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Poker News

Steve O’Dwyer Wins EPT Grand Final, Besting Best Final Table…Ever?


This win can pay for a lotta grilled cheese sandwiches.

This win can pay for a lotta grilled cheese sandwiches.

Sure, Steve O’Dwyer may look like the Southern fraternity brother we had in the ’90′s who liked acid, weed, devil sticks, and Phish a liiiiiiiiiiitttttttttle too much, but fuckina he’s tearing up the poker circuit.

O’Dwyer, 31, defeated what many are calling one of the best naturally conceived final tables in modern poker history at the EPT Grand Final.

The line-up was ridiculous: Daniel Negreanu, Jason Mercier, Johnny Lodden, Jake Cody, Andrew Pantling (Matchbook.com exec), Noah Schwartz.

O’Dwyer conquered the field of 531, earning €1,224,000. He defeated the aforementioned Pantling (€842,000) heads-up for the title.

Daniel Negreanu finished fourth, earning €321,000. The cash puts Negreanu third all-time on the poker tournament career money list–or first all-time if you knock-out the OneDrop event.

Back to O’Dwyer, check out his year-by-year stats here. It’s like he visited Adrian Peterson’s doctor and went on poker PEDs in 2011.

Get full EPT Grand Final results here.

* Photo Credit PokerStarsBlog.

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Online Poker Is Legal Again: Ultimate Poker Deals Real Money Hand in Nevada


 

This image was not Photoshopped.

This image was not Photoshopped.

One small step for man, one giant leap for grinders…

Online poker has returned to the United States!

In Nevada!

On one site…

[With a few people on it right now.]

But hey, gotta start somewhere. And not bad for just two years and two weeks after Why’s-It-Gotta-Be-Black-Friday.

Just two months after Nevada legalized online poker, Ultimate Poker is up and running. You have to a white 21 or over Nevada resident to play.

Ultimate Poker is a majority-owned subsidiary of Station Casinos LLC, which is owned by the Fertitta Brothers, who also own the UFC. The company announced Antonio Esfandiari as its poker ambassador earlier this month.

Check out Ultimate Poker here.

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More Good News! SDNY Indicts Celeb Poker Players Involved In Russian Mob Backed Gambling Ring…Oh Wait…


Bolshevik! SDNY can stick glasnost up its задница!*

For fuck’s sake already.

Because poker hasn’t had enough black eyes the past few years, SDNY has decided to pile on more fun for everyone. On Tuesday, two years and a day after Why’s-It-Gotta-Be-Black-Friday, the Fed unsealed a 27-count indictment against a total of 34 people, including  Justin Smith, Abe Mosseri, Vadim Trincher, as well as Bill Edler and Peter ‘Nordberg’ Feldman.

Nordberg and Edler?! [shaking head]

The indictment charges them with operating an illegal sports betting and poker syndicate tied to Russian organized crime.

According to BLUFF:

The indictment alleges that the gambling syndicate operated under the protection of Alimzhan Tokhtakhounov, a powerful member of the Russian organized crime underworld who is already under indictment for his alleged involvement in bribing officials at the 2002 Winter Olympics. Tokhtakhounov is believed to be a “Vor” – the Eastern European equivalent of an Italian godfather.

Sooooooo…let’s just file this under “Bad for Poker” and move on.

Read more about it in F-Train’s BLUFF article (he crushes everyone else’s reporting on this) here.

Read the indictment in full here.

* Russian for “ass”

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Daniel Negreanu Wins 2013 WSOP Asia Pacific Main Event


'I just came in my pants.' 'Me too.'

‘I just came in my pants.’ ‘Me too.’

If dude’s in their upper 30′s still had wet dreams, WSOP commish Ty Stewart just blasted a massive load in his jammies.

In just over six months, the game’s two biggest names–Phil Hellmuth and Daniel Negreanu–have won the WSOP “expansion” Main Events.  Solid shot in the arm for those event’s credibility.

In related news if you haven’t figured it out yet, Daniel Negreanu dominated final table play on route to the inaugural WSOP Asia Pacific Main Event crown. This marks Negreanu’s fifth bracelet. For the win, he banked just over $1M AUD.

Sure to be discussed at length within the poker community is Negreanu’s involvement with the Choice Center for his recent surge. To that point, Negreanu credited the aforementioned Choice Center for a role in the victory, telling WSOP.com:

“I went to do these personal growth courses and the biggest thing I got out of that was confidence and self-trust. I trust myself and I trust myself to make the right decisions. Antonio [Esfandiari] also went to the same thing and he won a couple bracelets, made a couple of final tables, and came ninth here. I just graduated myself and I’ve come fourth and first. People can hate all they want. I’m not in a cult, they’re nuts, and I would never be in one. I went through a course, I’ve done the course, and I am so happy I did it.”

Australia’s Daniel Morton finished second for $637,911 AUD. Macau big game leader Winfred Yu came in third for $423,225 AUD. Benny Spindler, who held the chip leader at the start of final table play, flamed out in sixth for $146,205 AUD.

Get a full recap and results here.

Hear what Gavin Smith said about Choice on our podcast here.

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Daniel Negreanu Goes for WSOP Asia Pacific Main Event Title


Is it Negreau's time THIS time?

Is it Negreau’s time THIS time?

The final table is set for the inaugural WSOP Asia Pacific Main Event.

Among the big stacks is poker’s biggest name.

Daniel Negreanu enters final table play as the second big stack with 2,437,000. Negreanu missed out on bracelet #5 earlier in the week to Phil Ivey. He only trails Germany’s Benny Spindler, who is the big stack with 2,931,000.

Joining them at the final table is last year’s November Niner Russell Thomas with 490,000.

Also making the final table as short-stack is the man responsible for putting together some of Macau’s highest stake games, Winfred Yu, with 367,000.

Just bubbling the TV final table was Antonio Esfandiari. He banks $65,408 for his ninth place finish.

Somewhere, deep within the bowels of Choice Center, their cabalish leadership is going, “Wassup, bitches!”*

Follow the final table action starting at 12am ET on Monday here.

* Kidding kidding don’t exercise us from the poker community. 

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