Recapping PGT Kickoff, Mixed Games, and SHRB Mixed Games

By the way, it's two ten pm. I got to point out the time as always two ten pm on Monday February sixteen, when I was playing poker over the weekend at Venetian there was a gentleman at my table from Europe and he said, in Europe, none of their tests that they have in school have multiple choice answers or possibilities on them, you know how like you go to a test it says what's his collar and it gives you a through D or whatever. And he said, you know, he said, it's just you either know the

answer or you don't. You write it in on the line, and that's that. And that makes a lot of sense to me. Again, it just goes back to just every one here is soft. I guess and we're having multiple choice and you know, the worst you can do if you just guess blindly as twenty five percent, which is kind of ridiculous, like know the answer or we don't know the answer. End of story.

which we have a bunch of questions from. We are not going to talk about the WSITV schedule, just putting that out there, and the reason is is because Tim and I it just dropped today, Yes, but Tim and I like to digest it, actually come with some coherent, somewhat coherent thoughts on it, and not just be shooting

from the hip. We do enough shooting on the hip, but for the very important topics such as the WSITV schedule that drops every single year, we're gonna We're gonna leave that to either the next episode or maybe the next episode after that, but we'll get to it. Digest our thoughts, come with some takes, all that sort of stuff. So that is that is coming, that is on the horizon. So if you're expecting that on this episode, sorry, you

just ain't getting it. As always, if you are listening, please leave a review, hit the favorite button, subscribe if that's what you can do on your podcast, catch or whatever it is. It does help us grow and it is very much appreciated. Shout out to everyone who did submit a question or just a suggestion as my dogs go nuts for the mailbag that's coming up at the end of the episode. If you guys ever want to drop us a line podcast at PokerGO dot com and we might read it on air.

If I just stop playing too much poker in my downtime and actually get around to doing something that my wife would like me to do, that would be great. Can't put the dogs outside, though, buddy, because coyotes in the area. Two small dogs that'd just be a recipe for disaster, so not doing that. I guess I could go full Daniel and the gronding style thing, but I'm just not rich enough to do something like that. So there's that.

and Nick air Ball. And then in the return of the National Heads of Poker Championship, we've got Jason Kuhne Live Buried, Doug pol Chris Moneymaker, Nick Wright, Richard Seymour, tj Lavin, Kevin Pollock, and a whole bunch more all among the field of sixty four. You can binge the entire full seasons of both, and you can do that on poker Go, And for those looking to save some cash, use the Promo Code podcast. When you become a poker gro annual subscriber, that'll save you twenty dollars off your

first year of a new annual plan. The discount isn't only available for new subscribers, it's also available for current subscribers if you have a monthly or a quarterly plan and you want to upgrade to an annual plan. So you can do that today. Head on over to PokerGO dot com join or upgrade and use the promo Code podcast and get in there and watch those two seasons. All right, let's get into actually some substance here instead of me just complaining about what I need to do

around the house and my dog's barking. PGT Kickoff Event number one, Andrew Lichtenberger won the event one hundred and sixty two thousand dollars, the same event he won a season ago. He asked right now after he won, if he was the first person to go back to back in the same event. That is not true, or he's not. Kristin Foxen did it. She did in the final event of the PGT Kickoff series. And I think it's only.

Moreno took home one hundred and sixty two thousand dollars. There, Taylor Parr one hundred and seventy four thousand dollars for winning the event number four e at number five, Michael Burke two hundred and sixty two thousand dollars. That's the biggest prize first place prize from this series. And then Aril Mantel and event number six one hundred and seventy one thousand dollars for him. He topped Clement Dang and denied

Clement Dang a second title. Three cashes were had by Andrew Lichtenberger, Dan Smith, Clemen Dang, Dan Maher, Patrick, Leonard, A. K. Pads and John Reordan and then after the series was all finished, Andrew Lichtenberger topped the PGT leaderboard of five hundred and thirty one points. What say you on the kickoff series?

you know, one hundred and five entrants. This year we went up to you know, one hundred and thirty five entrants, one hundred and fifty one entrance, one fifty nine one, like just absolutely kind of ginormous numbers.

whatever reason that may be. So yeah, look, we came into the year, the season talking about all the tax issues and you know what was that going to mean for poker or you know, we used that seminal data where we saw pretty steep decline in the twenty five k's, and you know what, maybe it's just the fact that like some of these guys are you you know, they're going to concentrate on that five K buying. You know, we always discuss that we think threes and fives are

just like the best price point here in America. And with the numbers that we had at kickoff, you know, you look in totally, we had one hundred and twenty eight unique players, which is, you know, one of our biggest kind of showings for a series. And you know, the five case they're just gonna they're just the beast. And we're going to do a few more of those this year. And obviously as the year kind of goes on, we'll see, we'll see how the rate of play kind

of evolves. Hearing from players, they're going to kind of take shots early and if things go south, they'll slow down. If things go well, they'll kind of keep playing, so we're going to make adjustments every series.

to seventy four players. No drop off there. We look at a twenty five K back in twenty twenty two, we had ninety three entrants drop down, a seventy four drop down to fifty twenty twenty five, was fifty six this year, twenty eight, and they they added a second one that didn't go.

of about a bit of an oversight there. The first twenty five K, you know, half the field drop off, fifty percent drop off in that and supposedly they had put in two players from They ran a promotion in the poker room where two players qualified, knowing that you would expect the numbers to be a bigger but then also having spoken to so many poker players, you know that played both our events and seminal, they had always they had always been weary of the twenty five k

and probably skipping those. So look, they've seen the data, the big drop off and the cancelation. Looks like, hey, that's not going to be on the schedule for the foreseeable future. As confirmed for the AFL event, the ten K has being strong. They also do a five K that normally has a two hundred or quarter million dollar guarantee that that just crushes nearly every year. Back in

twenty twenty two, one hundred and eighty two players. They took a year off twenty twenty four was one hundred, twenty twenty five was one point fifty three, and then this year was one seventeen. So you know, looking at those those data points, fives and tens seemed to still be strong, fives especially strong. And then obviously the thirty five hundred this year went up about five percent, so

that's good there. And you know, this stop is always a weird one, always kind of slightly overlaps the Borgata January event, so you're gonna split the player pool. And then this year they also had and not a new event, but maybe I guess you call it a return, they had a Biloxi main event that was also a bet MGM property. So three kind of pretty big no limit holder main events all running kind of simultaneously. Isn't great

for the industry. Now, you could argue that, hey, ones in Florida, ones in you know, Biloxi, ones in uh up in the up in the cold. It's it's completely different player pools, but you are just making you know, players pick and choose. It's a little difficult. I'd rather just have some more offset for these for these companies.

just pretty different locations. But when you're making players pick and choose, the players that Tim is talking about is the traveling player, right, You're making the traveling player pick and choose. Right, There's only a select few people like let's say Brock Wilson, for example, Who's going to hop on a plane and try and hit like every single

stop one after another. You know, there's just not a lot of those, so that you know, you might you guys that you know they travel just to Borgada and then back home, or they traveled just a seminole and then back home. So you're making those players pick and choose. So I think eventually, when I talk about this shift in the landscape, I think you're going to see a shift to these venues who are running these really big tournaments,

these really big series. Is like I think they're going to shift things to more of a regional and local focus and not so much as like we're putting on this big series to attract people from everywhere. I think it's going to be more dialed in or at least I mean partly is like that's what I would advise

these places to do. So, like you know, Seminal, for example, should focus on just that region like that really southeast region, draw people from like all the way up to like Atlanta, right and then listen, if you get traveling players and you get people to come in from Afar, great, you know, bonus. But I think you start catering really towards more that regional, local crowd, probably anywhere that's within like what in our flight two hour drive something like that, like that's your region.

Maybe a little bit more extended on the drive part, but still that's what I think you're targeting. So you know, when you have someone something like in January where you have that Biloxi event, you have the Borgata event, you have the Seminal event, all happening at once, Well, if they're all just trying to pull from regional pools, then

it's just a little bit more. It's a little it's less overlap between the player pools, so it's going to be more beneficial to those players, so you know, yeah, I also think that kind of the model that seems to be working in some places is like a big one K one K slash eleven hundred and then like a thirty five hundred main like those are your two

core products, and then you build around those. I would even say that you could take that thirty five hundred Maine up to a five K if you wanted, so then you have like a one K price point and a five K price point and then build all around that. And I think those just just tend to you know, kind of cater to a more regional, local crowd, of course, bolstered by you know, plenty of promotions and stuff like that getting people into these tournaments.

any way, shape or form. Like if you want to say I want to own the whole player pool everywhere, I want people coming in. In order to do that, you need to do something like let's say WPT does in December, right or I think WSP Paradise does a good job of it, although they're pulling more international. I

think WPT in December is pulling more from the US, right. So, but still like, you got to have big guarantees, big promotions, throw a lot of money behind it, a lot of resources behind it, and I just don't think you're going to be able to be given that sort of marketing and promotional firepower to be able to do such a thing.

So if I'm just coming into it with the assumption that I'm not going to be given the firepower I need to make it this big, big, big thing, then I think the shift is going to be to more regional. That's where I'm coming at my side of things.

Bloxi is that's an MGM property. They were running qualifiers, which is also kind of silly if you look at those two events, because you're running qualifiers on betmgm to either send people to Burgata or send them to Biloxi. Why are you not having those events at two different times and sending why why are you making people choose from the qualifiers? Like that's silly, But like if you're Seminoal it's it's a little bit more difficult.

points for things. I would build up the tour this year and next year, and then that twenty twenty seven stop you nouns the championship event. You know, you could probably line it up where it coincides with what's going on here in Vegas in end of November and December, you know, And I think you could take that approach to things like like that would be my kind of

big picture plan for Seminoles specifically. And then and then, like I said, with with you know, Borgata, you just have to lean on bet MGM.

out in the end. So yeah, a lot of people can can keep trying to contest with other people and whatnot. But I do think eventually, like someone like a seminole is going to be okay versus someone that's a little bit smaller might might die out in the long or just have to have lesser events because I think seminoles ultimately just too big of a powerhouse right now, you know. So so yeah, but I still think shifting to regional plus I just factor in I think everything kind of lags,

you know, this tax situation. I know, like right now we kind of think, like, oh, kickoff numbers were freaking booming, like what's everything seems to be fine, But I always just think things lack, you know, same with like the economy or people having less money to spend all that sort of stuff, Like it just kind of lacks, and eventually it'll catch up and everyone will kind of kind of, you know, be like freak out and be like, well, why did this happen now? Well, which is because everything

just kind of lags behind anything else. On PGT kickoff before we roll into mixed games.

I do love this series. It's just that I wonder if if it if we shake it up a little bit, I'm not really sure yet.

into is the best way to go about it. So I don't know, I don't think I would change anything the way it is. I'm also a big proponent of, you know, if it's not broke, don't fix it, and if it's only getting better, definitely don't fucking fix it. Like this got way better than last year. The only thing that you did is you added one more event as a single day event, And that doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of this because this tournament series

doesn't have a series title. It's just about the double points aspect to it all. So yeah, I think as long as this series, if we continue to see numbers increase like they are, if we continue to get more unique players, which I think is the most important point from this series, you know, trying to get people into the pgt ecosystem, hopefully they have a great experience, they love playing in the studio, they get some points, and then they continue to play the whole series. Like that's

the goal with this series. So as long as those things are being achieved, I mean, just just keep running it back, you know, because it's a lot of fun, all right. Let's move on to PGT Mixed Games. Speaking of a fun series, this one's always the most fun, you know. I think that part of me says mixed game players get a bad rap, and I would say deservedly so, you know, because a lot of them are just absolute chromade with everything constant complaining, whining and crying

like the whole thing. Right, But the ones inside the studio I think are pretty fun and entertaining, and even the few curmudgeons that we have are still wildly entertaining in the grand scheme of things. Seven events as part of this year's Mixed Games series. This this did have a series title winner, and that was Yuri Zebeleski aka Yuri Nerd Guy or Yuri Martins has multiple names that he goes by the brazil By.

Championship event. So Yuri Zevelevski is the PGT Mixed Games Series champion and a very fitting champion. I don't think there's any debate here in terms of who is the best performer from the series, but I do want to give some honorable mention to the man who finished in second place, King Hi Pan aka Jackpan, who also had three cashes, also three top three finishes, but his were first, second, and third. So it's just absolutely wild how all these

guys were battling to the end. But Yury Zeveleski does come out on top here. Just running through the event winners. Event number one, Chino Reem comes out on top for one hundred and twelve thousand dollars. He did make a deal with Dylan Lindy in heads up play, and right out of the gate, I was like, here we go. Chino reim third PGT series title, Like here we go again. Justin Liberto won Event number two. Great to see Justin Liberto in the mix for more PGT events. He did

play some kick off events. He played the entire mixed game series, so that's good to have him in there. Ryan Hoenig his first time at the PGT Mixed Game Series. He won Event number three for two hundred and thirty two thousand dollars. A Liberto one Event number two for one hundred twenty seven thousand dollars, So excuse me there. Nick Shulman the real goat event number four two hundred and thirty five thousand dollars for him. Yurizevilevski won Event

number five two hundred and sixty two thousand dollars. Event number six, King Hipan won two hundred and seventy three thousand dollars, and then event number seven was Brian rast Rast winning four hundred and eighty thousand dollars in the twenty five K ten Game Championship event. I'll let you correct me in a second, but just let me kind of set the table here in that I think every

event was down except for the last one. Basically, what I'm saying is we saw booming numbers for Kickoff, we saw a pullback in numbers for mixed games.

but that went down by twelve players. The ten K eight game that went down by eight players, So that's pretty marginal. That's just kind of some reentry variance. The Big Bet mix was I would call a return, So if we're comparing it to the previous Big Bit mix, it was also different buy and can't really do that dealer's choice down a couple people as well.

ten days and play a bunch of different games. The cash games were absolutely popping I heard, and then all leading into the one hundred k.

would be, it's only twenty K to play both. I mean, it's not like I'm asking you to play, you know, three hundred ks or whatever. Like you could take a shot in both, you could raise money, like you can make it happen, you know. And I would say that for a lot of these guys, you're not getting high buy ins like this in a condensed time frame anywhere else in the world. And I would say really kind of even the WSP, because the difference between this and the WSP is that the WSP is just spread out

much more. You know this, you can basically take a week off, come play at all in once, and then you get the benefit of things like elite staff and dealers, incredible luxurious studio that's private, it's nowhere near a casino. You know, It's just everything is just really top of the line. I know that does sound like company man speak coming from me, and while it is, I think you guys out there know me enough to say that,

I wouldn't say that if I didn't believe it. I would just probably dump on it or ignore it altogether. But yeah, it really is the best. And again, you know you mentioned it, a shout out to Phil Sterneimer for a lot of the recruiting he does, not only for the bigger buying events, but just kind of about

this whole series, just just really getting behind it. You know, he really is the guy behind this whole thing, almost to the point that we should put him on the payroll for all these But I heard he did all right in the mix and the cash game, so I'm sure he's doing just fine. And he did have a couple of couple of deep runs in the tournaments as well. Speaking of the twenty five K ten Game Championship, he got third there for two hundred and sixteen. So yeah,

so overall, I think a really fun series. Hopefully we get some of these guys that start playing more than just mixed games, you know, I would love to see, for example, Yuri's e Aleski start playing more of our stuff, you know, around the rest of the year. You know, yeah, Yury's gonna he's gonna be there for the entire WSP and play all that sort of stuff. But you know, can we get him for Poker gro Cup. It's not like he's not good at Nolam at Oldham. He's great

at that too. He's literally great at all of the games. So can we get him out there for that sort of stuff. I mean, that's probably gonna factor in. Does it coincide with Scoop and stuff like that? And I know they move Scoop this year, and I don't even know if they fully release schedule yet. I just remember Patrick.

I think it would just be incredible. My favorite event from all seven events that we had during the Mix game series was this Big Bet Mix, even though it had the lowest turnout with fifty three entries fifteen K price point, Uri Beats Pads heads Up. So two online legends there, you know, going at it in the live realm, very familiar with each other's games. But just I thought the mix was super fun and unique and interesting. You

certainly don't see it anywhere else in the world. A bunch of the games, you know, just being there throughout the entirety of this event, A bunch of the games players had no idea what they were doing. Also, several times, probably a dozen times, players were playing the wrong game. Like so if you if you're on the fence about playing this sort of thing, Like for example, I saw John Reardon at the Venetian the other day and I was sitting right next to him and I said, you know,

you should have played this Big Bet Mix. He's like, I know, I thought about that. I didn't, And I was like, you don't understand, man. Like players are playing the wrong game, Like they had no idea what the rules were. They had no idea like kind of hand rankings all this sort of stuff, and he's like, man,

damn it, I should have played. I'm like, yeah, you should have played, because as good as you are and like some of these games, you know, you probably could have figured out the other ones quite nicely because some of the players I don't think I had any idea what they were doing, which was awesome.

multiple players can back me up. He would show up at noon every day and order a shot at the bar and a drink and then just drink the whole time, the whole time, NonStop. And then I guess Brian Breck shout out to him too. He was there a bunch of times, probably fifteen Coors Lights a day, so I'm like just three at a time on the table. I mean, it's just absolute riot in the studio for this series. Overall, shout out too, Uri Zevilevski, who won the series title.

And then because of all that, his five hundred and thirty four points that he earned from this series was enough to put him on top of the overall PGT leader board for the entire series. He overtook Andrew Liechtenberger by three points. And it was all heading in to Super High ROLLERBLEL Mixed Games, the biggest buy in mixed games tournament in the world. We no longer have that title when it comes to the PLO one, but we still have it when it comes to the Super High

ROLLABLEL Mixed Games one. And this is the only thing that I'll say about the WSP schedule is that we still have the title because I saw the schedule and they did not do one hundred k mixed games buying that I saw, So we still have the title, buddy, for at least one more year. We're still there. And naturally speaking, Yuri Zeveleski Day one chip leader, Day two chip leader entering the final table and then he is

the champion of this event. One point three million dollars for Yuri Martins four hundred PGT points as well, only extended his lead at the top of the PGT leaderboard. He's now got nine hundred and thirty four points, which I mean might as well be qualification for the PGT Championship. At the end of the year, he's four hundred and three points ahead of second place. In this two week stretch it was actually less than two weeks, but two week stretch for mixed games and the Super High rollablel

Mixed Games. Uri won more than two million dollars inside the Poker Ghost Studio. This event was freaking awesome from start to finish. Much larger field than last year. Last year had what was it, twenty one uniques and twenty nine entries. This year was I don't know the uniques, but thirty eight entries. How many uniques this year? Do you know it was more than last year? Obviously?

that sort of stuff. So if you guys haven't watched the coverage, I would highly encourage you to do so. Just simply great action from start to finish. The top seven spots paid. You had Yuris of Alefski coming out on top for one point three million dollars. Chad Eve Sledge. I mean, this freaking guy won the event last year, finished second this year for eight hundred and thirty five K, and in the middle of that he just won the

PGT Championship in January. No big deal for Chad. He's just just like an all around goat when it comes to stuff. Benny Glauser finished in third. Robert Wells got fourth. Shout out to Robert Wells, you know, really kind of emerging now as as a top mixed game player. He took four hundred and fifteen thousand dollars there to buy it.

could have expected, immediately starts busting out cards. Nick Schulman's buying half the pack. I mean, it was just it was it was a plus entertainment and poker. I mean at one point he like gets up from the table. He still has his hand. This is very early in the final table. He still has his hand. They're gonna unbox stuff, you know, open the pack with Nick Shulman, and he's just like, yeah, I'm just gonna use my time. Banks.

Like a couple of the players are like, what the fuck is going on type of you know, and he walks around the table. He's in like the two or three seat. He walks all the way over to the seventh seat to sweat the cards with Nick Shoman while his hand is just being timed out, Like it's just the whole thing is just crazy. I mean it's just absolutely crazy. So Blessnik gets sixth plays and then Nick Shulman.

Nick Shulman, despite making one of the best folds you will ever see when he folded jacks on the short stack, still ends up busting in seventh place. Shulman joins a pretty elite club of players who have cashed in multiple super high rollable variants, and he also cashed in the He got fourth I believe in the super high rollable in December, the Nolan and hold them one. But there's only there's only players that have cashed in two either

like Mixed and and PLO. Blesnik for example, he's he cashed and Mixed and Plo, so he's in that club as well, is Nan Yeah, Negranu obviously cash Mix and then he's done well in the regular one, so you know, but it's not No one's done three yet nope, So we'll see if that can happen.

watch it from start to finish. My question to you, tim is is Yuri Zevelski now the favorite to win PGT Player of the Year.

but can you tell me? I was like, okay, well, end of the year, we have a championship. The guy with the most points has the most chips. Obviously you're leading right now. I explained to him the twenty five k kind of bonus you get for winning player of the year, and he goes, oh, awesome, awesome, Yeah, I got lots of extra value. And I go, look at our events are always on there. You know, will we see him come out for some of those no limits?

I'm going to probably say no. So that's why, like, you know, you got someone like an Alex foxon or the you know, Nick Shulman, they're going to play all the big stuff at the World Series. They're going to play all our stuff season season long. You know, nine hundred, You know, nine hundred points is a lot, but I don't think it's as much now with you know, the little tweaks we made and kind of the volume that you know, someone like an Alex Fox is gonna put

in where he had. He you know, he had three thousand points last year. Several had twenty nine hundred, you know, Chino twenty eight hundred. So although nine hundred is a great start and might you know pretty much put your bought in a seat for the championship, he's gonna have to, you know, pretty much triple that if he wants to win Player of the Year.

game stuff in there. I know it's some of the lower buy and stuff, but still there's some mixed game stuff in there. And you know, we we do know Yuri like he'll play all the way down to like those fifteen hundred dollars mixed games. He doesn't care, like he'll play them all, you know. And then also like there's enough kind of higher buying stuff as well to kind of wet his appetite in that regard. So you know, I would say that if I was him, I would certainly try and make the push to just be out

here to play that sort of stuff. And then you know, if you want to scallop back, maybe you don't come to US Poker Open or something like that. But you know, I would say, right now, you're hot, man, just just keep you You're probably gonna win WPT Venetian one Poker gro Cup event. I mean, this is how it's gonna happen, right, So you know I would say that, yeah, you know, have him keep coming out. And last year he didn't qualify.

He was finished one hundred and fifteenth place in the leader board with six hundred and nineteen points, so he's already well passed that. You know, I would think that he's by far favorite to lock up a seat for sure, basically like one result from this from the WSP and a ten k plus event, then he'll just he'll be locked in. Pretty much.

at all, because he's not. He's the complete opposite, completely humble, one of the nicest guys, if not the nicest guy in poker. But I still think like just you know, being able to stack up those those wins, the trophies, all that sort of stuff is is great. So I would love to have him, you know, come out. Maybe he can turn into some content he you know, he does a lot of content around his own you know, maybe that's another angle for him.

like it's pretty fine. You know, like we're pretty leaning overall in the studio and we want to benefit the players as much as you know, we like when the players benefit us, so you know, overall, it's all good. I think I'm gonna make the argument that Yuri is the favorite for players that year, Like I think we're gonna get some more volume out of him, and then I think he's I think he's just in line for a pretty big summer, Like he had a pretty bad summer I think last year, So I think this year

things will turn the other way. The pendulum will swing and uh Ury will be in the mix for Player of the Year. And then also, like you gotta figure even if he doesn't come into Cup or USPO, let's say he has a big summer and now he's up two thousand points something like that, then it's like, okay, like I can really win this thing. Yeah, I'm coming to Masters, I'm coming to this other stuff, Like I'm

gonna I'm gonna go for it. I would even say, like with him one hundred k buy in for Super High Roller Bowl, Like if that happens again at the end of the season, Like that's not out of his realm. His biggest score is in a one hundred and fifty k Nolan hold Him event. Yeah, Like, so he's he's one of the best. Yes, he's known for mixed game more so, but he's certainly has enough that it takes to be able to compete at the you know, the

six figure Nola math Holden price point as well. He's no slouch in any way, shape or form, which which probably you know, helped him a lot when he had some of these runs when when the big bet games were involved, you know, because he had a lot of success in these mixed games when the big bet games were involved in the various mixes, case and point being the Super High Rollable Mixed Games Ten Game Tournament, some other little PGT nuggets from this stretch of events to

open the season. So Uri has the most wins with two, he has the most final tables with four, and he has the most podium finishes with four. So every time he's made the final table, he's made the podium. Every time he's cashed, he's finished in the podium right, every time he's cash, he's finished in the top two, first or second.

at Venetian Las Vegas March twentieth through twenty ninth. What do you got on those schedules that you want to outline.

If you guys, remember we did a five K showcase for Poker Massa's this year, we're going to try a three K. See how that goes, same kind of concept, two starting flights a day two then something new for this series. And this is basically due to the overlap with Win Millions. Is we're going to run three single

day five case on March fourth, fifth, and sixth. They will finish in a day and you know, there is some other events at the win We're trying to give players a chance to play both or you know, pick and choose how they go. Then we're actually taking the whole weekend off. You know, we take Sundays off this year. You know, we're taking Saturday and Sunday off basically due to a poker player's wedding and him stealing steal, yeah,

more weddings. This is terrible, terrible decision making from these poker players.

if he wanted to, he could play everything. And then that second week we're kind of back to normal. We hit we up the stakes, we go up to ten K, and it's those two day events all the way through to the twenty five K, sorry, the fifteen K finale, which is kind of the new thing this year. We as the players said, twenty five to much and you know, I've got something to kind of add to that once

we get to that mailbag. But fifteen K finale, we're also going to try a satellite into that fifteen K for the first time, so when you really need the players to support that so we can keep that round. But yeah, looking forward to it. Ten events March first to fifteenth, New Trophies you know, I'm always excited about trophies. We've got new PoCA Go Cup trophies this year, both the big one and the little ones, so hopefully the players appreciate that as well.

is the money. If you want to play a five K, you need the five K. If you want to play a three K, you need a three K. If you want to play a twenty five K, you need twenty five K.

want some satellite offerings, they got those two. Overall, I think it'll be good. I'm curious how this this three K performs at the start. I think it's gonna do well. I think it's timed really well with everything that's happening in the Las Vegas. You know, you got WPT Venetian that's a five K You got thirty five hundred dollars win Millions Championship event, and then you got our three K Poker Rol Cup Showcase to open things up there.

So you know, for that sort of price point player like that's like bang bang bang, you can do all three.

It's a nice little stretch of stuff, you know. I know we often talk about poker in Las Vegas centered around everything in the summer and now centered around a lot of stuff in December, right, but I think this has become a quite a nice window as well with everything that's happening, this little six week stretch, five week stretch that's happening if you want to include the Mixed Game series a little bit, you know, longer of a stretch, but just for the kind of the big bet focus,

the Nola Holdham focus, You're getting a really nice stretch of stuff at Venetian at Win and at the Poker Grol Studio. So definitely check out those schedules, try and pair it up. We would encourage you, of course to play the Poker Girl Cup opener and see if you guys can parlay that into something. But overall, just a really good time to play poker in Las Vegas. So

so come on out. I know Tim and I will be playing a lot of that stuff, or trying to play a lot of that stuff at Venetion and and win, you know, leading into some of the stuff that happens at the studio when we have to work. So you can also see us around town say hello, chat it up a bit. Always love to meet the listeners. And then after that PLO baby, Yeah, we pumped he he's pumped for we talked all about the other day.

will be a really slow structure. You can register on the start of day too as well. It is unlimited re entries, and yeah, we're trying to give you know, a price point for players kind of basically resembling what we do with the one hundred k Super High Rollerball, but at a price point substantially less. And then on those final two days in March twenty eighth and twenty ninth, we're doing some single day five ks. So yes, it's

a considerable cheaper series. That's what we normally do with the PGTPLO series, and we're just trying something different.

I think it's it's an awesome idea. So yeah, if you love PLO, come support the damp thing.

day two. So lots of chances for people to take shots when a satellite seat getting to the you know, one of these PGTPLO series events.

you can get all of your PGT stuff. Next up, it's mailbag time. Had a bunch of questions come in. I'm going to be answering four maybe five of them. I think one might be a two parter here, but we'll get into them. Tim will share our thoughts on this. First up, we got Andy Heidelberg who said, for the last few years there's been talk about how more people per year should be inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame.

One of the reasons for this is the amazing growth in numbers over the last ten to twenty thirty forty fifty years. How hard people would have laughed in nineteen seventy nine if you said a thousand person main event, forget about ten thousand would happen growth means more. Now, all of a sudden, an influential voice is saying there are too many bracelets. Seems inconsistent to say more Hall of Fame but also say a fewer bracelets. Am I

missing something? I want to say. The in influential voice is Josh Aria, I think was saying some bracelet stuff on Twitter. But you know, if I'm wrong, there, forgive me. I mean, I'll take this one first. I just think that I think that the two arguments are coming from different places. I'm not not necessarily going to tie them together. You know. I think when you're suggesting that there are

too many bracelets, you know your guests. My guess is that that influential voice is saying that because he thinks the bracelets are a little bit more watered down or as watered down as they ever have been, and that there's more value in scarcity, which I do agree with there.

And then as it relates to the Hall of Fame, I think that idea of wanting to put more in is that there's just at the rate of one year per many, and I know they did did two last year technically with the the the off the cuff one of Michael MSS Rocky when he won the main event. But at a rate of one per year, just with the current backlog of players that should likely qualify and

get in, it's just never going to happen. So you got to kind of start getting more in there, so probably go to two per year, maybe three per year. I don't know. I think it should just be kind of a voting thing, and then you know, if you get a certain amount of votes, you're in. So like some years, maybe that's eight people get in. Some years maybe it's one person gets in. Like it's kind of all over the place. It's never just one. It's never

like a set number of people get in. It's it's based on if you get the qualifying votes, then yes you should should get in, because there will be years, you know, in a perfect world, some years there might be a bunch of people that are eligible and qualify and people want to induct. In other years, maybe there's zero. Honestly, maybe no one deserves to get in in a given year. Who knows, you know. I can see how Andy here, you know, might think that there's a bit of an

inconsistency with these two things. But I just don't particularly you know, draw the line as these two things being connected. I think they're rather two independent thoughts. And that's how I think, you know, the influence your voice, who talked about this is kind of kind of coming about it.

or Asia Pacific or Antarctica. Probably, So bracelets are going to go up. The real problem here is the Hall of Fame. And I'm gonna read you some names, Okay, Donnie Scott, Severer, Ben Lamb, Jeremy As, Josh Aria, Antonio s Fandiari, Mike Madison, Ted Forrest.

Jason Mercier, Tom Dwan, Chris and Foxon. You know, these people multi brace winners and obviously have careers that extend to the online fell and all around the world. And look, it's only going to get hotter and harder every year. So I think now they should be looking at this list that I'm looking at that has eligibility all the way to twenty thirty five and say, look, we're gonna

have some issues coming up. Let's rethink this, let's make it three four five this year, and then now we're in a good spot going forward.

like not not out of the game. He's still in the game, of course, but like out of the spotlight of the game for a decent amount of time where you can look at it and you can say, like, Okay, is he still deserved to get in? And I think a lot of people, myself included, would make the case that yes, Jason Mercier should get in. But I think that you need that time away to be able to look back on it as opposed to the person being

front and center of your mind right now. Like if Kristin Foxen stopped playing poker today, or if Jeremie olismonth stopped playing poker today, or if for somebody who is like just turns forty stops playing poker. If if you fast forward twenty years, do you still look back on their career and say, this person's Hall of Fame worthy? Or are you only selecting them to be in the Hall of Fame because they're so in your face right now.

So that's why I think, like you have to just and maybe the number of forty, the forty years old thing was made that way because years and years and years ago it was forty was just much older than forty is now. I mean, forty is.

deserve to get in. I'm not saying that, right, I'm just saying that there's still very much like in your face that when you're looking at two people, you might be you might shed it or shade it towards going to the person who's just more in your face at that time versus somebody who's not, because it's just front and center and it's all you know right now.

that would make it that probably won't get in. I think you can't write the book on the history of poker without mentioning Tom Dwan. So although he may not qualify in the current world, he would qualify in how I kind of feel like the Hall of Fame should be And obviously my theory it's going to knock a lot of these people out, but yeah, it's going to bring some people in that, you know, a lot of others may not think are deserving, such as you know,

I think Mike Mattis or Ted Forrest. You know Ted Forrest winning was a three bracelets in three days back in then. You know, I think that in itself is an accomplishment that obviously will never be repeated due to the the way events are now, but even at the time, it's just something incredible and I don't think you could write that history of poker without him. You know, and as we go down the list and we start looking at you know, like I said, I think Tom Dwan.

You know, if it's a history of poker, it's not just WSP. You have to look at WPT. You know, someone like a Darren Elias is going to he's going to shift up a little bit in the rankings. You know, we're going to talk about cash games, You're going to talk about the biggest parts in televised history. You know, Andrew Roebel is going to be moved up the rankings a little bit. We're going to look at the trying events.

You're going to look at obviously Jason Kohn with all those titles, and you know, in a few years, who knows who else will be kind of with him. So that's the way I view the Hall of Fame. You know, I'm probably in the minority, but that's my take on it. But undercurrent you know, criteria and how many people they put in, it's going to be tough. And I think they need to change several aspects of it, such as I don't think the age they need to change, or they would help, but let a few more people in,

you know, even if it's just going to two. Going to two would be a dramatic difference. I think going to three is fine with one of those, say every three years, being like an industry member. You know, they talk about Lana Normal, they talk about Mats Savage, they talk about you know, the industry side. You know, maybe one every five years or something, you vote one of those in. But yeah, I think some changes need to happen. I just I just don't know if they if they will do anything.

I have absolutely no insider info as it comes to that, other than the fact that I've seen a lot of changes in the last year and a half to two years under the gg poker ownership as it pertains to the DIVISIP. I think the biggest thing is, of course thesp plus app, you know, and I think I would I would imagine again, I have no insider info whatsoever, but I would imagine somebody like a Jeff Platt or a TJ. Reid is like, has this on their list of things they want to improve? You know.

for feeling this way. I I somewhat feel this way too, But I also think that it's just the nature of that Beast, that WISP Paradise Super Main Event Beast. You know, I think that that event and that that series is it's made a certain way. It's to cater to a certain type of poker player, and yeah, you're gonna get

some shot takers, some qualifiers, some people chasing those promotions. Yes, but I think just just knowing that it's it's not supposed to be the same thing as the ws AP in the summer is I just personally don't view it like that. I don't think it's been put out like that in the start. I think it's just it's a dobasipy high roller series, super high roll issies. That's what it is, right, So if that stops you from playing it,

I get it. I totally understand it. It's probably why I won't ever play it, because I feel like I'm going in there at a little bit of disadvantage. And that's not just with this event. I've opted to not take shots in some other events where I felt kind of the same way. The biggest one I think would be WBT five Diamond in the past, where you just know that people are in there for endless bullets and

I might be able to fire one or two. Now, there's obviously some middle ground when you have these bigger buying events that have only like one entry per day or two entries per day or something like that, so you feel a little bit more on par with everyone else. But I can't blame Michael, and I'm sure many people

feel this sort of way. But I also do think that, you know, the WSP Superman Event has its place in poker, like I think that it's again, it's an event catered towards the super high roll or crowd, and that's what it's designed for. I mean, even the structure itself is designed to pump as many bolts in the damn thing

as possible, right, So I think that it's fine. You know, if it turns you off from playing it, I get it, you know, but you're always going to have the w SP Man Event in the summer, which is still the biggest and best tournament in the world. So you know, I wouldn't worry too much about not being able to play this event or not wanting to play it for

that reason, because there is still a lot of poker. Now, let's say, in some crazy hypothetical world, if they were to have taken what they did with the WSP Superman event and make that the new w SP main event in the summer. Then I think, Okay, everyone freak out, and that's just over the line. But they're two different things. They're offered in two different places, two different you know, two very different times times of the year. So I

think it's fine to have both of them. But I do understand where's coming from.

So we just go find something else to play. That's the beauty of poker in the last few years that we've just had this you know, gluttony of events and options all around the world and all around the city you're in, you know, obviously us being in Las Vegas is you know, a luxury, So yeah, you can kind

of pick and choose. Does it, you know, hurt poker a little bit, But it's like I said, it's these events are not that you know, there's not endless multi flyer twenty five k's, multi entry twenty five k's all around the world, So I think it's fine.

balance with the type of events you're offering. All these companies want to they all want a money grab, They all want as much riag as they can, but they I think a lot of them are still trying to protect, you know, what poker is, whether that's with freeze outs or with the events that you know, if WSP cared about money, they would probably never run a mixed game tournament. Let's be honest, everything would be multi entry, multi flying

elemen hold them in pay a lot. But look, it's obviously they still care about you know, they still care about the brands, still care about the game because you know, fifteen hundred Horse and Dealer's Choice and Raz and they're all still on the schedule. So yeah, that's kind of my take on it.

pockets of poker players, it's not a good thing. But I would also guess that it's not going to slow down much, both in the greater poker sense and then also for me personally. I mean, listen, these are just kind of the new rules, the new guidelines that we have to play by, and it's gonna be a little bit of more money out of everyone's pocket. But that's just how it is. There's nothing we can do really

to change anything. You know. Obviously we can try and voice our support to get it taken away, to get it reverted back to what it was, and and hopefully that does happen. So I'll kind of try and remain positive in that light. But overall, I would say generally it's it's probably more overblown than not. You know, again, I don't want I don't want you to confuse me or twist what I'm saying in that it's I don't

think it's a positive thing. I don't think it's something that we should just completely ignore to the extent that we're not trying to fix it. But I do think that, you know, it's a little bit overblown and like all these people out there saying like no one's gonna play poker anymore, And if I said that in the past,

I've definitely changed my tune on it. Just also seeing some of the numbers, like I think we'll still see the biggest pullback in the really high buy and stuff, and then it'll kind of just scale from there and just be more normal as you get down to like the the price points that like Tim and myself play. So yeah, you know, I think it's also going to be kind of a wait and see approach, at least

for this year. People are just gonna be doing whatever they do and then tax season will come around, then maybe they get hit, then maybe they adjust for the next year. But for this year, I don't really say it's going to affect poker overall too much. I think the number of venues that are running big tournament series against one another is going to have a greater effect on poker in terms of like tournament numbers then this tax thing will. That's kind of where I'm at in it. So what do you got?

the States outside of the world series. And like we touched on earlier in the episode, seven are already pulling back removing their twenty five k's. We've pulled back, you know, adjusting our twenty five k's as well. Will we see a reversal possibly? Will we see creative accountancy? Most likely?

And I think it's going to be the most adjustments will probably later in the year, when you know people are stuck a lot or they're up a lot, and they'll make you know their adjustments according to what you know their accountant kind of recommends.

line up really well. I'm not your target demographic of someone who would buy into a three thousand dollars due to seven Nolmit mystery boundy, but I do think it would be funny, fun to watch excuse me, and the two concepts fit together. So I think what Lars is getting at here is he thinks if we were to host or he suggests maybe exploring hosting a bigger buying no limit due to seven single draw tournament that is

also a bounty, which sounds interesting. I think it could be fun as a relations I'm not sure where we would put it in, but I could certainly see this being a thing. I don't know if I would do mystery bounty. Maybe I would, maybe I wouldn't, but I think it would be cool to do this.

seven and now we're adding a bounding. It just shrinks the potential player for the buying goes up, shrinks it even more.

I'm sure his deal with GIGI is extremely rich, but would that be a part of the arrangement also turning buy ins at a certain level or a percentage. I don't know Daniel's deal, I won't pretend to know his deal, but I do know that various sponsorship deals in the past have allotted all, if not part of, like the sponsorship money in buy ins. I think that's what Poker

Stars used to do for some of their ambassadors. For example, you get like this fee per year, but then you also get like x amount of tournament dollars that you can use to go play, like you know, the epts and apts and like all that sort of stuff. So maybe someone like Daniel has that worked in, or maybe other pros have that worked in for various places like let's say you know a ramp or brad Owen where they're associated with WPT in a way there, so maybe

that's built in. So I would say it just kind of comes down to the the specific deal and how that deal is worked out. If it was me, I would probably try and lead to some sort of both of them, you know. I like, i'd want the fee right to just be like kind of my salary, my income, Like I'd want that as like some support. But then i'd want like the tournament buyings as well. I wouldn't

put it all in one bucket. I'd like to bet on some upside with the tournament buying stuff, but I also what wouldn't want to put it all on that sort of upside. So so that's how those work out. A lot of action and staking and peace buying and all that sort of stuff for the high rollers. Of course, you know, there's a lot of guys that share a lot of action. There's a lot of people that swap with one another. You know, even someone like Danon and Granu.

You know, he every single year he puts out different packages for the different WSOP events. He does one in the summer where he puts stuff on poker Steak. He does one for ws Paradise where he puts it on poker Steak. So even he's not playing, you know, one hundred percent of his own action, you know, he's got

some of that allotted out there. Now. Maybe Daniel's doing it more so just to like kind of give back to the fans and grow his follower base and all that sort of stuff, versus like he actually needs to do it for the money. But there's there's a lot of stuff out there. You know, a lot of people don't have one hundred percent of themselves, even down to lower buyings. It's just a way to reduce variants. I

regularly sell action in myself for various things. You know, I sold for this eight hundred play that I played over the weekend. You know, just a little bit, but it's still you know, it's good to have your friends sweating along. I also know that, at least as it pertains to me, friends want to get involved, like they almost get annoyed me. You don't sell them a piece because they just want to be in on the action. So yeah, there's a lot of it that just goes around.

And then the staking and the backing deals are just they're kind of all over the place. You know, you have stuff that's just like what I do, for example, where it's not it's not any sort of agreement with people. I just hey, I'm going to go play this event. Would you like the action? They buy it as a one off, and once it's done, it done. I either give them money back or they send me money for their shares and that's it. There's no makeup. There's none

of that. Other ones have you know, lengthy makeup deals and contracts and you know you only get fifty percent and then you know, but if we're down and if you're in makeup, I get higher percentage or whatever. Like there's all there's all different levels of it all. Yeah, there's not really a one size fits all. A lot of it's unknown and you kind of have to piece together information. Some people are very upfront about it and they'll just tell you flat up, flat out. Other people aren't,

you know. So yeah, like I think when when Espin Yourstad won the main event a couple of years ago, he was pretty upfront with like how much he had, and he's like, yeah, I had whatever fifty percent of myself or whatever the heck he said stuff like that. So you know, yeah, you're in these circles, what do you got? Probably the same thing.

It's when they start getting over that they're looking to sell off pieces or people are looking to buy, you know, spread that risk a little bit.

everyone's different. You know, we know that there's certain people that buy a lot of pieces of every one, and you know, they're the big piece buyers, and and you know with that, you're gonna have to assume that even some of these top guys, even the you know, potentially even the Jeremy Osmus of the world and and you the Steven Songs all the they probably do have coaches and a lot of these new coaching deals nowadays involved and I'll coach you for this, but I also get,

you know, X percentage of these events, et cetera. So I think everyone's deals different. Just the higher buyings you go, obviously, the more risk needs to be kind of spread out a little bit. Yeah, it's it's it's always an interesting thing. I always like to hear about this stuff. I was going to see who's who's who's the big spender, who buys the most pieces, you know, who who's coaching, who

who's in under you know, who's stable. I find that stuff like really interesting but obviously quite private to a lot of these guys, so you won't really hear too much about it.

like to stay private with it. So yeah, I mean Tim can, Tim and I can only really talk about, you know, some of the stuff that we no firsthand or that we know is out there in the public. And yeah, but yeah, I think, yeah, I mean, Daniel's always been pretty open. I would say he probably just takes all his own action other than the times when he you know, puts it on poker steak like that.

I'm playing this series, I'm selling action whatever. Like you can find some information as to who's selling who's not, you know, how much action they're keeping of themselves, all that sort of stuff. Like it's it's available, you know, at least to some extent if you want to, if you want to dig around a bit. So yeah, all right, well that's going to do it for us. We went way too long, but it is what it is. It's

been a while, so all good. Two days of No Gamble in the Future Live coming on Tuesday and Wednesday this week, and then of course we have the Poker ro Cup that is coming up at the beginning of March for the first two weeks, a lot of streaming there as well. So so yeah, so that's going to do it for Tim and I. As we talked about at the top of the show, we will be coming to you with our WSOP schedule thoughts in the coming days,

up to a week or something like that. We'll you know, we'll get to crack in on what we think about the schedule. You know, I've already seen on social media. There's a handful of submissions, there's a handful of new events in there. So we'll be touching on it all on the next show. All right, Cool, that's gonna do it for us. We got nothing else, right, all right?