The WSOP announce the final plans for the WSOP National Championships No Limit Hold’em (NLHE) event due to take place at Bally’s Atlantic City May 22-24.
Is the World Series of Poker (WSOP) National Championships one of the most value laden live poker tournament in the world?
With $1m in free money being donated by the WSOP, a field consisting largely of qualifiers from the World Series of Poker Circuit (WSOPC), and the season’s first WSOP bracelet up for grabs – then you would have to have a serious excuse not to enter this event if invited.
Those that are invited to the party are the top 100 poker players as ranked by the WSOP, based on their performance in bracelet events over the past two years.
Daniel Negreanu heads that list and the full breakdown can be found here.
With WSOPC stops remaining in North Carolina, Iowa, Colorado and New Orleans, 10 more players are going to be added to the automatic qualification spots (44 entries in total), with 50 players earning their berth through the points accrual system.
The current National Leaderboard standings can be found here.
That means there are six seats remaining to take the total number of qualifiers up to 100 and the WSOP have just announced how those final six seats will be taken.
In May, the WSOP.com online poker rooms in both Nevada and New Jersey will host an online freeroll where the winner of each event will walk away with a WSOP National Championship Seat. To enter the freeroll simply make a cash deposit at WSOP.com in the month of April and you will be awarded with a free ticket into the event. The Nevada tourney takes place May 10 and the New Jersey one May 17.
That isn’t the end of the online entry story as both states will also host a mirrored Knockout Series April 20 – May 3. There will be 14 individual tournaments and the winners of each will be free-rolled into a 14-person Knockout Series Champions Freeroll taking place on May 4, and the winner will win a seat into the WSOP National Championships.
The final two seats will be awarded to winners of live tournaments being held in the WSOP National Championships venue – Bally’s in Atlantic City.
The first event will be a live tournament free roll that will take place on Monday May 19 and the winner will earn a seat, and then on Tue May 20, they will host a $1,125 ‘last chance’ two-day structured event that will hand the final seat to the winner.
“We look forward to welcoming the best poker players in the world to Atlantic City and our brand new poker room at Bally’s,” Kevin Ortzman, General Manager, Bally’s, stated in a press release issued by WSOP. “We are dedicated to making our new room the best in New Jersey, and are excited for players to see all the great things happening in Atlantic City with the convergence of online and land-based gaming.”
“The WSOP National Championship is really about toasting the most consistent and dedicated players of the World Series of Poker brand,” said WSOP Executive Director Ty Stewart. “They have shown strong performance across our events and we’re delighted to provide a platform in Atlantic City for the first time to showcase and award these championship caliber players.”
