advanced poker play

Introduction.

As if not before time PokerStars have finally been confirmed as the name behind a new TV poker show “The Big Game”, to be aired on Fox TV later in the year. “The Big Game” will be a series of televised cash poker games with player’s putting up $10,000 to play in $200/$400 no limit Texas Hold ‘em poker games. Both PokerStars and Fox are ‘talking up’ the poker stars that will be playing poker on the show, but to date as far as the press can ascertain only Daniel Negreanu is confirmed. However, with the potential sums of money involved it surely won’t be long before more poker player’s sign up for it – and not just Team PokerStars Pro players.

Your chance to play in “The Big Game”.

Keen to see regular poker players included in this TV show you can play in a free qualifying round any time up to June 25^th on PokerStars, after that you need to finish in the top 200 of the further poker rounds. However, being in that top 200 doesn’t guarantee you your “15 minutes of fame” on TV. Quite what’s going on here is rather suspicious – to get on to the TV show, if you’re in that top 200, you have to then send a ‘casting video’ to PokerStars who’ll then assess you for suitability as a ‘loose canon’ on the show! So, being a great poker player might not be enough, you’ll also need to be photogenic and, no doubt in their eyes, have some quirky/whacky TV character – so heaven knows what that could throw up, or perhaps even make you want to throw up!

Can the loose canon be fired to fame?

Only one loose canon will feature in each episode so at best, getting through to that top 200 players, you probably stand less than a 1:10 chance of making it to a TV show. However, should you do so you’ll be given a seat on a free roll with $100,000 to either fire yourself into poker fame or simply get burned by the big players! Some conditions do apply to this show – you have to be resident in the USA or Canada to play the qualifiers, if you are the loose canon you can’t quit whilst ahead half way through the poker game, but have to stay in to the end. However, any poker winnings you make – you get to keep.

Introduction

One week after Joe Cada won the 2009 WSOP comes the news that Patrik Antonius has made a record online win for playing internet poker. The biggest win in online poker history came during an all-Scandinavian match between the Finn and the mystery Swedish online poker player ‘Isildur1′, who had himself previously taken apart top pro poker player Tom ‘durrrr’ Dwan.

The game

The game being played in this historic poker match was heads-up pot-limit Omaha, at $500 and $1000. Until the identity of Isildur1 can be found out we can only presume he, or she, is one well heeled amateur as before long the pot had reached a six figure sum. The all important hand came when both players had stacks around $450k, with Isildur1 having the slightly bigger one by about $10,000. On the turn both players had pairs of Queens and pairs of Aces, but isildur1 was better placed also holding a King, whilst Patrick had a 6, 9, Q and A as his hole cards, with 5, 7, Q and A on the table. Whether an inspired guess or truly top-class poker play, Patrik went all in and forced Isildur1 to call, creating, at $878,958.50, the then world record online poker pot.

The river

When the river card was turned over the 8 of diamonds was revealed, giving Patrik the Straight and the pot. How long this new record will stand can only be guessed at, but the way Patrik is playing online at present – don’t be surprised if he surpasses even this big win soon. I don’t know what resources Isildur1 has at his/her disposal, but the pair of them were immediately back at it with Patrik quickly sitting on $1.575 million! Patrik, already the number 1 all-time money winning Finnish poker player, now has another title to add to his CV and quite a handy addition to his $3+ million poker winnings since 2002.

Introduction

Two quite separate news articles caught my eye this week; that are strangely connected regarding professional poker players. Both of the articles concern the professional poker players on the numerous world poker tours that seem to provide a year round living for them.

Too many poker tours?

The first article to catch my eye related that there are now too many poker tours which means the top poker professionals are spread too thinly across them. The upshot of this fact, according to the author, is that more and more amateur or unknown professional tour poker players are winning them resulting in dull and boring final tables that no one is really interested in watching or reading about. Now then, I might well agree that the number of so called ‘world tours’ should be curbed before the whole concept of a world tour is devalued – but I cannot agree that poker fans all over the world aren’t interested to hear of someone new breaking through. After all, don’t we all dream of making it big in poker one day and therefore will cheer for the underdog or new comer?  The article I read went on to say that the author wanted to see only the big names like Ivey, Hellmuth and Negreanu winning these world tours, so it was with a rather raised eyebrow I read the next article.

A pros view of playing

 In the other article that caught my eye, about what motivates the top players, I found it quite ironic that Daniel Negreanu stated that he no longer plays for the money – lucky him eh! Daniel is apparently now more concerned with setting records and what the history books might say about his poker playing. However, I guess with that amount of money you might be able to see his point as he has won a lifetime $11 million so far and is unconcerned at having ended this season in the red. However, it begs the question as to how much might a player really want to win a tour for the money compared to their eventual poker legacy?

A report recently filed highlights what is surely an anomaly and indeed an anathema (completely against the grain) for all poker players. Apparently some Californian casinos are offering prize money in the thousands of dollars – even if you lose at a game of poker; surely meaning that the lunatics have finally taken over the asylum!

It’s really just a poker lottery.

Apparently the casinos named take a $1 ‘fee’ from the pot of every game played which, even for any one of those casinos, can add up to thousands of dollars a day. They then pay out this money to poker players who, despite having had a strong hand, didn’t actually win; having their names put into a draw for the losers’ jackpot at the end of that days play. What must be truly galling here is that these jackpots often exceed the value of the pots to be won at the poker tables! I personally am astounded and outraged at this – I thought reward for failure only applied to bankers and government officials?

Legal challenge to poker lotteries.

In an interesting twist to this story two Californian poker players are taking the matter to court, which might yet result in this practice being outlawed. Unfortunately they’re not doing this to challenge the blatantly unfair practice of rewarding failure but because of a technicality in the wording of these poker games with a loser’s jackpot. Their case basically hinges on whether or not the casinos are promoting these particular games fairly and that by taking $1 out of the pot – the actual winners pot is unfairly diminished. Now I’m all for the ‘little guy’ taking on any big business/corporation when he thinks he’s not getting a fair deal – but these two look doomed to failure. The reason for their likely failure is because the casinos named insist that players can choose to play at tables without the $1 jackpot deduction if they wish too. So, what do you think – is this idea of loser’s jackpots fair or unfair?

Who says there’s no room for charity in the game of poker? Well being charitable to your opponents in a game of poker would be very odd indeed; however, playing poker to raise money for charity – is surely a most noble thing to do. Poker players are often portrayed as being rather self-indulgent and only ‘out for themselves’. So a piece of news that really deserves a wider audience than it is reaching at present; is the news that some professional and celebrity poker players got together recently to pay a charity poker tournament, to raise money for people affected in the strife ridden Darfur region of Africa.

Winning for charity.

Raising €260,000 (that’s about the same in dollars) the ‘Ante Up for Africa’ tournament in Monte Carlo was supported by; and generously contributed to by PokerStars. The tournament was won by Canadian born Isabelle Mercier. Isabelle plays mainly in Europe, with her best season to date being 2005 when she finished tenth on the European tour. Despite starting the final match with a very strong lead – Daniel Negreanu, from the USA with career earnings of over $10 millions, finished fifth out of the nine players whilst another Europe based player, Darion Minieri, finished in third place. Darion is the fourth all-time highest poker money winner from Italy, holder of a 2008 World Series bracelet and is perhaps best known for being the first poker player ever to buy a Porsche Cayman S, from the VIP club, with his winnings.

The best celebrity was …

Perhaps the surprise of the night was that a celebrity took second place. Teddy Sheringham, a former international soccer player from England who has played for teams including Manchester United and  Tottenham Hotspurs, ended up in a head-to-head with Mercier with a 3-to-1 chip advantage, before Isabelle fought back and took the title.