In this week’s Calling the Clock, Lee Davy ignores that stiff neck to bring you news that includes a lot of poker on TV, a superlative performance by an unsung star, Jason Somerville trying to become Daniel Negreanu, Daniel Negreanu trying to become Jason Somerville, and a whole lot more.
If I was handing out the gold stars this week, then the biggest one would be pinned onto the chest of Angela Jordison.
The mother of two, who spends most of her time running a bar, hit the headlines of every poker media outlet on the planet, after winning the first three events in the low stakes buy-in series: The Spring Poker Round Up at the Wildhorse Resort & Casino, Pendleton, Oregon.
Statistically speaking, you are more likely to see a major Game of Thrones star last an entire series without getting a body part hacked off, such is the magnitude of her success.
She only picked up $37,907 for her three victories. But after wading through fields of 537, 448 and 215 players in the space of three days, unless Roy Orbison wins the World Series of Poker (WSOP) Main Event, I demand that someone flies this woman to the other side of the world, and hand her an award for Tournament Performance of the Year.
Knowing her luck, the Global Poker Index (GPI) will move the America Poker Awards (APA) to Oregon next year…well I did hear that Beverly Hills is quite expensive.
Jordison wasn’t the only poker player hitting the headlines for taking down poker tournaments this week. Chan Pelton put his WSOP ban behind him by taking down the Card Player Poker Tour (CPPT) Main Event in Choctaw for $130,445, and Jason Mirza did likewise at the Mid-Stakes Poker Tour (MSPT) winning $147,529.
But the biggest win of the week went to Jason Mo. The High Stakes reg made mincemeat of a tough final table that included the likes of Dong Kim (7th), Celina Lin (4th), and Bryan Huang (2nd) on his way to a $151,333 score.
Both Lin and Huang are members of Team PokerStars Pro and a few of their superstar associates were in the news this week. Liv Boeree has decided to take up comedy writing (she took a comedy writing class and had us rolling in the aisles with a joke about ants) and serious writing (she was invited onto the pages of The Independent to tell us all what she would do if she was Britain’s Prime Minister), and good buddies Jason Somerville and Daniel Negreanu were trying each others hat on.
Next Impulse Sports wrote an article about sports brand ambassadors being celebrity legends, and pinned Somerville’s mug on a rogue’s gallery that included David Beckham, Tiger Woods and Lewis Hamilton.
I thought Daniel Negreanu was our brand ambassador?
The jewel in PokerStars crown also had a good week when he decided to venture into the world of Twitch. Kid Poker only rolled around in play money, and was only testing the water, but he received 150,000 total views, and already has 6,500 followers.
I thought Jason Somerville was our Twitch star?
If we were using video game analogy’s then I guess Twitch would be Grand Theft Auto XXVVI, and TV would be Pong. But that hasn’t stopped Poker Central announcing plans to open a 24/7 TV Channel solely dedicated to our beautiful game.
Does anyone watch TV anymore?
A launch date has not been revealed, but CEO Clint Stinchcomb has been speaking to PokerNews this week, and he’s extremely excited about the new channel.
“We plan to offer unique all-day, everyday access to exclusive poker tournaments, celebrity players, tips and tricks from the pros, player profiles and stunning destinations from around the globe.” Stinchcomb told PokerNews.
Isn’t that the World Poker Tour?
It’s the second piece of news broken out by Poker Central this past fortnight. The other being the news of the $25m* Super High Roller Bowl, with an $8m* first prize.
Did you spot them?
The deadly asterisks.
The little stars that mean: “don’t believe a thing we tell you.”
I hate it when they do that!
Let’s hope the event gets the 50 players it needs, so the marketing department can get their correction fluid out and smear it all over those little bad boys.
Partouche Poker Tour anyone?
Of course people still watch TV.
How stupid of me!
I can’t read a poker media news site without reading about Alex Jacob this week. The young man many predicted to be one of our shining lights has not cashed in a live tournament since 2012. I mean why would he? He had won $2.6m up to that point. But that hasn’t stopped him from being a sensation this week.
Jacob has had poker players leaving their Twitch stations in their droves, as he single handedly destroys everyone who gets in his way on the long-running TV show Jeopardy! At the time of writing he has won four shows, and people who are a lot cleverer than me, are lighting up the forums with words of wisdom on his optimal game theory.
I will end this spot of spit by talking about something that makes me fall asleep. Fortunately, it’s way past my bedtime, and there is nobody left to read me a bedtime story.
I am, of course, talking about the online poker political preposterousness that goes on in the land of the brave and the home of the not so free. There are simply too many complicated words that I don’t understand, and more bills than a safe of ducks lining up to eat in a McDonalds restaurant serving small crustaceans.
As far as I can tell, there will not be online poker in California for a long time. This has something to do with the vast number of different Indian tribes who can’t seem to agree on whether or not they want to pick PokerStars, or leave them standing against the wall.
This week, one of those Indian tribes, The Lipay Nation of Santa Ysabel, issued a white paper pointing out that it was sort of hypocritical for the California authorities to be trying to claim that online poker falls under the guise of Class II gaming, whilst declaring in a lawsuit against the tribe, that it’s actually Class III.
All this California dreaming means that many experts predict that Pennsylvania will be the fourth state to launch a fully regulated iGaming operation in the US. That is as long as Sheldon Adelson and the cronies doesn’t deliver a fatal paper cut with the Restoration of America’s Wire Act (RAWA).
To combat that, Pennsylvanian politician John D. Payne wrote a resolution (HR 140) designed to give the Congress of the United States a different view than one showing young children pressing a mouse and losing a house.
The boy did well.
The Pennsylvania House Gaming Oversight Committee voted in favor of the resolution by 18 votes to 8, and that will come in rather handy in the forthcoming iGaming talks scheduled for April 16 and May 6.
And here was me thinking that he only knew how to wear a Stetson, ride a horse and kill Indians.
Time, Ladies and Gentlemen.
Someone has just called the clock.
