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Top stories of 2023: Poker boom, cheaters of all kind and farewell to a legend
Last goodbye to a legend
I've been doing this work for over 10 years now, and I always suspected that when Doyle Brunson left us one day, it would be one of those moments when you would always remember where you were and what you were doing. On May 14, 2023, I was watching the WPT Prime final table live at the Card Casino in Bratislava when a reporter from the WPT came up to me and told me that it looked like a legend had left us. Apparently a source close to Doyle had told him this, and since no other news was available yet, I could only hope it wasn't true.
Sadly, after half an hour the first condolence tweets started to pour in, and soon it was clear that the day had arrived. The legendary Texan had left the world at the age of 89, but he left behind an incredible legacy and legacy. Doyle became one of poker's early pioneers, won 10 WSOP bracelets during his career, was inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame, and we can't forget about his SuperSystem, perhaps the first relevant poker book.
We also remembered Doyle in a three-part series charting his life:
- The Godfather of Poker #1: Competitiveness, a promising NBA career and the accident that changed everything
- The Godfather of Poker #2: Gangsters, drugs, the longest session of a lifetime and murder right at the table
- The Godfather of Poker #3: The arrival of the game called hold'em and finally time to go to Vegas
Cheaters, Liars and Thieves
As is (good) custom, the poker community is not without liars, cheaters, thieves and other scandals, and it was no different during 2023. The entire poker community was stirred up in June by Ali Imsirovic, who, in a half-hour YouTube confession, openly talked about how he used multi-account online poker during the pandemic but despite this confession, it was accepted by the community as excuses rather than humility.
In early December, a case in which Nick Airball and Wesley Fei accused Tony Mars of a multi-million dollar scam saw the light of day. The self-named Ye Shen was said to have cheated during private $25/$50 and $50/$100 games with decks of special cards that were UV-lighted with values only visible through special glasses. According to testimony, players were to be cheated out of up to $3 million this way, and well, you can read the details of the case here.
The "showpiece" of the whole year was put to an end in the last days of December by a user with the nickname "Moneytaker69", who revealed a security flaw at GGPoker. As a result, he was able to get to see his opponents' cards and what was coming on the board, and he made good use of this advantage. He should have lost his opponents at least $30,000 this way, but since we know of at least one of his $47,586 tournament cashes, it's highly likely that the final number will be much higher.
Game of Gold and other TV content
Today's age of the internet and social networking is moving further and further forward, and with that current goes poker material. In addition to the "must-have" live streams of the biggest and most exciting tournaments, various cash games and many other formats are becoming more and more prominent. Among the cash games, the Hustler Casino Live production clearly stood out this year, which gained a lot of new viewers after the incident between Robbi Lew and Garrett Adelstein.
Youtuber also made a dent in the world this year Wolfgang, which reached one million subscribers surpassing the likes of Doug Polk, Joey Ingram and Daniel Negreanu. But what was talked about everywhere and for a long time was the premiere of the GGPoker-produced show Game of Gold. The fusion of poker and reality TV produced 12 episodes packed with great poker stars, at the end of which champion Maria Ho took home $456,000. The unprecedented format has reached hundreds of thousands of viewers around the world, and after its huge success, we can only expect it to open the door for similar projects later this year.
The Biggest WSOP Main Event in History
It's been 17 long years since Jamie Gold's record-breaking win in the 2006 WSOP Main Event, during which time the record of 8,772 entries has remained unbroken. It was only narrowly missed in 2022 (8,663 entries), but this year the organisers left nothing to chance and went all out in the promos. The result did not wait and not only the 9,000 mark was broken, but also the next one - the number of entries stopped at 10,043!
GG and its 744 online qualifiers certainly contributed a bit to this, but even without them the record would have been successfully broken. As you know, at the end of this story shines the name Daniel Weinman,the local pro who took home $12,100,000 for his winnings. What do you think, will this record be broken in 2024?
Hellmuth and the incredible 17th bracelet
When the WSOP is mentioned, it's hard to think of any other name than Phil Hellmuth. The long-time record holder for the most gold bracelets won (which no one will probably ever break), Hellmuth started his incredible journey in 1989 when he won the Main Event for $755,000. In the 35 years since then, he has won a total of 17 bracelets, with the most recent of which he added this year.
EPT vs WPT vs WSOP
Back during the summer and the record-breaking WSOP festival, many of us suspected that we were living in another poker boom, and December has definitely confirmed those claims. For the first time in history, the three biggest poker series in the world came into direct conflict at the same time as the EPT Prague, the WSOP in the Bahamas and the WPT in Las Vegas.
The GG sent over 1,000 online qualifiers to the Bahamas, the WPT lured a Main Event with a whopping $40 million guarantee, and the EPT decided to do nothing but stay true to its 19-year tradition. The result? All three events became record-breakers in many dimensions, but they definitely confirmed that we're experiencing a golden era of poker. We'll see how it continues throughout this year as we all keep a close eye on the summer WSOP, and then in December we can expect a similar battle to this year.
Source - WPT, WSOP, PokerNews, PSlive, WorldPokerDeals, PokerStrategy