Hello, I’m Sean Gibson and welcome to the Poker News Daily Weekly Update. We are moving to this new weekly format for now as we have a ton of great poker lifestyle pieces heading your way and didn’t want you to miss out on those. However, I’ll still be back bringing the news every Friday.
Our first topic covers the Prince of Poker, larger than life Poker Hall of Fame nominee Scotty Nguyen, who is offering his fans the chance to play against him in small regional tournaments. According to his official blog, Nguyen will skip the World Series of Poker Europe this year to play in smaller buy-in events all over the United States. Nguyen’s first stop will be in Durant, Oklahoma at the Choctaw Casino for the T.J. Cloutier Classic. The nineteen ninety-eight WSOP Main Event champ was enthused over his decision on Twitter:
“Don’t forget baby! Gonna skip WSOPE and instead travel for my fans baby!”
In a decision filed on September fourteenth, United States District Judge James Nowlin denied a motion for a Temporary Restraining Order filed by Deliverance Poker, which is suingNovember Nine member Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi for allegedly jumping ship to be sponsored by Full Tilt Poker in the middle of the Main Event. If the motion had been successful, Mizrachi may have been forbidden from wearing Full Tilt logos until the legal process was finished. Fortunately for him – and Full Tilt – Judge Nowlin dismissed it, and went as far as to say there is no “substantial likelihood” that Deliverance would win the case.
In more online poker news, the sale of the CEREUS Network to Blanca Games has “violated and/or triggered the application of certain rights under the agreements between Excapsa and Blast Off and its related entities” according to XMT Liquidations.
Potentially referring to the UltimateBet.com domain, “Blast Off intended to wind-up [end] any and all operations related to assets over which Excapsa has been granted a security interest.”
The situation remains murky at best, but as one member of the Two Plus two Forum put it,
“Looks like Blast Off’s (AP/UB) lawyers are going to try to get the hundred Million dollar note reduced or canceled due to players cheated in two thousand and four and two thousand and five.”
On Friday, members of the Poker Hall of Fame voting committee received their ballots in an e-mail from Harrah’s officials. Noticeably different this year is a “10-point must system” that asks each member of the panel to allocate ten points among the candidates of their choosing. The 10 finalists that the panel must choose from are:
Chris Ferguson, Barry Greenstein, Jennifer Harman, “Action” Dan Harrington, Phil Ivey, Erik Seidel, Linda Johnson, Tom McEvoy, Daniel Negreanu, and Scotty Nguyen.
After the votes are tabulated, the top two players receiving the majority of the vote will be enshrined as part of the Class of two thousand and ten. PND’s own Dan Cypra has the privilege of being on the panel for the second straight year.
The Poker Players Alliance struck back at the Commerce Casino and other gambling establishments in California by launching PlayersBeforeProfits.com, an online petition designed to encourage support of H-R Two-Two-Six-Seven, the Internet Gambling Regulation, Consumer Protection, and Enforcement Act. At the time of taping, the petition at PlayersBeforeProfits.com has well over ten thousand signatures, including the support of pros such as Tom Dwan, Howard Lederer, and Jennifer Tilly.
Twenty-four year-old Brit Sam Trickett took down the sixth PartyPoker World Open, banking two hundred thousand dollars. The tournament played out last week from the Palm Beach Casino in London.
Trickett has been on a tear in two-thousand ten. In June, he was the runner-up in a No Limit Hold’em event held during the World Series of Poker and took over half a million dollars. Then, Trickett bubbled the final table of the twenty-five thousand dollar No Limit Hold’em Six-Handed event, also at the WSOP. In August, Trickett did it again, finishing fourth in the European Poker Tour Main Event in Vilamoura, Portugal. His win at the PartyPoker World Open VI gives Trickett four six-figure cashes in the last three months.
Finally, Poker News Daily congratulates Phil Laak on yet another achievement. This time, “The Unabomber” took down his first gold World Series of Poker bracelet across “The Pond” in London. Laak won a twenty-five hundred Pound Six-Handed No Limit Hold’em tournament during WSOP Europe for one-hundred seventy thousand Pounds.
Laak’s bracelet was in the kickoff event of WSOP Europe, which sold out at 244 entrants. The final table also featured bracelet winners Chris [BEE-OR-IN] Bjorin and Willie Tann.
That does it for this week’s top headlines here at Poker News Daily. Don’t miss us next Friday for another executive recap of the week in Poker. Until next time, here’s to hoping you run great at the tables – I’m Sean Gibson for Poker News Daily.