The $25,000 PokerStars NL Hold'em Players Championship at the 2019 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure has attracted a field of 1,039 to create a total prize pool of $26,455,500, including the $1,000,000 that's added to the first-place prize of $5,100,000.
The list with the biggest events in the world, looking at the total prize pool, is dominated by the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas. 2006's Main Event, won by Jamie Gold for $12,000,000, stands out as the biggest of them all with a total prize pool of $82,512,162 ponied up by 8,773 players.
The €1,000,000 buy-in The Big One for One Drop in 2016 comes next, followed by this PSPC. Here's the Top 25:
The Biggest Events in the History of the Game Looking at the Total Prize Pool
Ramin Hajiyev raised to 6,000 on the button and Elio Fox defended from the big blind. The flop came and Fox checked to Hajiyev who continued for 5,000. Fox check-raised to 17,500 and Hajiyev responded with a three-bet to 50,000. Fox deliberated his option and then moved all in for 176,500. Hajiyev asked for a count and then called to put Fox at risk.
Ramin Hajiyev:
Elio Fox:
"You gotta be bluffing sometimes," Fox said before the remaining cards came out. The turn was the which took away three of Fox's outs and the on the river completed the board. Hajiyev held on to send Fox to the rail and climb near the top of the leaderboard.
Poker and MMA go hand-in-hand, both requiring discipline, competitive drive, precision and discretion. On top of that, the two realms overlap a good deal in terms of demographics, a major reason for the recently announced partnership between PokerStars and the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC®).
One person heavily involved in both of these worlds is Bruce Buffer, the veteran voice of the world-famous UFC Octagon. Aware of Buffer’s robust history as a poker player and in light of their recent sponsorship deal, PokerStars invited Buffer to play in the $25K PSPC on a Platinum Pass freeroll.
Buffer obliged and came out to the Bahamas to announce the kick off of the biggest $25K in history, and also to take his shot in it.
UFC-Poker Connection
The renowned MMA cage announcer sat down with PokerNews’ [Removed:139] before the start of Day 2 and shared some of his thoughts on the UFC-PokerStars deal and the links between poker and MMA.
“I think it’s a brilliant move and a brilliant partnership for many reasons. The demographic with the UFC with the 18 to 34 crowd which are big in the poker world, they’ll be more embedded into this. We just signed a big deal with ESPN so we’re going to be on more TV sets and more eyeballs than ever, so the timing is perfect.”
As a longtime poker player in the Los Angeles and Las Vegas areas, Buffer is atuned to the parallels between the worlds he fluctuates between.
“There are a lot of mental similarities between fighting and poker: when to be offensive, when to be defensive, when to go in for the knockout - which means you’re either going to get knocked out or you’re going to knock out your opponent, whether it’s for the chips on the table or you knock ‘em out in the Octagon.
“In business and in life, poker is a parable to many things,” he continued. “I truly believe that and I’ve been a very passionate lover and player of poker for many years.”
For someone as passionate about poker as Buffer is, the chance to play in the PSPC was an exciting one.
Finished Day #1 with 71,100 chips & the average chip count for remaining players is 80.477. 1,015 started & 754 l… https://t.co/NmdHvKu0h3
— Bruce Buffer (@brucebuffer)
Though he got through Day 1 with a healthy stack, he wasn’t as fortunate here on Day 2 as he busted in the third level of the day. You can watch the interview with Buffer from just before the start of Day 2 below:
Before he was eliminated from the PokerStars Players Championship, Platinum Pass winner Tyson Apostol spoke with [Removed:139] about making his way through the #TestingTyson challenge and coming out to the Bahamas for the PSPC.
After a raise to 6,000 from early position, Martin Jacobson three-bet to 19,000 on the button. Jake Cody was in the big blind and announced all-in for 155,000. The initial raiser quickly folded and Jacobson called just as quickly.
Martin Jacobson:
Jake Cody:
Jacobson held a massive preflop lead and the flop of only improved his outs. The on the turn gave Cody a straight draw but the on the river bricked off as the majority of Cody's chips were sent across the table.
Chess Draw. A game combining chess and poker won Warren Sheaves a Platinum Pass to this year's PokerStars Players Championship. Sheaves spoke with [Removed:139] about the game he came up with.
After a series of preflop raises, Upeshka De Silva was all in for just under 100,000. The action was on Jacqueline Burkhart who made the call to put De Silva at risk.
Upeshka De Silva:
Jacqueline Burkhart:
The flop of left De Silva in the lead with his pair of aces. Burkhart was looking to spike a ten but the and the missed her, allowing De Silva to double up.
Yiannis Liperis opened for 10,000 in the cutoff and Linda Johnson jammed in the small blind for 114,500. Liperis took some time before dropping in a stack of chips to call.
"Not much," Johnson said, showing .
She was in trouble against . She found an ace on the flop but left her all but dead. The confirmed her demise on the turn.
Marvin Rettenmaier opened to 12,500 from middle position and Jaime Staples pushed all in for his last 100,000 from the big blind. Rettenmaier asked for a count and then made the call to put Staples at risk.
Marvin Rettenmaier:
Jaime Staples:
Staples was in a great position to double up, hoping to avoid an ace. However, the flop of was detrimental, leaving Staples with just one out to stay alive. The turn and river were of no help as the PokerStars Pro headed for the exit.
Day 2 of the record-breaking $25,000 PokerStars NL Hold'em Players Championship as part of the 2019 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure has come to an end with just 207 players still in contention. Even before the cards got into the air at noon, the field had reached four-figures and another 26 hopefuls jumped in.
That created a field of 1,039 entries and monster prize pool of $26,455,500, making it one of the biggest events ever. The top 181 spots will take home a portion of that and a Bahamian flag for their Hendon Mob profiles. The winner can look forward to a life-changing payday of $5.1 million, which includes $1 million added by PokerStars. While the money spots were not reached throughout the eight 60-minute levels on Day 2, the bubble won't be far off when the action resumes for Day 3.
Leading the survivors into Day 3 will be Farid Jattin with 921,000. The high roller regular from Colombia edged past a trio of familiar faces in the final level of the night with Mustapha Kanit (888,000), Griffin Benger (885,000) and Julien Martini (832,000) hot on his heels. Jattin is certainly no unknown at the international poker tables — the regular on the European Poker Tour and Latin American Poker Tour has already racked up nearly $3 million in live cashes.
Martini continually increased his stack throughout the day and sent 2005 EPT Copenhagen champion Noah Boeken to the rail when flopping top two pair with eight-nine suited against the bottom pair and nut flush draw of the Dutchman. Kanit spent most of his day on the secondary feature table and Benger built up his stack without showdown in the final level of the night when taking on Sven McDermott twice.
Among the players that made the most of their late entry before the start of Day 2 were Brandon Adams and Ramin Hajiyev. Especially Hajiyev got involved in many big pots, making waves early on and ascending to the top mid-way through the day when he called the shove of Fox with ace-jack for flopped top pair and held against a king-high flush draw. Adams advanced to Day 3 with very respectable 731,000 and Hajiyev follows not far behind with 720,000.
Several Platinum Pass winners also bagged and tagged for the night, and Frenchman Alexandre De Zutter tops them all with 700,000. In the last break of the night, De Zutter had far less than that with just 250,000 and ran hot in the final two hours of the night. He admitted that he got lucky in one particular hand where he went runner-runner to beat a flopped nut flush with a full house before dropping a few chips at the very end of the day.
Other big stacks and notables include Athanasios Polychonopoulos (797,000), Martins Adeniya (748,000), start-of-the-day chip leader Talal Shakerchi (691,000), Ryan Olisar (650,000), Patrick "Iregption" Tardif (633,000), Kristen Bicknell (631,000), Dan O'Brien (622,000), Christoph Vogelsang (483,000) and Ryan Riess (354,000) to name just a few. Two players will represent the red spade on the third day in Benjamin Spragg (118,000) and Celina Lin (12,000).
With more than 700 players returning to their seats in the ballroom of the Atlantis Resort, many hopes were crushed and big names fell along the way. Phil Hellmuth lost a race with pocket tens against the ace-queen of John Andress on the feature table and defending PCA Main Event champion Maria Lampropulos was coolered with the flopped second nuts against the nut straight of Theo Da Cruz Lima.
Team PokerStars suffered heavy losses on Day 2, as Lex Veldhuis and Kevin Martin were ousted in the first level of the day, Team Pro Jen Shahade and Team Online's Randy Lew followed soon after. Aditya Agarwal, Fatima Moreira de Melo, Chris Moneymaker, Jake Cody and Jason Somerville all bowed out before bagging and tagging. The dream of Jaime Staples to make a deep run ended in the final level of the night when his pocket jacks were outflopped by Marvin Rettenmaier's ace-jack.
By then, popular Platinum Pass winners Joey Ingram, Kevin "Kevmath" Mathers, Linda Johnson and other big names such as Justin Bonomo, Stephen Chidwick, Mike Watson, UFC's Bruce Buffer, Alex Foxen, Jason and Natasha Mercier were just a few victims of the fast-paced action of the day.
The $25,000 PokerStars NL Hold'em Players Championship will continue with Day 3 on Tuesday at noon local time with blinds of 4,000/8,000 and a big blind ante of 8,000. The money bubble is expected to burst in the first few levels of the day and once the money has been reached, the 30-second clock comes into play.
As usual, the PokerNews live reporting team will be on the floor to provide all you need to know about one of the biggest poker events to date.