of the tournament are all engraved, so there was no way that someone would not be able to realize that this bracelet belonged to Duhamel.

Duhamel has been one of the hottest players to start 2012, and it looks like he’s rebounded well from the home invasion as well.  Keep an eye on him throughout the year as he could be in for another huge year.