PokerStars Sunday Million Final Table
I was watching the final table of PokerStars Sunday Million take two with a $10 Million guaranteed and was reminded of all of the great times that we, as United States poker players, had playing on large field online tournaments. This Sunday Million attracted 56,310 entries with a total prize pool of $11,262,000. The final two tables took less than three hours to play down to a winner. The final table action started with a cooler with AA getting it is against the eventual winner Daenarys T with QQ. A Queen on the flop and the pocket aces could not find an Ace or runner runner flush and finished with a nice $63,229 payday on a $215 entry.
The action did not stop as player Noobanx kept the aggression up throughout the remainder of their final table eventually going out in third place for $505,818.08. Noobanx’s final hand was a out of position shove into ThEcLaiMEer on with a four card straight and possible flush on board. ThEcLaiMEer called with a turned straight and eliminated Noobanx. The final hand of the tournament was ThEcLaiMer calling down with a pair of tens against Daenarys T pair of aces.
The overall play of the final table was remarkable not only for the speed of play, the aggressive lines taken but more for the remembrance of the start of online poker. Where else can you enter a tournament for $215 and within two days time one player will end of with a little over $1 million for first place. My poker journey began on PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker. Discovering the joys of the Big $11 was my nightly routine. I was fortunate to final table the Big $11 a number of times and managed to finish 3rd once and 5th and 6th a number of times. Twelve to thirteen hours to turn $11 into $4.6k was a remarkable journey. Sadly, the United States government took away that joy by banishing regulated online poker. Watching the final table tonight took me back to the style of play prior to Black Friday. The incredible aggression without regard to ICM was common place because the game theory for large field multi table tournaments was not fully developed. This was the style of play on the final table with a $1,000,000 first prize.
United States Online Poker Community
The poker community in the United States is being deprived from playing a game that we love from the comfort of our home based upon poor legislation and government over-reach. The reality that it is perfectly legal to play this game in our local casino just rubs salt in the wound. Our community welcomes regulation, oversight and even paying taxes on our winnings for the ability to play in the worldwide player pool. It is perfectly legal to play in a countrywide player pool for a state sponsored lottery but we cannot play a game with known odds, relatively fair rake (a discussion and debate for another time), and the ability to learn and study to improve our game. The inability to have a United States government, by either political party, enact fair legislation that will allow United States players into the worldwide player pools on sites such as PokerStars, PartyPoker, 888Poker and others is beyond comprehension.
The upcoming WSOP in Las Vegas is the largest live tournament series anywhere in the world but the only way that these large scale fields of 50,000 plus players can only take place online. This was a great stroll down memory lane when registering the Big $11 which was what I looked forward to after a long day of work. I know a number other United States players have similar memories and others where accomplished enough to leave the United States and continue their poker career pursuits. For those of you who can play on PokerStars, take advantage of the situation, keep studying, continue to register for cash, tournaments or sit-n-gos and play for those of us who cannot.
Americas Cardroom is the largest online poker room available to those of us in the United States and it does have a variety of tournaments but much shallower fields. On PokerStars if you bust a tournament there is another tournament with a similar buy-in available to register. Americas Cardroom is what we in the United States have now to scratch the online poker itch but the player pool on ACR has to increase tremendously to be able to support the number and variety of tournaments that are found on PokerStars.
Thank you PokerStars for a great $10milly guaranteed Take Two and for this stroll down memory lane. Join the Poker Player Alliance and hopefully through it and through the lobby of the large online poker platforms, we, the United States poker players, can join the worldwide player pool and be represented once again in the Sunday Million.
Take a few minutes and remember why you began playing this great game of poker and contact your government representative and join the Poker Players Alliance. Involvement is the only way that we can have access to all of the online poker platforms. Good luck and find a poker game near you.