Back when the Poker Million first made it to the television screen, poker was riding a pre-Moneymaker wave of cult popularity in Britain. Late Night Poker had just come out and was gaining a niche audience who lived for the midnight hour once a week to see their favourite characters take to the felt.
In 2000, the Poker Million was invented to offer one player the chance of winning a million pound top prize. This wouldn’t be the only prize, but the pay-jumps were brutal. In the original series of the Poker Million, 10th-placed Dave Welch cashed for £2,000. The big names at the time went up the top 10, but the amounts were paltry compared to that top prize. Simon Trumper (9th for £6,000), Barny Boatman (6th or £14,000) and Tony Bloom (4th for £25,000) all missed out on the first seven-figure tournament prize in British poker. Heads-up, John Duthie, creator of the European Poker Tour, would beat Teddy ‘Sugar’ Tuil to give the Israeli player a £100,000 consolation prize. It was the final hand that the TV company must have dreamed of when they conceived the show in the first place.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ic_lswkSAh8
The Poker Million might have been a success, but the format would not return to TV screens until three years later in 2003, the year Moneymaker won the biggest prize in poker. This time, the prize-pool was reduced by a vast amount, and it was snooker legend Jimmy White who won the first prize, a comparatively miniscule $150,000.
This trend for keeping the brand going at the expense of a large prize-pool continued the next year as Donnacha O’Dea bested a final table featuring Dave ‘Devilfish’ Ulliott and future Tory MP Zac Goldsmith, winning $300,000.
A year later, however, the million-dollar top prize was in place. Not pound sterling, only dollars, but still. Donnacha O’Dea again reached the final table but could only manage a 5th place finish for $40,000. TV presenter Helen Chamberlain banked $400,000 for finishing as runner-up and Tony Jones, an online freeroll winner, got the win of his life, taking home the million dollars for nothing.
In 2005, another big shock took place, as Rajesh Modha, who had qualified for the event online for just $9, won an incredible $1.2 million. In 2007, it was the turn of Joe Beevers to win a million dollars, his triumph over Marty Smyth denying the Irishman victory at the final table for the second time. It would be third time lucky for Smyth in 2008, however, as he won the final table, which had four Irish players finishing in the final four places, and he banked that million at last.
A year later, early December 2009, the prize-pool was as good as halved, and it was British WSOP Main Event final table player James Akenhead who took home the top prize of $500,000, beating Juha Helppi heads-up and outlasting a final table including Luke Schwartz. If the format needed refreshing, it was to get the ultimate makeover in its final iteration.
In 2010, it was the Full Tilt Poker Million, and there was an extreme twist to proceedings. The million-dollar top prize was back for what would be one last tournament, but this time it was winner-takes all. No-one else in the tournament would cash at all, with a million-dollar bubble between runner-up and winner. The final table was predictably an incredible one to play at, with some of the world’s best players making it that far. Patrik Antonius and Howard Lederer both played but fell short.
Barny Boatman got unlucky to bust in 4th place. Tony Bloom, now chairman of Brighton & Hove Albion Football Club, would be defeated in 2nd place, the cruelest cut of all. It was Gus Hansen who won the million, and with it went the series, never to return in the decade since.
Could the Poker Million return? As a winner-takes-all tournament, it’s highly unlikely that players would ever go for that format. But as a million ‘up-top’ event, perhaps the time has passed where it would be so fabled that a seven-figure sum would demand an audience.
There was a time when winning a million dollars – or better, pounds – for a poker tournament would raise eyebrows, demand attention and coral viewing figures. But today? Justin Bonomo won an online event for $1.7 million just last week.
Times have truly changed.
