Online Poker Directory

Archive for May, 2012

It’s been a crazy couple of weeks! I finally managed to get all of my things packed up and put safely away in storage in California after procrastinating horribly for days. I think that I needed the pressure of a hard deadline to get me to finally start putting things in boxes. The move went well though and the very next day I caught a plane for England.

I’m staying in Brighton for a bit while I catch up with old friends. I’m having such an amazing time here and am seriously considering moving back to this part of the world. I’ve always said that Brighton is one of my very favourite places in the whole world. And right now, the weather is amazing!

I spent the past week in Greece, doing some sailing with a group of 9 friends. We rented a 50 foot sailboat and one of our friends has his skipper’s license so we were able to crew the whole thing ourselves. It was kind of a reunion of sorts. Many of the same group were on a sailing trip to Italy that we took about 5 years ago. We’d had such a great time that we decided to do it again for one of our friends who was having a big birthday.

It was great. We learned very quickly just how important it is to check the weather forecasts (oops) even when it looks brilliantly sunny out. We managed to sail into a storm but after a few tricky moments, a few hours of getting soaked through and really working hard on the sails plus a lot of adrenaline, we managed to find safe harbor.

It was a brilliant trip and now I’m just washing all of my clothes and repacking my bags as I’ll be heading off to Cannes in a couple of days for the WPT National Series event. Hopefully see you there!

When I flicked the switch in my brain from SCOOP to WSOP, I knew it would be jarring. It’s like that moment you step from indoor lighting to the summer sunlight. It’s probably no brighter. It’s simply different. In this case, I walked out of a room that I had shared with Shaun Deeb for a couple of weeks and walked onto a patio where Team PokerStars Pro Vanessa Selbst was sitting there with a cocktail and a look on her face like, “What took you so long?”

Vanessa Selbst does not work for a casino. She works at casinos. That meant she was ineligible to play in Event #1 of the 2012 World Series of Poker, a Casino Employees-only tournament. Hence, Selbst had to wait a full day to start treating the WSOP like her own personal playground. That was almost too much time. If it had taken any longer, I suspect Selbst would’ve gotten a croupier job at Ellis Island just to be eligible. Instead, she’s just 14 people away from her second gold bracelet.

In a few hours, Selbst will arrive at the Rio and sit down as one of the final 15 players in Event #2, the first $ 1,500 No-Limit Hold’em event of the summer. She currently sits in fifth place out of the remaining runners

Here’s how she stacks up against the field in the hunt for the first open event bracelet of the summer season.

WSOP Event #2 Day 3 players

1. Jacob Bazeley — 1,291,000
2. Ryan Schmidt — 1,193,000
3. Abdyl Konjuhi — 754,000
4. JP Kelly — 721,000
5. Vanessa Selbst — 706,000
6. Joseph Cino — 703,000
7. Kenneth Strickland — 685,000
8. Kwinsee Khoa Tran — 592,000
9. Brent Hanks — 578,000
10. Neil Willerson — 479,000
11. Kennii Nguyen — 411,000
12. Richard Park — 379,000
13. Andrew Badecker — 349,000
14. Todd Keikoan — 265,000
15. Michael Kaufman — 243,000

Vanessa Selbst, a couple million dollars agoThis WSOP could end up being particularly important to Selbst’s overall winning milestones. As of right now, her worldwide live tournament earnings sit at just a little less than $ 5 million. A decent finish today could bump her over that mark.

The WSOP is familiar territory for the young woman. Over the past few years, she’s put up eleven Series cashes worth $ 671,391. Included in those winnings are a gold bracelet from her 2008 $ 1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha title.

Tonight, Selbst will be up against some tough competition, including two-time WSOP bracelet-winner JP Kelly. But, as Selbst has proven in the past, it doesn’t really matter who stands in her way. If she’s going to get there, she’ll step on, climb over, or barrel through anyone to do it.

What’s more, as Nolan Dalla pointed out in his Daily Shuffle, “Should Selbst go on to win, she would break the dubious streak of no-female winners in open events over the past four years. In fact, she was the last female to win a gold bracelet.”

Play resumes at 1pm Vegas time.

PartyPoker’s Premier League Poker V is coming to you! The first show goes out on the 5th June on Sky Sports HD2. Check out the trailer below plus also Tom Dwan and Luke Schwartz reviewing the Premier League line-up:

Here’s Tom Dwan talking about his opponents:

And here’s Luke Schwartz talking about his opponents:

SCOOP is gone. The LAPT main event is Punta del Este is over. The World Series has yet to get underway. This should be a time we can all take a breath and collect our thoughts. Instead, we decided to dive right back in to the PokerStars weekend majors. And why not, right? This is where all the champions of those big series really get their experience anyway.

This was the last weekend of May, which meant a ton of big stories as people looked to close strong on the month. The best story out there this weekend was Brazilian diegokeep’s chance at redemption. It’s barely been a few weeks since he almost won the Sunday Million but ended up finishing in the runner-up spot. This weekend, he did himself one better and notched the title.

Here are the biggest stories from the past couple of days.

• Sunday Million: diegokeep drums up a $ 196k win

 

• Sunday Warm-up: orange6 pounces on the final table for victory
• Battle of the Planets: danhp134 chops up the win, Team Online’s Dominguez 4th place
• Cosita Rica captures May 27 Women’s Sunday title
  Sunday Million final tableFinally, for some important and educational reading about how good poker tournaments work, please do check out Lee Jones’ piece from the weekend: Tournament decisions: not black and white

  For a complete look at all the big weekend final tables, see the 5-27-12 PokerStars weekend majors results.

  Good luck in the coming week. Bring on June!

The first event of the 43rd annual World Series of Poker began play yesterday at the Rio Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, with 60 additional bracelet events to follow. Starting with the $ 500 buy-in No-Limit Hold’em event for casino employees, this year’s series will have three more bracelet events than last year.

The series culminates with the Main Event – the $ 10,000 buy-in No Limit Hold’em World Championship – which begins play July 7. World Series of Poker Executive Director Ty Stewart expects records to fall.

Avid poker fans can still win their WSOP seats at Titan Poker’s ongoing satellite series, which run through the middle of June.

A total of 732 casino employees paid the buy-in to take their seats at 2012 WSOP Event 1: $ 500 Casino Employees No-Limit Hold’em. This is a drop from last year’s first event, which attracted 850 players.

Last year, 105 countries were represented at the World Series of Poker tournaments. A total of 75,672 players participated in the events, and a total of $ 192 million in prize money was awarded, both all-time records. WSOP Executive Director Ty Stewart expects both records to fall in the 2012 series.

“There is a tremendous amount of growth and interest in poker through out the world,” Stewart said. “The boom we saw in the U.S. that happened in 2003 and 2004 is now worldwide.”

Mad Marvin Rettenmaier leads WPT Championship Final Table on debut as Team PartyPoker.com pro. Marvin is huge chip leader on a final table at the elite event that also includes Michael ‘The Grinder’ Mizrachi, the in-form Steve O’Dwyer, Nick Schulman, Trevor Pope and Philippe Ktorza. All are vying for a first-place prize of nearly $ 1.2 million.

Only this week, Marvin joined the likes of Tony G, Kara Scott, Mike Sexton, Bodo Sbrzesny and Tomeu ‘Amatos’ Gomila in the Team PartyPoker.com ranks. “This is amazing, I couldn’t have asked for a better start to my new deal,” said Marvin. “I am just focused on Saturday now and using the great position I am in. Thanks for the support!”

The final table gets underway at 4pm PT on Saturday. Live streaming of the event, complete with hole cards and commentary from Tony Dunst and Dan O’Brien begins at 4:30pm PT. (Sunday 1.30am CET, 12.30am BST). Before that there will also be streamed coverage of the superstar packed $ 100,000 buy-in WPT Super High Roller at Bellagio on Friday at 4.30pm PT (Saturday 1.30am CET, 12.30am BST). Both live streams will feature exclusive PartyPoker.com offers and you can watch at PartyPoker.com Blog.

WPT Super High Roller:

• Seat 1: Bill Klein – 620,000
• Seat 2: John Juanda – 1,875,000
• Seat 3: Tom Marchese – 2,235,000
• Seat 4: Daniel Perper – 3,415,000
• Seat 5: Justin Bonomo – 2,105,000
• Seat 6: Andrew Robl – 3,355,000

WPT Championship:

• Seat 1: Michael Mizrachi – 2,560,000
• Seat 2: Marvin Rettenmaier – 6,715,000
• Seat 3: Steve O’Dwyer – 2,035,000
• Seat 4: Nick Schulman – 1,555,000
• Seat 5: Trevor Pope – 1,480,000
• Seat 6: Philippe Ktorza – 895,000

 

We’re back! Unlike Days 1 and 2, when we stopped for the night after six levels, this time we’re coming back for more, the plan being to play through Level 22 or stop at nine players, whichever comes first.

Our hour away from the poker room was spent mostly enjoying the buffet here at the Mantra Resort, Spa and Casino, a meal which included to our delight a super-sized serving of parilla, an overflowing plate full of assorted meats that is in fact a staple of Argentine cuisine. Speaking of, with 22 players remaining a half-dozen Argentinians were left in the field when the dinner break came, second at the time to Brazil who still had eight representatives with seats at the tables.

Keeping us from utterly slipping into food comas by hour’s end was the excitement of recounting to one another the huge triple-up hand involving Vladimir Dobrovolskiy, Leandro Rubinsztain, and Angel Guillen that came just before the dinner bell had sounded.

A Guillen open from early position got callers in Dobrovolskiy (cutoff) and Rubinsztain (small blind). The flop came [Qd][10s][8c] and a smorgasbord of bets ensued, leaving Rubinsztain and Guillen all in and Dobrovokskiy with only a little left.

Indeed, there were so many chips in the middle of the table, it looked a lot like our plates would at dinner, the cuts of beef, sausages, and chicken claiming nearly every square inch available.

Dobrovolskiy managed to find an empty space on the felt to table his [Ad][Ac]. Guillen showed [Ks][Ks]. And Rubinsztain turned over the hand that currently beat them both — [Js][9c]!

Rubinsztain had to think he was about to be served a nice, fortuitous helping of chips just before dinner. But the turn brought the [Kd], a card that complicated things enough to upset even the strongest constitution. Guillen had made trips and was alive with a draw to a full house or four of a kind. And Dobrovolskiy, too, had improved his slim chances just a touch and was hoping for a jack to fill a gutshot to Broadway.

Then came the river… the [8d]! Just before the rest of us filled up, Guillen had filled up… and how!

A whopping 550,000-chip pot was pushed Guillen’s way, catapulting him into second place behind leader Juan Garcia. Dobrovolskiy was left with table scraps for chips with less than 60,000. And Rubinsztain was out in 25th place, having the rest of the night to ponder over his unfortunate fate.

Certainly not a dish any of us would envy having to digest.

If he could have, Leandro Rubinsztain would have sent that last hand back as it was overdone.Looks like since our return a few more have joined Rubinsztain on the rail — Federico Borello (Argentina) in 22nd, Takeo Nakati (Brazil) in 21st, Ariel Celestino (Brazil) in 20th, Eduardo Santi (Argentina) in 19th, Martin Lategui (Uruguay) in 18th, and Moussa Hasbani (Brazil) in 17th.

That leaves us with just two tables full of players, all plenty hungry to keep their seats.

It was a short Day 1 at LAPT5 Punta del Este at Mantra. Union regulations on the length of dealer workdays, combined with a shortage of dealers, meant that only six levels were completed before play came to an end. By that point, Juan Garcia of Uruguay had a commanding chip lead of 134,650. No other player had amassed more than 100,000. It looked like Claudio Garrone, also of Uruguay, might be the 2nd place player with 84,200 but it will take some time to sort out all the bags and confirm that.

 

After a perfect mood-setting morning, we started our abbreviated Day 1 by looking back at Season 4. There were six LAPT awards up for grabs in Season 4, and all six were presented last night at the welcome party for this event. Spoiler alert: Colombia took four of the six awards.

Season 4 award winners Pablo Gonzalez (l) and Engelberth Varela (r)While we were telling you about the Season 4 award winners, the players were finding their seats. It’s no easy task at the Mantra Resort & Casino, as the popularity of this event means that players are spread out over four tournament locations. The LAPT supplied plenty of friendly faces to make sure players found their assigned seats.

My blogging partner, Martin Harris, has been to Punta del Este once before and knows the town like the back of his hand. He gave blog readers a first-hand look at Punta del Este’s signature icon. It was my favorite post of the day, hands down.

Back in the tournament room, the war of words continued between Team PokerStars Pros Andre Akkari and Jose “Nacho” Barbero. Each one has put his money where his mouth is, hoping to inspire his countrymen to a commanding final table presence. There will be at least one less Brazilian in the Day 2 field, however; Akkari busted out on Day 1. Barbero is through to Day 2 with 22,650, a bit more than his starting stack. Lynn Gilmartin chatted with him mid-day.

While the players were winding down for the day, knocking each other out, and consolidating their chip stacks for the tag-and-bag portion of the night, we took a look back at the Season 4 installment of Punta del Este. Alex Komaromi was the champion last August and has returned this year to defend. The top prize is a bit less this time around, but $ 181,000 is still something to shoot for.

The big board shows 274 players remaining of the 375 to start the day, but the likely total is slightly less than that. However many there are, they’ll be back at 12 noon Atlantic Standard Time tomorrow. That’s GMT -3 for those of you following along in other parts of the world. It’s likely to be an abbreviated day tomorrow as well, followed by significantly longer Days 3 and 4 on Saturday and Sunday.

Until then, we’ll be enjoying an early evening and formulating plans for our own blogging union.

Hey guys. Last year was my first WSOP and I gave away a buy-in for the Main Event to a player that had never played in it before and this year I want to do the same! In 2011, it was a raffle but in 2012 I want you to send me videos of you doing good deeds.

To enter, upload your video on Youtube and tweet the link mentioning @junglemandan and @partypoker. Tweet this: I entered @junglemandan WSOP Challenge @partypoker to win a free WSOP Main Event package. See: YOUR YOUTUBE LINK

I will pick my favourite videos and allow you guys to vote on the one that gets the package. Person that wins will get a free seat to the WSOP Main Event, free air travel and a free room at the Rio. I will also throw in a poker lesson.

This must be your first WSOP Main Event and you will be responsible for your own travel and accommodation (I will refund these costs). You have until 20th June to submit your videos.

I’m looking forward to the WSOP. My life has changed immeasurably in recent years and there is always mad stuff going on in the poker world. That said, I will never forget when I was playing low stakes in college and I don’t take for granted any success I have had. I want to give something back to those who are just falling in love with the game or haven’t had the opportunities I am lucky to have had.

So here we go. I want to see your videos of good deeds – winner gets a WSOP Main Event package – here are the full rules:

1. To enter tweet your Youtube video link mentioning @junglemandan and @partypoker
2. You must not have played in any WSOP $ 10,000 Main Event in a previous year
3. Open to participants over the age of 21 only
4. You may enter as many times as you like
5. Any entries submitted after 20th June will be deemed invalid
6. Seat is non-transferable, prize is non-transferable
7. You are responsible for your own transportation and accommodation in Las Vegas (I’ll refund the flight and room though)
8. You will be contacted immediately if you have won

There is no overstating it. The 2012 Spring Championship of Online Poker was simply amazing. It was history’s biggest online poker festival. It hosted more players than any PokerStars festival ever. It awarded more money than PokerStars has ever given out in a poker tournament series. Meanwhile, one player stood above them all as the clear and undeniable Player of the Series.

Shaun Deeb, the American expat living in Mexico, made SCOOP his personal playground for the past two weeks. Already a previous SCOOP champion, Deeb added four more titles in this series alone to become the all-time leading title-winner among all SCOOP players. Deeb played 115 of the 120 tournaments, cashed 27 times (more than anybody), made eight final tables (double his nearest opponent’s four final tables), and won $ 237,528 in tournament prizes. The performance earned him the overall Player of the Series title and the high buy-in Player of the Series championship. For his Herculean efforts, Deeb will win an 2013 EPT Grand Final package and 2013 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure package.

Shaun Deeb, 2012 SCOOP Player of the SeriesWhile Deeb dominated the standings in those categories, he wasn’t the only one picking up Player of the Series honors. PokerStars Team Online’s George Lind won the low buy-in leaderboard, and C. Darwin2 won the medium leaderboard. Both players will pick up 2013 PCA packages.

George LindWhile all of those players put on performances that will be remembered for ages, nobody earned more money in this year’s SCOOP series than the $ 10,300 buy-in 2012 SCOOP main event winner GripDsNutz who pocketed $ 814,079 overall, including his $ 798,675 main event win. He was joined on the main event podium by medium main event winner suarez_BG and low main event champion john_tri80.

In all SCOOP awarded $ 65,332,179 in prizes and bounties over the two-week festival. Players from 156 countries put up 526,154 buy-ins, the biggest of any SCOOP in history. It was impressive by almost any measure.

Here are a few more superlatives from the past two weeks:

• Top 10 2012 SCOOP money-winners: GripDsNutz ($ 814,079.74), ministerborg ($ 781,325.94), sosickPL ($ 727,995.72), sp00led ($ 725,713.00), suarez_BG ($ 562,864.30), Isildur1 ($ 438,669.58), UrMySponsor ($ 415,226.76), Fiskin1 ($ 370,077.96), hustla16 ($ 348,084.57), raidalot ($ 341,057.70)
• 2012 multiple title winners: Shaun Deeb (4), bleu329 (2), Drew M Scott (2), Viktor “Isildur1″ Blom (2), joacowalter (2)
• Top 5 2012 winningest counties: Canada ($ 10,330,331.50), United Kingdom ($ 7,048,947.59), Germany ($ 5,721,034.06), Russia ($ 4,045,340.71), Sweden ($ 2,799,407.38)
• Most 2012 titles by country: Canada (20), United Kingdom (16), Germany (9), Sweden (9), Mexico (7)
• For all the numbers from this year’s SCOOP and previous festivals, see the SCOOP stats page.

  If you missed anything over the past two weeks, we’ve been on top of all the action. You can look back at all the coverage in our special 2012 PokerStars SCOOP news section.

  Thanks to everyone for making this the biggest and best SCOOP yet.