PokerStars is pulling out of China, Taiwan, and Macau, this according to an e-mail that the online poker room recently sent to its customers in the three countries. PokerStars has yet to make an official comment; the e-mail was posted on the Two Plus Two forums. The policy takes effect Tuesday, September 1. The trio… Read more »
With the shutdown in tournament poker due to the COVID-19 outbreak, many of the all-time money earner lists have also paused as there aren’t any new tournaments to add to the totals. Prior to this, we’ve covered North American, Central America and the Caribbean, so it’s only natural to finish off the Western Hemisphere. Up… Read more »
You could be forgiven if you didn’t know it, but the 2020 online WSOP Main Event is ready to start “Day 2” this afternoon. To cover their $25 million guarantee, however, they have had to run 22 “Day Ones,” even running one on the VERY SAME DAY as the start of “Day 2.” In other… Read more »
It used to be that poker professionals aligned themselves with pretty much any product out there, eager to get their names in the ether so they could increase their notoriety. In 2020, however, those opportunities are few and far between. One pro who has beat that monkey is veteran poker professional Allen Kessler, who has… Read more »
With the shutdown in tournament poker due to the COVID-19 outbreak, many of the all-time money earner lists have also paused as there aren’t any new tournaments to add to the totals. At the end of last week, we started looking at who leads the rankings for the countries in North America. As we continue… Read more »
On Tuesday, PokerStars announced a minor change to its loyalty program, Stars Rewards. The change, which the online poker room touts as one that gives players “absolutely nothing to lose,” offers players the opportunity to cash in their progress bar for a lower-tier Chest with no restrictions. Until this week, the progress bar had to… Read more »
No mint juleps Following in the footsteps of most major sporting events, Churchill Downs has decided to hold the Kentucky Derby without fans in order to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus. In March, when the threat of the COVID-19 pandemic was finally becoming realized in the United States, the Kentucky Derby was moved… Read more »
Started with a pro’s ban In the wake of GGPoker’s closure of high stakes poker pro Tobias Duthweiler’s account a couple weeks ago, the online poker room has announced that it is giving previously banned players a limited-time opportunity to get out of jail free. That offer, as generous as it may sound, however, is… Read more »
Money vanished while McPhee was playing Late last week, poker pro Kevin McPhee revealed via Twitter that his GGPoker account had allegedly been hacked, his bankroll syphoned off. Though the poker room did reimburse him, McPhee is still largely in the dark as to how his account was compromised. In a series of posts, McPhee… Read more »
Closed businesses = fewer coins in circulation When I was in middle school, around seventh or eighth grade, my family and I took a road trip to South Dakota. I know, it sounds weird, but it was cool: Mount Rushmore, the Black Hills, Wall Drug, the Badlands, and we were even there during the Sturgis… Read more »
For the past six months, the poker world has basically shut itself down (THANKS, COVID-19). Because of that inactivity, there has been little to no movement on the respective charts for all-time money winnings in poker. So, who are the leaders in the individual countries? We stopped to examine that issue (thanks to the stoppage… Read more »
While many might have questioned the logic of having it, the 2020 online WSOP has had at least one good outcome. Revenues for the month of July in the state of New Jersey set records, in part driven by the month-long series of tournaments. With this said, the percentage of online poker in the overall… Read more »
If you didn’t know that the 2020 online WSOP Main Event was going on right at this moment on GGPoker, you could be forgiven. To Saturday, there have been six “Day Ones” played out, with the plan to play 22 “Day Ones” to get the numbers for the online Main Event. In addition, the players… Read more »
There has been a lot of online poker played around the world in the last few months. With people staying home because of the coronavirus pandemic, internet poker numbers have jumped. Netflix, poker, and chill. And though we haven’t been traveling, I am sure mobile app use is up, too. To that end, partypoker recently… Read more »
It’s not exactly shutting down casinos again, but Illinois is tightening its belt again in response to rising COVID-19 cases. Governor JB Pritzker and the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) announced on Tuesday that extra mitigation efforts – some that affect casinos – have gone into effect in the area just outside St. Louis.… Read more »
Ok, I know I’m totally a bad person and a bad parent for finding part of this story entertaining, but come on, sometimes things are funny. And of course I would never take my kids onto a casino floor and let them gamble – I don’t even keep my payment information stored on any online… Read more »
New York’s commercial casinos are still closed by order of the governor and employees have had enough. A group of casino workers have planned a rally for Thursday morning outside the state Capitol Building in Albany to protest for their right to get back to their jobs. The casinos closed in mid-March, as did every… Read more »
Here we go again. The PokerStars World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP) is just about upon us. Running August 30 through September 23, it features 75 triple-tiered events an $80 million in guaranteed prize pools, the most the WCOOP has even guaranteed. The three Main Events will take place on September 20 with buy-ins of… Read more »
After a week’s delay, David Peters battled his way through two tough competitors – one well known and the other the “Cinderella story” of the tournament – to capture his second bracelet at the 2020 online WSOP. Along with picking up the bracelet in this $10,000 event, Peters also took down a $360,480 payday and… Read more »
There are just a few major events left on the schedule for the 2020 online WSOP at GGPoker (more on that in a minute), but one of them is being completed today. Event #54, the $10,000 Heads Up No Limit Hold’em Championship, has come down to its Final Four and the players have been champing… Read more »
There are many that believe online poker is perfect as it is today. Bringing the game from the poker table (or even dinner table) to the computer indeed was a significant step forward, but there’s always room for improvement with anything. But, with online poker, where are the things that you could improve? Some have… Read more »
Need that revenue to flow again Encore Boston Harbor and MGM Springfield have asked the Massachusetts Gaming Commission for the go-ahead to open up their craps and roulette tables. The Commission will consider the request, scheduled to have a virtual meeting to discuss the matter at 10:00am Thursday. “We appreciate the Gaming Commission’s consideration of… Read more »
The reward of a functioning society When people started realizing the COVID-19 pandemic might be serious in March, sports shut down. The NBA halted its season, NCAA March Madness was cancelled outright, the NHL paused its season, so on and so forth. The NBA and NHL are back, playing their “bubbles,” and Major League Baseball… Read more »
Last night, I wrote that Norman Chad is just about the last person in the poker world you would want to see get COVID-19 (I don’t want anyone to, but that’s not the point), but unfortunately, he did. Using a little parallel article structure for a moment, the last person in the poker world I… Read more »
Not that I would want anyone to contract the novel coronavirus, but of all the people in the poker world, one of the last people I would want to see get sick is the legendary Norman Chad. Well, sure enough, Mr. Chad has caught the virus and as one might expect, he is not feeling… Read more »
