Become a Lock Poker Pro at PokerNewsBoy.com

March 2nd, 2011 by | No Comments

For the second year in a row Bluff Magazine and Lock Poker are teaming up to offer one lucky player a chance to become the next Lock Poker sponsored pro, and this time around the promotion will be even bigger and better as one of the top online poker news sites and poker portals, PokerNewsBoy.com, has also signed on to be part of the promotion!

By signing up at Lock Poker through the PokerNewsBoy website or using the exclusive referral code PNB1200 you will be eligible for a massive 200% up to $1,200 deposit bonus, the maximum rakeback deal available at Lock Poker, as well as entry into the Bluff Pro Challenge.

The Bluff pro Challenge will run from April 1st to the April 30th with the player showing the most profit at the end of that time period getting the sponsorship deal of a lifetime! Not only will they be signed to a 2-year contract with Lock Poker, they will also be the recipient of a 6-month marketing campaign by Lock Poker, be featured on the cover of Bluff Magazine, as well as receiving a free entry into the $10,000 WSOP Main Event.

Players can participate in wither tournaments, sit and go’s, or cash games, with the minimum weekly play required being 250 SNGs/MTTs or 2000 raked hands.

As Lock Poker cardroom manager Eric Lynch put it in a recent press release: “One month, one goal, whoever makes the most money wins. I’m looking forward to finding out who emerges from the challenge and getting to know the next big thing in poker!”

NAPT in Los Angeles

January 31st, 2011 by | No Comments

PokerStars has announced the first three stops of the North American Poker Tour’s second season. The first event on the NAPT tour was the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure that just wrapped last week.

The next two stops will mirror the stops last year on the NAPT. They include Los Angeles, where the $5,000 Main Event will take place at the Bicycle Casino from March 5 to 10. This event will feature a full festival format; parts of the tournament – including the Main Event – will be televised at a later date on ESPN2.

From April 9 to 13, players will descend on the popular Mohegan Sun in Connecticut for the $5,000 Main Event. This event will also feature a full festival format and the Main Event will also be videotaped for future broadcast.

For her part, Kelley O’Hara, director of marketing at the Bicycle Casino, said players are excited about the upcoming event.

“This year’s NAPT LA is eagerly anticipated by the players and the Bike is going all out to make this a memorable tour stop. The 9-day NAPT event will take center stage in our March poker festival, which kicks off Feb. 25,” O’Hara said. “Players will find a game or tournament of their choosing, every day, every night.”

2011 WSOP Schedule Released

January 29th, 2011 by | No Comments

The World Series of Poker announced its 2o11 schedule this week.

The 42nd running of the biggest poker tournament in the world will begin May 31 and end July 19. As it has in recent years, the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas will host the thousands of poker players who come from all over the world for a chance to win one of the many tournaments held during the weeks-long event.

The event wraps with the always anticipated final table, which last year awarded several million dollars to the big winner.

The first bracelet event of the tournament will also be a new event. The $25,000 Heads-Up No Limit Hold’em Championship will be open to a maximum of 256 players and will begin at 5 p.m. on May 31.

“Something for everyone is the best way to describe the 2011 World Series of Poker schedule,” said WSOP Tournament Director Jack Effel in a press release. “It’s staggering to think that last year alone the WSOP hosted nine of the 17 largest tournaments in poker history … We can’t wait to get at it again and offer players at all levels the best poker action on the planet.”

Players can pre-register for WSOP events on-site at the Rio in Las Vegas or online through www.WSOP.com beginning Feb. 7.

Aside from registering, interested poker players can play in satellites at their favorite sites to win seats to various WSOP tournaments, and can visit www.WSOP.com for more information and for other schedule and registration information.

PokerStars Eastern Europe Tour

January 28th, 2011 by | No Comments

PokerStars has announced plans to launch a live poker tour in Eastern Europe this year.

The Eureka Poker Tour kicks off in March. It offers affordable buy-ins to players who live in Eastern Europe as well as those players from around the world who qualify through online tournaments.

The inaugural tournament will begin at the Card Casino in Prague beginning March 16. This first tournament will be the first glance that players will have at the affordable buy-ins. While buy-ins on the European Poker Tour generally run around €5,000, the buy-ins on this tour will be as low as €800 for main event buy-ins.

Other stops on this inaugural season include Slovenia from May 11 to 15, Bulgaria from June 22 to 26, Croatia from Sept. 7 to 11, and Romania, dates yet to be determined.

“The Italian Poker Tour went to Nova Gorica (in Slovenia) and there were a lot of Italian players, but a lot of local players as well, and a lot of players from Croatia and Romania,” said Team PokerStars pro Luca Pagano. “That means that those countries are becoming natural markets and that is why PokerStars decided to create a poker tour for those countries.”

As always PokerStars is offering online satellites for players interested in playing at any of the Eureka Poker Tour stops.

Play Aces VIP Poker Program

January 24th, 2011 by | No Comments

Players who haven’t yet done so should check out the VIP program at Sportsbook poker. The Play Aces VIP program is ideal for the casual player or the wannabe pro and is designed specifically to reward all players who enjoy Sportsbook’s poker play.

There are a number of special benefits that VIP members at Play Aces get.

The newest addition to the online poker room program is the feature that allows VIP points to be exchanged for cash. Unlike many VIP programs, the program at Play Aces lets you turn your hard-earned VIP points into cash. If you reach the green tier in the program, you can begin to cash out your VIP points. Each 1,000 VIP points can be cashed out for $10.

Although that might be enough incentive for many players, Play Aces is ramping up the opportunities to earn points. Each week, the site is offering private tournaments for each tier of VIP members that feature free buy-ins and big prize pools. Players can only play in their listed tier. For example, green tier members can play in the $100 per week freeroll, and gold tier players can play in the $1,000 a week freeroll (though there are a total of five tiers).

Players might not want to cash out their VIP points; those players can use VIP points to buy into guaranteed tournaments.

Interested in the Play Aces VIP program? Visit the site at www.sportsbook.com/playaces.

New Poker League Headed by Annie Duke

January 21st, 2011 by | No Comments

A new poker league was announced this week that many believe might eventually rival something like the PGA. Federated Sports and Gaming announced an alliance with the Palms Casino Resort in Las Vegas to showcase a new professional poker league in 2011.

Professional poker player Annie Duke will act as commissioner of the league.

“A unified league is something we have been talking about in the industry for years and I’m really looking forward to bringing this vision to life,” Duke said in a press release.

The new poker league will be comprised of the top 200 players in the world. Events will be rake-free for poker professionals and will feature generous prize pool overlays. The league will have a complicated and proprietary ranking system that will be based on a mathematics-driven formula that determines eligibility based on proven historic achievements.

The system will ultimately rank the top professional poker players with guidelines that are very similar to those governing professional tennis and professional golf.

Federated Sports and Gaming (FS+G) was formed in 2010 by a number of digital media, gaming and sports industry leaders. They include Jeffrey Pollack, the former president and commissioner of the World Series of Poker, and the former heads of Ubet.com: Michael Brodsky, David Goldberg and Jeffrey Grosman.

Duke and the team are partnered to create the league as well as a series of televised events that will spotlight the game’s top stars.

The poker league will commence later this year with three initial tournaments, held from August to December. A fourth event and championship tournament will take place in January 2012.

PCA final table

January 20th, 2011 by | No Comments

When play resumes at the final table of the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure Main Event on Saturday, online poker pro Chris “Gettin Daize” Oliver will sit down with a substantial chip lead.

Oliver controls 40 percent of the chips in play. Unlike most poker tourneys, where players can lead one minute and find themselves with few chips the next, Oliver has led from the start of the $10,000 buy-in Main Event. He’s looking toward the top prize of $2.3 million.

Oliver was formerly a No. 1 player in the PocketFives.com online poker rankings. He also owns several titles, including wins in the PokerStars Sunday 500 (in which he won $87,000); he also won $83,000 in the Full Tilt Poker $1K Monday last June and $44,000 in the UB.com $200,000 Guaranteed event.

Oliver has told PokerStars officials that if takes the big prize at the PCA, he will buy a house with his winnings.

Following are the eight players who make up the final table and their chip stacks:

1. Oliver at 19,670,000
2. Galen “GasparLeMarc” Hall at 6,430,000
3. Sam “KingKobeMVP” Stein at 5,855,000
4. Mike “SowersUNCC” Sowers at 3,685,000
5. Anton Ionel at 3,520,000
6. Max “$Kill Game” Weinberg at 3,350,000
7. Bolivar “Ramux” Palacios at 2,445,000
8. Philippe Plouffe at 1,555,000

Each player is guaranteed a more than $200,000 cash prize. When play resumes, it will be broadcast live on ESPN3.com and ESPN2.

Full Tilt Multi-Entry Tournaments

January 18th, 2011 by | No Comments

Full Tilt Poker, often at the forefront of changing online poker sites technology, has recently introduced multi-entry tournaments to their tournament schedule.

According to the statement released Tuesday, players who enter multi-entry tournaments at the site will never have two of their entries at the same table. When a final table begins, any player who still has two entries remaining will see their stacks merged into one.

How many tournaments a player can enter is dependent on the tournament buy-in; players can track each entry they have in the tournament lobby or via the tournament “info” button, which is available at each table.

Full Tilt also recently introduced Rush Poker, Matrix Sit-n-Go’s and Cashout tournaments.

The end result is a higher quality and more exciting experience for players. Whether players visit casually or play regularly and in big dollar tournaments, there’s now truly something for everyone.

New players to Full Tilt can take advantage of the site’s new player bonus which matches a first deposit up to $600. New players can also take advantage of the new player $100K freeroll, which they are eligible for after they make that first deposit.

Negreanu Top Money Earner Passes Phil Ivey

January 14th, 2011 by | No Comments

Phil Ivey was removed from his position as the all-time live tournament money earner after he lost the $100,000 Super High Roller event at the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure this weekend.

The new money leader? Team PokerStars pro Daniel Negreanu, who came in second at the $100,000 high roller event.

The two players have both been at the top of the list at different times, but Ivey has been the top money earner for a bit now. Negreanu began to chase his heels, first when he scored a six-figure reward at the Vienna stop on the European Poker Tour and then with his $1 million win at the Super High Roller Event Saturday.

“Eugene Katchalove is one of the best players in the world, hands down, so losing to him in such a prestigious event is nothing to be embarrassed about; I fought really hard but the cards didn’t go my way,” Negreanu said after play ended in the High Roller Event. “The million bucks doesn’t suck, and I’m proud of the fact that the finish allowed me to retake Phil Ivey as the No. 1 all-time money winner in tournament poker history. I hope and expect to battle Ivey for that distinction for the next 20 years or so.”

The Super High Roller Event kicked off the 11-day poker festival at the Atlantis Resort in the Bahamas. It had the highest buy-in ever for a PokerStars tournament and drew a field of 38 players. That marks the biggest turnout ever for a $100K event as the online poker site continues to push poker’s boundaries.

Online Poker Home Games

January 13th, 2011 by Deb | No Comments

PokerStars is announcing a new addition to its vast lineup of games and offerings – Online Home Games.

The site’s new addition is a response to the reality that while many people enjoy playing home games with friends and family, people are also often spread apart because of business or living arrangements. Or, the host might not have the proper facility to host a party.

The new Home Games allows players to set up private ‘Poker Clubs’ and play directly with friends and family in these online poker rooms. They can play in ring games and tournaments at whatever stakes they want.

According to PokerStars (www.pokerstars.com), the new software is the biggest release of its kind from the site since it was launched in 2001.

“Nothing like PokerStars Home Games has been offered online before and it’s so easy to use,” said PokerStars Pro Daniel Negreanu. “My favorite aspect of Home Games is the fact that you can create your own Club and customize it any way you want, just like you would in a home game with friends… I love playing mixed games, and the software allows you to choose from a wide variety of games to add to your Club. The Leaderboard is also something I love. I’m a stats geek at heart.”

To celebrate the new offering, PokerStars is giving a group of up to 8 people a chance to win a trip to one of our locations.

The winner of the prize package can choose from Macau, Vancouver, Hingerglemm and Buenos Aires. The package includes a hosted game and night out with Negreanu, Jonathan Duhamel and a PokerStars pro of the winner’s choice.

Visit http://www.pokerstars.com/poker/home-games/ for more information on PokerStars Home Games.