In an apparent effort to spice up the event, the World Series of Poker (WSOP) announced Monday that up to 100 more players, including many name pros, will be participating in the 2012 WSOP National Championship. Last year, just 100 players were eligible in total; now as many as 200 will compete for a share of the $1,000,000 prize pool.
Like last year, 100 players will qualify based on their performance during the 2011-2012 WSOP Circuit season. There will be 34 automatic qualifiers: 17 WSOP Circuit Main Event winners and 17 casino champions (the players who earn the most points across all events at a single tour stop). The remaining 66 spots will go to the players who earn the most points on the WSOP Circuit during the entire season. These 100 players will get to play for free in the $1,000,000 guaranteed prize pool WSOP National Championship, which will start July 6th.
While the idea of rewarding the best WSOP Circuit players with a lucrative freeroll which is also a real WSOP bracelet event is a solid one, last year’s Championship did not attract much attention from the poker community. It looks like the attempt at a remedy to this situation is to include bigger name players, those who do not participate frequently in the lower buy-in Circuit events. As such, the top 100 points earners at the 2010 WSOP, 2010 WSOP Europe, 2011 WSOP, and 2011 WSOP Europe will all be eligible to compete in the 2012 WSOP National Championship. These players, however, will be required to buy-in for $10,000. This entry fee will be added on top of the $1,000,000 already in the prize pool.
In a press release, WSOP Executive Director Ty Stewart expressed his pride in the new format, saying, “This marks the first time we will take the best of the best from all our events to compete against one another to determine a true WSOP National Champion.”
The top ten points qualifiers from the last two years of the WSOP and WSOP Europe are Michael Mizrachi, Ben Lamb, Shawn Buchanan, Phil Hellmuth, John Juanda, Chris Moorman, Jonathan Duhamel, John Racener, David “Bakes” Baker, and Frank Kassela. The rest of the top 100 is littered with recognizable names such as Eugene Katchalov, Bertrand Grospelier, 2011 WSOP Main Event Champion Pius Heinz, Jason Mercier, Men “The Master” Nguyen, 2011 WSOP Main Event runner-up Martin Staszko, Tom “durrrr” Dwan, Gavin Smith, Sammy Farha, and many more.
Last year, 97 of the 100 qualifying WSOP Circuit players participated in the National Championship. Sam Barnhart not only earned his first WSOP gold bracelet by winning the event, but also his first ever WSOP cash. At $300,000, it was quite a nice debut in the money for Barnhart. He then went from relative no-name to a familiar face on the ESPN telecasts, making a tremendously deep run in the Main Event before eventually bowing out in 17th place. That finish bettered his National Championship cash by almost $80,000.
The second annual WSOP National Championship will begin July 6th at the Rio in Las Vegas and will continue on July 7th until the final table of nine players remain. Those nine will return on July 11th to play for the crown in front of the ESPN cameras.
