In this week’s Calling The Clock we bring you up to date on all the World Series of Poker news including a third Poker Player’s Championship win for Michael Mizrachi, Doyle Brunson’s retirement climb down and more.
I’ve spent the entire week saying ‘There’s no place like home,” as I retell the story of the Wizard of Oz as a ploy to get my daughter to eat her food, so that’s where we will begin.
The World Series of Poker (WSOP).
Michael Mizrachi was the headline stealer this week. The people ‘in the know’ will tell you that the cream of the crop rise to the top in the $50,000 Poker Player’s Championship (PPC), and this week The Grinder won the event for an unprecedented third time.
Watched by his legion, Mizrachi led from as early as Day 2, defeating the WSOP Player of the Year front-runner, John Hennigan, heads-up, to capture the $1.2m first prize. Mizrachi also holds the PPC record for most final table appearances (4) and the joint record for most cashes (4).
And we don’t have to lose too many tears over Hennigan’s defeat. The runner-up was making his fourth final table appearance of the summer, including defeating 166 entrants, banking $414,692 in the $10,000 H.O.R.S.E.
The Grinder wasn’t the only record-breaker this week. Farhintaj Bonyadi also grabbed a little snapshot of WSOP historical limelight after her bracelet win in the Super Seniors Event (where she earned $311,451 for beating 2,191 entrants) saw her become one half of the first mother-son tandem to win WSOP bracelets. Her little boy, Farzad has three of the things.
Jack Effel and the gang also handed bracelets out to record producer Steve Albini (beating 310 entrants in the baby Stud for $105,629), Yueqi Zhu (beating 773 entrants in a mixed PLO/Big-O event for $211,781), Yaniv Birman (beating 83 entrants in the $10,000 Stud for $236,238), Michael Addamo (beating 1,637 entrants in the Marathon for $653,581), Gal Yifrach (beating 868 entrants in a $3k NLHE event for $461,798), Hanh Tran (beating 356 entrants in the baby Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw for $117,282), Ryan Bambrick (beating 799 entrants in a baby PLO event for $217,123) and Filippos Stavrakis (beating 986 entrants in a $1k PLO for $169,842).
In other WSOP related news, Doyle Brunson announced via Twitter that the announcement of his retirement might have been a tad premature, and questioned why Daniel Negreanu would want to share his wisdom in such a cut-throat age.
I didn’t mean to make such a fuss over my “retirement”. I meant probably no more WSOP tournaments. That isn’t written in stone however. When they start the mixed games on high stakes poker, I’ll be there. Probably not so much cash games but I appreciate all the nice thoughts.
— Doyle Brunson (@TexDolly) June 13, 2018
Daniel…you are the best tournament player in the world. Why are you educating people? Don’t make the same mistake I did with S/S. I justify my teaching that it created lots of new players that we sorely need. Today there are plenty of players…just saying. https://t.co/nxx840bFiA
— Doyle Brunson (@TexDolly) June 13, 2018
And the WSOP announced that with barely a month to go, 30 people had registered for the $1m One Drop event. Here are the people who are willing to have their names up in lights.
1. Daniel Negreanu
2. Antonio Esfandiari
3. Christoph Vogelsang
4. Bryn Kenney
5. Nick Petrangelo
6. Rainer Kempe
7. Dominik Nitsche
8. Steffen Sontheimer
9. Jason Koon
10. Phil Ivey
11. Adrian Mateos
12. Phil Hellmuth
13. Rick Salomon
14. Talal Shakerchi
15. Leon Tsoukernik
The Best of the Rest
I guess when the WSOP is in full flow, everything else is categorised as ‘The Best of the Rest.’
Here it goes.
The World Poker Tour (WPT) partnered with a US-facing real money gambling app that connects slot machine games with live horse racing results. WPT branded games will appear on the b spot app by the end of the year. And Quentin Jones beat 620 entrants to take the title and $116,435 prize money in the WPTDeepStacks Main Event in Tampa.
Jason Somerville emerged from wherever he has been hiding while Lex Veldhuis and co take over the Twitter world to announce a new partnership with his employer PokerStars.
Somerville will launch RunItUp Studios in Las Vegas to help grow the Twitch side of the poker community by sharing his knowledge and expertise in the field. I should have a chance to talk to the man by the time I write this column next week, so keep your eyes peeled for that.
The Hendon Mob is leaving the Internet to become a bona fide poker tournament. The €250 buy-in Hendon Mob Championship will become a feature of the Malta Poker Tour, and HM Prez Eric Danis hinted that it could be the first of many appearances at grassroots festivals around Europe.
Doug Polk has extended his brand by creating another spinoff YouTube series, this time focusing on mainstream news stories such as why Star Wars is cancelling movies, why iHop changed their name, and a lot of other crap that seems to float his boat.
Only four people can join the Triple Crown this summer, and Roberto Romanello is one of them. Find out why the Welsh Wizard won’t be the one in Gambling Marketing Musings: betclever and the World Cup promotion, and PokerStars old boy Lars Lien sits down to talk about his new project, Luckbox.
Time ladies and gentlemen, please.
Someone has just called the clock.
