Three tales from the world of High Stakes poker including PokerGO streaming Aria High Roller Final Tables, Stefan Schillhabel taking down the Triton Series 6-Max, and an update on the Matt Kirk v Leon Tsoukernik legal tussle.
Let’s open the refrigerator and grab a can of High Stakes Poker, shall we?
We will begin with Poker Central’s subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) service PokerGO. It seems a week barely goes by these days without a new program popping up on the poker media channel and this week is no exception.
PokerGo has announced plans to stream ‘select’ ARIA High Roller Final Tables be
ginning October 27. The move marks the first time fans will get a glimpse of the High Stakes action born in 2014.
The timing is perfect with the series continuing to grow annually. It began with six events in 2014, and last year the ARIA held 38. With three months of the year remaining, event organisers have already breezed through 36 games.
According to Hendon Mob, Brian Rast is the leading ARIA High Roller money earner with $11.9m (including Super High Roller Bowl scores). The prominent number of cashes belongs to Cary Katz (32), the man primarily responsible for drumming up interest in the series, and creating Poker Central.
The ARIA High Roller Series buy-ins cover $10k, $25k, $50k and $100k. In May, Christian Christner banked more than $1.4m in a $100k event, a record for an ARIA High Roller event outside of the Super High Roller Bowl.
Those suffering from impatience will be glad to hear that you won’t have wait until Oct 27 to get your fill of High Stakes action. By the time you read this, PokerGO would have streamed the biggest game of Poker After Dark’s history with the likes of Brian Rast, Haralabos Voulgaris, Bill Perkins, Rick Salomon, Aaron Zang, and Phil Galfond competing in a No-Limit Hold’em (NLHE) cash game with stakes at $500/$1000. If you miss it, don’t fret, you can pick up all the action in the PokerGO library.
Stefan Schillhabel Wins The HK$250,000 6-Max at The Triton Super High Roller Series in Macau
Another high roller tournament, and another German winner.
Stefan Schillhabel has taken down the HK$250,000 6-Max at The Triton Super High Roller Series in Macau. Schillhabel disposed of the Canadian Mike Watson in heads-up action to win the top prize and cute little award.
The field attracted 87 entrants, which is enormous when you consider the similar events in Manila and Montenegro drew 43 and 41 entrants respectively.
It’s the fifth victory of Schillhabel’s career, and these days he is playing for a lot more money than his first victory when he won a $600 buy-in event at the Venetian. Schillhabel is a World Poker Tour (WPT) Champions Club member and finished third in the 2017 Super High Roller Bowl for $2.4m in the summer. 
All told, Schillhabel has now earned over $6.4m playing live tournaments.
Final Table Results
1. Stefan Schillhabel – HK$5,874,400 ($752,322)
2. Mike Watson – HK$4,297,000 ($550,308)
3. Manig Loeser – HK$2,660,000 ($340,660)
4. Dan Smith – HK$1,821,000 ($233,212)
5. Steve O’Dwyer – HK$1,207,000 ($154,577)
6. Isaac Haxton – HK$900,000 ($115,262)
7. Yat Wei Cheng – HK$737,000 ($94,386)
The HK$1m buy-in Main Event takes place Wednesday afternoon.
Matt Kirk and Leon Tsoukernik Update
Finally, a Las Vegas Judge has ruled that Matt Kirk’s $2m lawsuit against Leon Tsoukernik can proceed…just.
The nutshell backstory is in the summer, the two played heads-up in the ARIA, in a game that Kirk was a sharp winner. During the game, Kirk loaned Tsoukernik $3m in casino chips to keep him in the game. Tsoukernik left a beaten man.
A few days later, Tsoukernik won $1.8m playing in the Super High Roller Bowl and returned $1m of the $3m debt to Kirk. By my math that leaves $2m owed.
Tsoukernik’s legal team argued that the gambling debt was unenforceable because they were both unlicensed parties. The judge agreed slinging 8 of the 10 charges into the shredder. But he did allow the case to proceed on two claims of fraudulent inducement and unjust enrichment. Kirk’s legal team are trying to persuade a judge that Tsoukernik took the chips with no intention of repaying the debt because of this law. The primary evidence appears to be text messages between the pair with Tsoukernik admitting 20-minutes after the match finished that the debt was invalid.
The court filing showed that Tsoukernik lost the $3m in less than an hour.
Steaming?
Well, do you remember our interview with Elton Tsang, the One Drop winner who claimed Tsoukernik refused to repay a multi-million euro debt to him in the Casino Barcelona? Those vast losses also came in a rapid space of time, and Tsoukernik would later claim that the debt was unenforceable by law.
Please don’t let this lawsuit lull you into a false sense of right or wrong. Having a case thrown out because a gaming debt is unenforceable shouldn’t conveniently take us away from the point that Tsoukernik took the money and never paid it back.
Tsoukernik is currently busy playing host as the World Series of Poker Europe (WSOPE) is visiting his home at the King’s Casino in Rozvadov.
