On Friday, the World Poker Tour announced that it would air two tournaments filmed at the River Rock Casino in Vancouver as part of the first-ever WPT Canada series. The tournaments, which will air in a total of four one-hour episodes, will be hosted by Canadian sports announcer Jim Van Horne and poker pro Kenna James. The first installment will occur next week, when Sportsnet will air part one of a $1,000 buy-in bounty tournament which gives away a first place prize of over $90,000.
Two final tables will air in total. The Bounty event and Main Event from the Coast to Coast Championships will each consist of a pair of two-hour episodes. It’s the World Poker Tour’s latest venture into regional poker telecasts with poker pros from the viewing area featured. World Poker Tour spokesperson Lyndsay Lagree told Poker News Daily, “The Canadian market is very poker-hungry. The Canadians love their poker. It’s great to be able to bring the World Poker Tour up to Canada and just have a Canadian-focused show. Rogers is a huge network and we hope to do more with then in the future.” The WPT has also recently expanded into China and India.
The first episode can be seen starting Monday, September 1st. Interested viewers are urged to check their local listings for details. Personalities with bounties on their heads include Brad “Yukon” Booth, Gavin Smith, Jody Trainer, Davidson Matthew, Antonio “The Magician” Esfandiari and “Cowboy” Kenna James. Lagree noted that Gavin Smith and other Canadian poker pros also participated in the event, which serves to celebrate poker in that country. The River Rock Casino has a 25 table poker room, according to its website, and is home to the BC Poker Championship.
Sportsnet is headquartered in Toronto. Its television arm is composed of four regional channels: Rogers Sportsnet East, Rogers Sportsnet Ontario, Rogers Sportsnet West, and Rogers Sportsnet Pacific. It owns the Toronto Blue Jays Major League Baseball team and airs its games. It also serves as the television outlet for the Seattle Mariners, Calgary Flames, Edmonton Oilers, and Vancouver Canucks, as well as the Canadian Hockey League. Its equivalent in the United States would be ESPN.
Expanding internationally has been a focus of the World Poker Tour. Lagree explained, “The international marketplace is where we want the brand want to go. It would be great to replicate the Canadian WPT in different regions. That’s something we’re looking to do in the future. We want to create regionally-based and regionally-focused tournaments. People in other parts of the world want to see their own players compete.”
The Main Event of the Coast to Coast Championships doles out a $224,100 first place prize. According to the Rogers Sportsnet official television schedule, the first broadcast of the bounty tournament is Monday, September 1st at 11:30pm ET on Rogers Sportsnet East. Other airings follow later in the week. The Rogers family of networks also carries “Poker After Dark,” which is shown on NBC in the United States.
Canada has produced a healthy crop of talented poker players. Besides Smith, others include Daniel Negreanu, Evelyn Ng, Sorel “Imper1um” Mizzi, and World Series of Poker November Nine member Scott Montgomery.