Commerce Casino in California is the new sponsor for the Card Player Player of the Year, and the early leader in the 2017 race is Bryn Kenney. The Global Poker League, New York Rounders manager, won the $50,000 Single Day High Roller at the PokerStars Championship in the Bahamas.
Card Player has a new sponsor for their annual Player of the Year (POY) race. The Commerce Hotel & Casino in California will slap their bourgeois brand on the tin for the 2017 campaign.
Boasting 160 tables, Commerce Casino is the largest poker room in the world (The Rio smashes it once a year), and news of the hook up comes in the build up to one of their busiest times of the live tournament calendar.
Commerce will host the LA Poker Classic beginning January 13th with a $175 buy-in LAPC Kickoff No Limit-Hold’em Double Stack event. The opening event has a $100,000 guarantee, and the action takes place over two days. The festival runs until March 2.
David Peters spared us the annual Global Poker Index (GPI) Player of the Year (POY) vs. Card Player POY squabble after winning both awards in 2016, but for the Card Player team, there is no squabble to be had.
Writing about the new sponsorship deal on the Card Player site, Erik Fast, called the Card Player POY ‘not only poker’s first but it’s the most prestigious.’
Created in 1997, the first winner of the Card Player POY title was Men Nguyen, who then went on to win another three times, a record unequalled.
Here is a list of previous winners:
1997 – Men Nguyen
1998 – T. J. Cloutier
1999 – Tony Ma
2000 – David Pham
2001 – Men Nguyen
2002 – T. J. Cloutier
2003 – Men Nguyen
2004 – Daniel Negreanu
2005 – Men Nguyen
2006 – Michael Mizrachi
2007 – David Pham
2008 – John Phan
2009 – Eric Baldwin
2010 – Tom Marchese
2011 – Ben Lamb
2012 – Greg Merson
2013 – Daniel Negreanu
2014 – Daniel Colman
2015 – Anthony Zinno
2016 – David Peters
Bryn Kenney Picks Up an Early Lead With PokerStars Win; Aaron Paul Makes an Appearance
The very early leader in the 2017 Card Player POY race is Bryn Kenney. The Global Poker League (GPL) New York Rounders Team Manager sits on top of the leaderboard after taking down the PokerStars Championship $50,000 Single Day High Roller in The Bahamas for $969,075.
Kenney beat 2015 $50k High Roller Monaco winner Mustapha Kanit, in heads-up action, a few days after making a stout defence of his $100,000 title finishing seventh for $275,060.
Daniel Dvoress, Byron Kaverman, and Daniel Colman also made the final tables of both premier events.
$50k Final Table Results
1. Bryn Kenney – $969,075
2. Mustapha Kanit – $695,740
3. Byron Kaverman – $452,220
4. Daniel Colman – $341,240
5. Stephen Chidwick – $265,040
6. Ben Tollerene – $205,400
7. Sergi Reixach – $162,340
8. Daniel Dvoress – $125,900
9. Cary Katz – $96,080
The poker world was buzzing a few days ago when Kevin Hart decided to swap Hollywood for the poker table when he fired two bullets in the $100k event. Hart didn’t stop there. The American comedian and actor fired another two shots in the $50k before hopping into the PokerStars Championship Main Event.
And Hart wasn’t the only non-poker celebrity who happened to be kicking it back in the Bahamas. Breaking Bad and The Path star, Aaron Paul, made it through to Day 2 in the Main Event. You may remember that Paul was the only player to survive the Global Poker League (GPL) undefeated where he represented the LA Sunset, although he only played two matches.
