Poker

The Borgata Summer Poker Open, June 4-21, is fast approaching and offers up an even 50 tournament events over the 18 days counting evening tournaments and satellites.So really, there's something here for every grinder's taste.Like prize pool grantees? Seven of 19 main events carry prize pools totaling $1.275 million.That includes a $300,000 guaranteed $350 + $50 Deepstack No Limit tournament to kickoff the Open on June 4.The event has two opening days, Day 1A June 4 and Day 1B June 5.The biggest prize pool guarantee belongs to the Summer Poker Open Championship event, June 16-20. The $2,500 + $200 Double Play No Limit tournament carries a half million dollar guarantee, also known as $500,000 in some circles.Double Play tournaments allow players busting out on Day 1A (June 16) to re-buy on Day 1B (June 17), regardless of what level they went out.Here's the main event schedule.Satellites for the championship event begin June 14 with six different tournaments offered until June 16. They range from a $135 + $20 tournament (Event 38) at 3pm June 14 to a $540 + $60 No Limit Tournament (Event 41) at 3pm Sat, June 15.Each satellite sends a different proportion of players to the championship event depending on buy-in. For example, Event 38 will send 1 in 20 players to the championship while Event 41 sends 1 in 5.Secondary events ( Events 20 through 50) have evening and afternoon starts. For the Summer Poker Open, 15 of the secondary events are "Bounty" tournaments, where players can win cash chips from players they knock out of the tournament, regardless of where they ultimately finish.The secondary events also include six survivor tournaments and three Deepsatck tournaments.So you see, there's kind of a lot to choose from. Here's a look at the Borgata Summer Poker Open full schedule.Online reservations for all events are now open.Also, you can win a seat to the Borgata Summer Poker Open Champiosnhip by entering our special drawing.Summer comes early the Borgata Poker Room.

I don't have too much to report regarding my own play of late. However, I have been delivering some seriously good vibes to my friends who keep going deep in big tourneys. In fact, it seems like recently everyone around me in our little entourage has been doing well, and I have no choice but to attribute it to the great support they've been getting from me! I'm joking, but the truth is it can be very important to have support from others when you play. Recently I've been traveling not just with my brother, Matti, but also with our friends Wim Neys, Pieter Aerts, and Bart Lybaert, and all of those guys have been putting up some nice results this year. Having a group like that not only makes traveling and playing more fun, but can really help with maintaining focus, too. Poker's an individual sport, obviously, but having some friends and/or family there rooting for you -- especially when it gets down to a final table -- can be incredibly helpful, not just in terms of emotional support but also to discuss strategy and bounce ideas off one another as a tournament goes on. Having friends there to share those experiences can be nice, too, when you later look back on them as memories. I actually think there's a kind of "social control" (or whatever you want to call it) that happens when your friends are there watching you play. What I mean is, you are much less likely to blow up or make bad decisions at the table when you know you'll have to explain it later not just to yourself but to your friends, too. So it kind of keeps you in line a little, which is just another of the real, tangible benefits of having people supporting you when you play. A lot of times in the poker world you'll see players only railing other players when they have a piece of them, but I'm actually one who likes to see my friends do well and will be there at their final tables without having to have a piece of them. My friends are also always there for me in those situations, too, although as I was suggesting that hasn't been happening too much lately because I have been on a bit of a downswing since January. I had been playing a full schedule in terms of online tournaments as well as a lot of the live tourneys, and unfortunately haven't been cashing like I'd like. So I've kind of taken my foot off of the gas pedal and have reduced my volume a bit of late, and once I get some results again I can turn things back up. Not long ago I listened to a podcast featuring Tommy Angelo in which he talked about how the winter months can be difficult for people. The longer nights and the cold can make things hard for people sometimes, and they need that sunshine to keep them upbeat. I think I kind of suffer from that a little, and so with the spring arriving and the summer on its way, I'm hopeful that will help turn things around for me. Meanwhile, though, I'll keep on supporting my friends. I'll keep being their sunshine, you could say. Christophe de Meulder is a member of Team PokerStars Pro

A few years ago, photographer Neil Stoddart and PokerStars' tourney guru Bryan Slick hustled Dan Kelly into what amounted to a large closet at the PCA in the Bahamas. They shoved two bracelets onto his wrists and took the picture below. Why? Well, it was a big deal. Kelly had won not one but two WCOOP bracelets. Say it aloud: it was a BIG DEAL! Now, it's sort of quaint. See, last night, as Dave Behr wrote, Kelly won his second SCOOP title. Add that to his four WCOOP wins, and you have a 6-COOP man, which qualifies him as...I dunno...a demigod of some sort. Want to see who else is on their way to Dan Kelly status? Click any of the headlines below to see our wrap-ups. (Hint: Check out Randall Flowers who one event and final tabled another in the same night) zeus-tseuji wins first for Japan in Event #29-L, $11 NL Hold'em Entries: 18,102 Prize pool: $181,020 Places paid: 2,475 1st place: zeus-tseuji (Japan) $19,534.41 2nd place: SHUR43 (Russia) $15,386.70 3rd place: RONNALDO 9 (Mexico) $11,776.30 4th place: Celfhtd (Russia) $8,145.90 5th place: sakiss99 (Cyprus) $6,335.70 6th place: darkarchon-8 (Bulgaria) $4,525.50 7th place: MYspearGUN (Cyprus) $2,715.30 8th place: kuuuuuk (Norway) $1,629.18 9th place: DDrunkson (Portugal) $1,086.12 Passagero-LM flies high in Event 29-M ($109 NLHE) Players: 5213 Prize pool: $521,300 Places paid: 675 1. Passagero-LM (Brazil) - $56,043.54* 2. PutItAllYin (Canada) - $40,838.72* 3. beed2 (Slovakia) - $48,418.71* 4. dariepoker (Romania) - $54,966.22* 5. rounder3989 (Germany) - $36,874.22* 6. What0ver9000 (Germany) - $16,942.25 7. gardze_wami (Poland) - $11,729.25 8. holla@yoboy (Canada) - $6,516,25 9. dyng247 (Sweden) - $4,170.40 * denotes 5-way deal OverTheTop43 on top after chop in Event #29-H ($1,050 NLHE) Players: 1,534 Total prize pool: $1,534,000.00 Places paid: 171 1. OverTheTop43 (Germany) $199,446.39* 2. kikobicu (Brazil) $200,696.28* 3. MonkeyBudg (Ireland) $197,963.93* 4. Jude "j.thaddeus" Ainsworth (Ireland) $104,312.00 5. Tim "blumenkind53" Ulrich (Germany) $75,933.00 6. FONBET_RULIT (Russia) $60,593.00 7. Giuseppe "Ansgar2000" Pantaleo (Germany) $45,253.00 8. korjae (Canada) -- $29,913.00 9. Elia001 (Russia) -- $16,567.20 *reflects three-way deal Jomppeli_32 jumps to a win in Event #30-L, $27 Razz Entries: 2,192 Prize pool: $53,183.60 Places paid: 288 1st place: Jomppeli_32 (Finland) $9,243.37 2nd place: Jesseb888 (Canada) $6,538.35 3rd place: TomaszRa (United Kingdom) $5,112.29 4th place: erot1 (Norway) $3,766.95 5th place: scroosko (United Kingdom) $2,690.68 6th place: margenov (Bulgaria) $1,614.40 7th place: ViTaMin_F22 (China) $1,076.27 8th place: Kazerog (Russia) $538.13 lowballeric earns a lowball title in Event #30-M ($215 Razz) Players: 461 Total prize pool: $92,200.00 Places paid: 64 1. lowballeric (United Kingdom) $17,518.00 2. krec23 (Russia) $12,908.00 3. Gigaloff (Russia) $9,459.72 4. shrek7771 (Russia) $6,915.00 5. capeta333 (Brazil) $4,610.00 6. Paul "padjes" Berende (Netherlands) $3,227.00 7. Desslock (Canada) $2,305.00 8. Thayer "THAY3R" Rasmussen (Mexico) $1,844.00 Kelly captures sixth COOP title in Event 30-H ($2100 Razz) Players: 97 Prizepool: $194,000 Places paid: 12 1. Daniel "djk123" Kelly (Australia) - $45,377.50* 2. SebbyGl (Germany) - $43,377.50* 3. ShellyCalls (Australia) - $27,160.00 4. redeste (Russia) - $18,430.00 5. AceQuad (Mexico) - $13,580.00 6. Justin "ZeeJustin" Bonomo (Canada) - $10,185.00 7. villepn (Finland) - $8,245.00 8. blanconegro (Mexico) - $6,305.00 * denotes 2-way deal FoRiu89 pots victory in Event #32-L ($27 Pot Limit Omaha Turbo ZOOM) Entrants: 5,419 Prize pool: $133,036.45 Places paid: 720 1st FoRiu89 (Bulgaria) - $16,295.07* 2nd JeffBaas (Netherlands) - $15,497.07* 3rd N0b0dy (Canada) - $15,496.07* 4th badalhas (Portugal) - $7,516.55 5th mitsakos21 (Greece) - $5,654.04 6th ace201220 (Belgium) - $4,323.68 7th VernonH (Germany) - $2,993.32 8th Alexx_N (Russia) - $1,662.95 9th Funeraler (Ukraine) - $1,

On May 23, 2003, I was a television news reporter. I played online poker on the side. I'd already fallen in love with the movie Rounders. I played local home games regularly. I'd been to Vegas the year before and cut my teeth at the Bellagio. Two weeks earlier, a co-worker introduced me to Positively Fifth Street by Jim McManus. I spent nearly every rare moment of free time I had that spring playing poker, reading about poker, or thinking about poker. But on the morning of May 23, I had no idea how something that was happening in Las Vegas would change my life. How much would everything change? I'd end up writing poker stories that were crazier than Rounders. I'd play in games in casinos all over the world. I'd sit around with Jim McManus and talk about Positively Fifth Street. That's how much things changed because of May 23, 2003. That's how much changed because of this guy. Chris Moneymaker In the days before Twitter, the fastest way reporters got their outside news was via the Associated Press wire. My newsroom's fancy new software had an AP feed that came directly to our computers. That was where I first saw that a man named Moneymaker had won the biggest Main Event in history. That was ten years ago today, an historic Friday in Vegas that changed the lives of an uncountable number of people. Moneymaker's win struck me and my poker friends like it struck every other wannabe in the world. The restaurant accountant from Tennessee was just some guy. He wasn't a Brunson. He wasn't a Chan. He wasn't a star, but he was about to change our lives. There will be many retrospectives and re-told stories today. They're all worthy tales, and they all deserve their due. But today, I'm struck by a personal feeling of gratitude that I can't shake, and that's what this is about. *** So, why would I thank Chris? I stayed in TV news for another 18 months. My friends and I talked about Moneymaker. He was around our age, and he was the most unlikely of heroes in a game that we played. Our softball team was never going to walk into Fenway. Our disc golf games weren't going to land us in some disc golf version of The Masters. But our poker game...well, Chris Moneymaker gave us hope. I played poker as much as I could. I managed to win my first $10,000 tournament seat just a few weeks before I got the opportunity to start doing work for PokerStars (a seat I gave up for the privilege of doing what do today). PokerStars was exploding by that point in January 2005. It had put the last two World Champions into the WSOP. It was on its way to becoming the world's biggest online poker site. I gave up a career I'd been in for a decade to write about the people who were chasing...well, they were chasing my dream. I wasn't on the job long before then card room manager Lee Jones pulled me aside and laid it out for me. I don't remember his exact words, but in my head it sounded like this: "We're all here because of what Chris Moneymaker did." That may sound like dramatic hyperbole, and it probably discounts the role television and the hole card cameras played in the game's growth. Nevertheless, I feel comfortable that neither I nor most of the poker people I know would be where they are today if it weren't for Moneymaker making the choice to play that $39 satellite on PokerStars that put him in the WSOP Main Event. As always, Lee Jones was right. Our lives and the lives of many other people changed in an immeasurable way when Moneymaker finally took off his sunglasses and smiled ten years ago. *** I'll be honest. The first time I saw Chris was the morning of Day 1 of the 2005 PCA, and he didn't look especially good. He looked tired and a little worn out by the duties and obligations of being a world champion. I didn't ask him if I could write that--or even if it is true--but I don't think he would deny it. I only mention it to highlight the fact that playing the role of a hero when you don't have experience in the field can be

Some of poker's best known names from the west are looking east for a chance at winning big. PokerStars Macau recently announced the June 5 HK $1 Million (US $130k) buy-in GuangDong Ltd Asia Millions (GDAM) tournament at the City of Dreams casino. There was never any doubt that the regional super high rollers would show up. Now we can confirm the train from the western world is filling up. Players among the the early confirmations include Jonathan Duhamel, Isaac Haxton, Gus Hansen, Erik Seidel, Greg Merson, and Celina Lin. Organizers report they also have commitments from John Juanda, Joseph Cheong, Tony Gregg, Mike Watson, Yevgeniy Timoshenko, Igor Kurganov, Tobias Reinkemeier, Aaron Lim, JC Alvarado, Devan Tang, and Nick Wong. Isaac Haxton among super high rollers headed to Macau They are part of a list of more than 50 people already signed up, an unprecedented number of pre-registrations for an event of this magnitude. At least one more will qualify for the main event this Sunday in a special satellite on PokerStars. The GDAM main event will be webcast live on PokerStars.TV June 5-7 beginning at 3pm HKT each day. GDAM SCHEDULE Tue, June 4 @ 3:00 PM - HK $250,000 GDAM Warm-Up Event Wed, June 5 @ 3:00 PM - HK $1M + 2R GDAM Main Event - Day 1 Thu, June 6 @ 3:00 PM - GDAM Main Event - Day 2 Fri, June 7 @ 3:00 PM - GDAM Main Event - Final Table Brad Willis is the PokerStars Head of Blogging

The U.S. pro outlasted 97 players in Event 30-H to win $45,377. It was his second PokerStars SCOOP title but he already has a record four WCOOP wins. As a sharp contrast fellow MTT grinder Randal “RandAllin” Flowers finally got his due by winning his first SCOOP in the $2,100 PLO ZOOM tournament. Some of the other notable players to make decent scores last night included Justin Bonomo and upstart online high-stakes player jama-dharma. Jude Ainsworth also final tabled the $1,050 NLHE event that also included Giuseppe “Ansgar2000” Pantaleo. Here’s a look at two of the most significant tables last night: Kelly Outlasts Bonomo to Win $2,100 Razz Dan Kelly busted ZeeJustin in sixth.   Dan Kelly proved his diversity by picking up a win in Event 30-H $2,100 Razz yesterday. It was Kelly’s second SCOOP but once you add his four WCOOP tables he’s up to six overall COOP victories. That’s second only to Shaun Deeb who has a total of seven COOP titles, with five in SCOOP. The final table in Event 30-H was no cakewalk, as Kelly had to deal with noted high-stakes pros Justin “ZeeJustin” Bonomo. Kelly came to play, however, and he eventually busted Bonomo in sixth place. Here’s a look at the final-table results: 1. Daniel "djk123" Kelly (Australia) - $45,377.50* 2. SebbyGl (Germany) - $43,377.50* 3. ShellyCalls (Australia) - $27,160.00 4. redeste (Russia) - $18,430.00 5. AceQuad (Mexico) - $13,580.00 6. Justin "ZeeJustin" Bonomo (Canada) - $10,185.00 7. villepn (Finland) - $8,245.00 8. blanconegro (Mexico) - $6,305.00 RandAllin Makes High and Medium PLO Zoom Final Tables Randal "RandALLin" Flowers   Randal “RandAllin” Flowers actually made two final tables yesterday as he finished ninth in Event 32-M $215 PLO Zoom for $3,061. Flowers improved his result substantially in the high-version of the same event as he won it outright for $127,608. The North Carolina native outlasted 312 players and a final table that included recent high-stakes upstart jama-dharma. Flowers then out-dueled heads-up opponent zwacke to claim the title. The German zwacke picked up $93,600 for his second place finish. Here’s a complete look at the final table:  1. Randal "RandALLin" Flowers (Mexico) $127,608.00 2. zwacke (Germany) $93,600.00 3. mahripeluri (Finland) $70,512.00 4. Bandano (Netherlands) $53,040.00 5. jama-dharma (Russia) $36,192.00 6. vindog03 (United Kingdom) $28,080.00 7. vegaspolotsk (Belarus) $21,840.00 8. kartt (Brazil) $15,600.00 9. greeno99 (United Kingdom) $11,856.00 Visit www.pokerlistings.com

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Do you know George Jorj95' Lind III? You should. Not only is he the first player to have crossed the monumental 10,000,000 VPP barrier, but the member of Team PokerStars Online is also contesting for the SCOOP 2013 leader board. Lind has racked up 15 cashes in the series so far including two 2nd place finishes, SCOOP #6-H and SCOOP #15-H (those two results alone are worth more than $50,000) and have helped him to 11th place If his name still isn't ringing any bells then we suggest you quickly apprise yourself of his bio page here. At the beginning of the month Lind challenged himself with a three-pronged goal: to make a million VPP in May while maintaining a pre-rakeback profit and lose ten pounds in weight at the same time. You can read his insane goal declaration at his personal blog. One mill in a month? Ain't no thang The challenge Moving into the final quarter of the challenge Lind has nailed two of the three goals, breaking 1 million VPP and losing 10 pounds, but the third is proving to be a little problematic right now. "Unfortunately i got crushed today, losing like $50k, now I'm only up $2k pre-rakeback on the month. Gonna be a sweat for this last goal!" - Jorj95's blog, 23 May Well, even two out of three ain't bad, but don't go betting against Jorj95. It's tight at the moment Free vacation! (with every 10,000,000 VPPs) You can have a free holiday. Yeah, PokerStars will give you travel, accommodation and spending money, just so long as you earn 10,000,000 VPPs. You can read about the incredible family holiday of a lifetime at Jorj95's personal blog (although it's Mrs George writing as the challenge is on!) It started in Japan here but you can read about the whole trip through the links below. Anchorage glacier bay Dutch Hrabour and Kodiak Kobe and Petropavlovsk While Japan can be a fairly alien environment it is made a lot easier thanks to Naoya 'nkeyno' Kihara stepping in as a makeshift guide and paper sumo opponent. Team Online on the town Apparently you have tap the table a lot... SCOOPing it up Lind really should have made it a four-handed challenge by throwing in a top ten SCOOP leaderboard finish into the mix. He'd be on for a sweat with that one, too. Lind is currently sat in 11th position with 305 points. SCOOP hero Shaun Deeb is, of course, at the top of the leader board with 410 points. Read about that here. Rick Dacey is a staff writer for the PokerStars Blog.

The second version of SCOOP's "Super Tuesday Special Edition" -- after last week's Event #8-H that ended in a five-way chop with Sobizzle21 claiming the watch -- played out once more this week, again as a two-day event. This time the event concluded with a three-way deal resulting in all three players earning close to $200K for their efforts, with Germany's OverTheTop43 coming away at the end with the chips and SCOOP watch. Day 1 The first day of Event #29-H kicked off much as another Super Tuesday, PokerStars' weekly $1,050 no-limit hold'em tournament, with cards going in the air at 17:00 ET. However in this case the field would be nearly three times as large as the Super Tuesday has been of late, with a whopping 1,534 players ultimately taking to the felt by the time late registration closed. That big group meant a prize pool of $1,534,000, well over the $1 million guarantee assigned to this one, with the top 171 finishers destined to divide those riches. The schedule called for 16 half-hour levels to be played on Day 1, and as it happened by the end of the night exactly 172 players remained -- that's right, they stopped squarely on the stone cold bubble. Three Team PokerStars Pros were among that group surviving the first day, with Ike Haxton in 16th position with double the average stack, Chris "Money800" Moneymaker in 35th, and Lex Veldhuis in 44th. Meanwhile, Ondrej "Vinkyy" Vinklarek of the Czech Republic ended the night out in front of everyone with more than 162,000. Here's how the top of the counts appeared overnight: 1. Ondrej "Vinkyy" Vinklarek (Czech Republic) -- 162,061 2. Jim "Mr_BigQueso" Collopy (Australia) -- 140,603 3. kikobicu (Brazil) -- 136,421 4. Elia001 (Russia) -- 129,733 5. OverTheTop43 (Germany) -- 129,770 6. petermurphy8 (United Kingdom) -- 127,844 7. FONBET_RULIT (Russia) -- 118,515 8. Denys "SantaZzz" Chufarin (Ukraine) -- 109,512 9. SlovakPsycho (Slovakia) -- 108,976 10. Steve "BetrThanPhil" Tripp (Canada) -- 104,671 Day 2 The surviving players reassembled at 17:00 ET on Wednesday to begin Level 17 and the process of finding a winner. They started with all 20 remaining tables playing hand-for-hand, and made it to the fourth hand before NhFy reraised-shoved for about 16 big blinds with [Ah][Kc] and got a single caller in PokerPetty00 who held [Qd][Qh]. The community cards came eight-high, and having failed to improve NhFy was the unlucky 172nd-place finisher, the last to go out prior to the cash. About 50 players followed NhFy to the rail during that first hour, then during the second Lex Veldhuis unfortunately met his end in 108th place ($2,914.60) after running [Qc][Qh] into kjunia's [As][Ah] in a blind-versus-blind confrontation. By the three-hour mark they'd whittled down to the final 64 players, with kikobicu and Ondrej "Vinkyy" Vinklarek still at the top of the counts with Grayson "gray31" Ramage in third position. Meanwhile, Team PokerStars Pro Ike Haxton had just hit the rail in 66th ($3,528.20) after becoming short-stacked before being finished off in a hand versus Varosky. That left just Chris "Money800" Moneymaker who sat with an average stack. Moneymaker, of course, was celebrating the eve of an important anniversary of not just in his poker career, but for poker, generally speaking. As most are remembering this week, it was May 23, 2003 when Moneymaker completed his magical Main Event run to win the title and $2.5 million prize. Chris "Money800" Moneymaker After getting off to a good start in the night's fourth hour, Moneymaker would climb into the top 10 in the counts as players continued to fall, with Németh "probirs" András (63rd, $3,835), Denys "SantaZzz" Chufarin (62nd, $3,845), and Jim "Mr_BigQueso" Collopy (50th, $4,141.80) among the eliminated. They pushed on past the five-hour mark for Day 2 as the field shrunk further to less than 40. Then with the blinds at 1,600/3,200, Victor "VibizSbrissa" Sbrissa raised to 6,785 from early position a