Donnie and Rich discussed the big winners from the 2015 WSOP Main Event on last week's podcast, but neglected to mention the biggest winner, the U.S. Government. They break down some of the massive tax payments the IRS will receive from the November Niners, and discuss the online gaming bill moving swiftly through the Pennsylvania State Legislature.
Frank Foti, the man in charge of poker room operations will make sure 2016 is a year full of valuable promotions for players in this first-class poker room.
January is full speed ahead with seven different promos. High Hand promo is on for every Monday and every Wednesday. Twenty Five Hands of Poker, where players receive between $200 and $100 for making certain hands will be offered on every Tuesday.
The Syracuse Crunch Knockout tournament will take place Wednesday, Jan. 6. The $50,000 guarantee Winter Poker Meltdown tournament will be offered Jan. 7-10. The Winter Poker Meltdown Weekend $10,000 Cash Giveaway is slated for Jan. 9 and 10. There is a $7,500 Cash Giveaway on Monday Jan. 18. And rounding out the month there will be a $10,000 Cash Giveaway on Saturday Jan. 23.
You can stay and play at Turning Stone Resort Casino. This is an expansive resort with plenty of nightclubs, great restaurants, a full scale spa, an entire floor of gym space, well known entertainers, and a sports complex.
Eric updates the Player of the Year races from around the world, and the two dive into the global POY race, the GPI top 300, and a very friendly (and relevant) face in the Andy FrankenDanger Zone.
Rich and Donnie discuss Wednesday’s RAWA hearing and the latest PokerStars press release, and Daniel Weinman joins the program to talk about his first big win, OFC with Michael Jordan and John Smoltz, and more.
There was a time when people believed poker belonged to America. When they said "America" they discounted everything but the "United States of..."
To be fair, the USA is where poker rose to popularity, but these days the game belongs to the world. Still, PokerStars saw fit to hold a competition to see which country in the Americas--that's North, South, and everything in between--could claim poker as their own.
Tonight, that honor goes to Brazil.
PokerStars took its newest creation, the Americas Cup of Poker, about as far south as it could. Bariloche, Argentina played home to the competition over the last few days. The semi-finals saw the final four teams head into competition to fight for the $100,000 first prize.
In the first matchup, Team Canada faced Team Argentina in a series of six heads-up matches. The result? A tie. To determine a winner, the two team captains faced off in a two-hour marathon that ended in spectacular fashion.
Argentina's Leo Fernandez raised from the small blind to 1,100 and Canada's Darus Suharto re-raised to 2,700. Fernandez tanked for a moment before pushing the rest of his chips into the middle.
Fernandez: [As][4s]
Suharto: [Qd][Qh]
The flop ran out [Th][6d][9s]. Suharto remained in the lead, and looked good for the win after the [2d] fell on the turn. Then...the river...the [Ac]. The ballroom exploded and Argentina moved on to the finals.
The fight between Costa Rica and Brazil went much the same way. The heads-up matches ended in a tie and forced team captains Humberto Brenes and Alex Gomes to battle head to head. That match ended after an hour when Gomes made two pair to Brenes' turned top pair.
It was as if fate willed the match up. Saturday will see the two rival countries Brazil and Argentina face off on the pitch. The Americas Cup of Poker would see the same battle.
It would end in fairly unspectacular fashion, however. In the end, Argentina's Leo Fernandez couldn't make ace-nine hold up against Brazil's K-8 and Brazil walked away with the the Americas Cup title.
Congrats to our friends from Brazil on once again proving their place in the poker world.
Two new 2' x 2' LED Retrofit models expand Litetronics innovative patented system to easily convert conventional 2'x 2' T8 or T12 U-shape fluorescent ceiling troffers to much more energy-efficient linear LEDs. Result is an inexpensive, energy efficient, ultra long-life, maintenance-free interior lighting system for a wide variety of commercial, industrial and institutional end users. In each case, the 2' x 2' LED Retrofits economically reuse a facility’s existing ceiling troffers.
Design: Litetronics in-house design and engineering team.
Manufacturer: Litetronics International, a U.S. company supplying state-of-the-art lamps and lighting products to commercial markets for more than 40 years.
Product Applications: Litetronics two new 2'x 2' LED Retrofits provide superior energy savings and operating life compared to linear fluorescents. They each provide evenly distributed, flicker-free luminous white-light output sought for professional specification and installation in today’s office and other commercial buildings, retail stores, manufacturing plants, medical facilities, schools and warehouses.
Product Description: Litetronics 2'x 2' Two-Lamp LED Retrofit replaces typical U-shape linear fluorescent T8 lamp systems, consumes only 22 watts while producing 2300 lumens with a CRI of 83. Its rated operating life of 85,000 hours per Litetronics unit, lets facility owners and operators enjoy 50% energy savings or more compared to T8 or T12 U-shape linear fluorescents, throughout years of use. Litetronics 2'x 2' Two-Lamp LED Retrofit is available in 3500, 4000 and 5000K, is UL listed, DLC recognized and backed by a 7-year factory warranty.
The 2'x 2' Four-Lamp LED Retrofit replaces two 1-5/8" U-shape fluorescent lamps, consumes 52 total watts while producing 5380 lumens with a CRI of 83. Its rated operating life of 85,000 hours per Litetronics® unit, lets facility owners and operators enjoy 50% energy savings or more compared to T8 or T12 U-shape linear fluorescents, throughout years of use. Litetronics 2'x 2' Four-Lamp LED Retrofit is available in 3500, 4000 and 5000K, is UL listed, DLC recognized and backed by a 7-year factory warranty.
Installation of both the new 2'x 2' Two-Lamp LED Retrofit and 2'x 2' Four-Lamp LED Retrofit is swift (three minutes typical retrofit, start to finish) and easy. It greatly reduces labor cost of complete fixture replacements or other LED retrofit kits. After removing lamps, ballast cover and ballast, each of the new 2'x 2' LED Retrofits literally pop securely into the existing troffer housing. They are securely held in place with Litetronics® patented “rare-earth” magnetized system, allowing a hands-free completion of installation and connection.
Litetronics 2'x 2' LED Retrofits take the guesswork out of fluorescent troffer retrofitting for professional lighting specifiers, lighting distributors and contractors alike. These 2'x 2' LED Retrofits are completely autonomous one-piece units, suited for 120v to 277v systems. They avoid all time and costs of removing and recycling perfectly good ceiling fluorescent-troffer housings.
There is a place at the end of the world, where snow falls in August, where the women can fell governments, and red meat is eaten with such fervor that the idea of a boneless, skinless chicken breast is, at best, quaint. Patagonia, this mythical sounding place in southwest of Argentina, will soon be home for a battle of the ages. There, in the land of beef and summer snow, the Americas will decide which country is deserving of the Americas Cup.
Today, countries from all over the Americas started fighting for their rightful spot at the final fight in Argentina. The Americas Cup is going to put online qualifiers together with Team PokerStars Pro for a live poker event like you've never seen before. On the line is national pride for 13 different countries and no small amount of money...$250,000 to be exact.
As if that wasn't enough, people who make it to the live final get a chance to take one heckuva a ski vacation at the end of August and beginning of September. Seriously...there aren't a lot of things that you're going to do in the next two months you're going to enjoy more.
Qualifiers are running now on PokerStars. If you'd like to see all the rules, see how you can get on a team, and see how the Americas Cup works, we suggest you head on over to the PokerStars Americas Cup home page.
In the meantime, we're going to be fantasizing about a juicy steak and fresh powder.
Photo by Luca Galuzzi
Infamous high-stakes poker player Dan Bilzerian is in a new movie with Bruce Willis. The film, called Extraction, is a shoot-em-up style movie about an effort to save a CIA operative.
In addition to Willis, Gina Carano, Kellan Lutz and D.B. Sweeney also star in the movie, which hit theaters nationwide on Dec. 18. Reviews of the film have been lackluster.
The movie is Bilzerian’s first film appearance since 2014’s The Equalizer. The Instagram star has appeared in five movies now as an actor, according to IMBD.
Extraction currently has a 4/10 rating on the site and a stunning 0% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The R-rated thriller is just one hour and 23 minutes long.
One review on Rotten Tomatoes said: “Extraction is an exhaustively paint-by-numbers affair, and nobody is more bored with it than Willis.” Another review, from Liz Braun of the Toronto Sun said: “It’s a rare movie that can’t be saved by Bruce Willis single-handedly killing all the bad guys. And yet, here it is: Extraction.”
A critic from The Globe and Mail remarked: “Extraction? I’d rather have my teeth pulled by diseased, evil monkeys.”
Bang. Bang. Bang.
Just like that we've already lost half of the six final tablists in the first two hours here.
It was poker legend Erik Seidel who would hit the rail first this afternoon. Seidel shoved all in three hands in a row, and while the first two got through, the third saw him behind and at risk of elimination when Anton Astapau called from the big blind with a dominant hand.
Astapau: [ac][td]
Seidel: [ad][7s]
Seidel was dead by the turn on the [kc][8h][4d][th][tc] run out and would head to the cashier to collect HK$1,696,000 (~$219,000).
And following Seidel out the door was Belarusian Anton Astapau. His final hand saw Astapau open to 200,000 before Andy Andrejevic popped it up to 575,000. Astapau came back over the top for his whole 2,800,000 and Andrejevic didn't hesitate to call.
Astapau: [qs][qd]
Andrejevic: [ah][kd]
They were flipping for the huge pot and Astapau jumped into the lead spiking top set on the [qh][jd][8d] flop. Andrejevic needed a ten for Broadway and received immediate service on the [tc] turn. Astapau was desperate for the board to pair but it wasn't to be as the [5h] completed the board to see him eliminated in fifth place.
Joining Seidel and Astapau on the rail was reigning champion Steve O'Dwyer. He was so close to going back to back but unfortunately for O'Dwyer he comes up three short today. The American had gotten short and moved in for his last 1,975,000 over an open from chip leader Andy Andrejevic. The latter called it off and players tabled their cards.
O'Dwyer: [kc][qs]
Andrejevic: [ac][th]
It was an interesting [kd][qc][jc] flop with Andrejevic flopping the nuts and O'Dwyer chasing four outs to a full house. The [5c] turn and the [8h] river wouldn't cooperate and O'Dwyer headed to the exit in fourth.
So now only three remain in the hunt. It's Andrejevic with the substantial chip lead over Bryn Kenney and John Juanda. Here's how their stacks look.
ACOP Super High Roller Final Three Chip Counts
Andy Andrejevic - 13,000,000
Bryn Kenney - 6,385,000
John Juanda - 6,230,000
At the moment the players have just stepped away for a 10-minute respite. Play will recommence momentarily as we play down to an ACOP Super High Roller Champion!
Costa, who is from Portugal, dominated the tournament from the first to the last hand. He was the Day 1A chip leader, the Day 2 chip leader and only lost his lead for a few moments on the final table. And while you may not think that is unusual, consider that this was his first attempt at a live tournament!
After starting the heads-up behind Henrique Custódio, Costa managed to recover ground and win when, after three shoves, Custódio had [ah][7h] against Costa's [6d][6c]. The board held the young man's pocket pair and Custódio finished runner-up for €15,700.
Visit the PokerStars Portugal Poker Series site to learn more about the tour and how you can qualify.
