Category Archives: Poker

You won't see this everyday. A player in a recent session on Poker at the Lodge folded with the stone-cold nuts following an all in and call bet on the river.

The poker player, Jay "JWin," Nguyen a regular at The Lodge Card Club in Round Rock, Texas, lost the nearly $20,000 pot to a player named Jake, who was actually rivered in the hand.

Not only did JWin lose the pot due to apparently misinterpreting his opponent's hand and the cards on the board, he was also forced to remain standing as the table was playing the Texas Stand Up game. In that game, everyone stands up for the first hand dealt and then can sit down only upon winning a pot. The last person standing must pay each player at the table a loser's fee.

It's happened to us all, accidentally clicking "fold" with a monster hand online. But this isn't online poker. There are no buttons. JWin simply mis-clicked in real life, and here's how it went down.

Following a preflop raise to $150 from "Slicer," who was holding , three players called to see a flop of , giving Jake a gut-shot straight draw as he had . The flop didn't hit JWin's , but "TM" did spike top pair with .

Action folded to Jake, who semi-bluff bet for $200 and TM called. JWin then made an ambitious raise to $800 with queen-high, perhaps hoping to take down the pot so he could sit down. Jake called while TM folded the best hand, although the announcers agreed with the decision.

The turn was the , giving Jake the nuts to go along with an open-ended straight flush draw. It did, however, also give JWin a little bit of equity as he picked up a three-outer to a straight (heart on the river would be no good even if he hit his straight). He continued his aggression, betting out $2,200, and he received a call.

Both players saw the on the river, a cruel card for Jake because there was no getting away from the hand even though he was up against the rivered nuts. Jake moved all in for $6,160 and received a snap call. He flipped over his cards, showing the lower straight before JWin mis-click folded the stone-cold nuts in a $19,155 pot.

"The cards were read right, he just folded the winning hand," The Lodge commentator "Skull Mike" said.

So, what caused him to fold the nuts? Mike Brady, a partner at The Lodge, explained what happened in a tweet.

"He misread the board (thought there were 3 hearts) and he interpreted the snap call as "must be a flush" - then the guy showed two hearts. Only after mucking did he see the jack was a diamond. Unfortunate," Brady wrote.

As Brady described, it truly was a real-life mis-click. Nguyen reiterated Brady's comments.

To make matters worse for the regular on the Lodge's popular YouTube stream, the player who folded the nuts was also forced to continue standing. That's a brutal way to lose a massive pot and the Texas Stand Up game all in the same.

The Lodge Card Club is co-owned by poker legend Doug Polk and poker vlogging icons Andrew Neeme and Brad Owen. The trio of celebrity poker players, especially Polk, often compete on the show, which now has over 77,000 YouTube subscribers.

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Player Mis-click Folds the Nuts on the River During Poker At The Lodge Stream - PokerNews.com

Esfandiari (centre) pictured in 2005 - playing at a Beverly Hills charity event

Antonio Esfandiari's heart was beating like a drum. There was $18m (15.8m) on the line, the cash was stacked up about 12ft from where he was sitting.

It was 3 July 2012 and Esfandiari, then 33, had outlasted 47 other poker players in Las Vegas. Either he or Englishman Sam Trickett would be claiming the biggest first prize in the game's history to date.

The live TV cameras were primed, the tension among fans at breaking point. The commentators held their breath as the dealer prepared to reveal the final card. Esfandiari was about to experience the most euphoric moment of his life. But he still looked like the coolest head in the room.

When he was confirmed as the winner, he immediately took off his glasses. Not in relief or disbelief but to save them from being crushed as his family and friends flooded in from all sides to congratulate him.

The celebrations were wild. He was held high in the air by the group now gathered tight around him. Somebody threw over a huge bundle of $100 bills from the stack. Eventually he got his glasses back on.

As the huddle cleared and broadcaster ESPN kept rolling, everybody recognised something extraordinary had just happened.

For Esfandiari it represented the culmination of a career which began in very different circumstances a decade earlier.

But Poker itself had changed immeasurably in that time too. A once frowned-upon card game now had its own share of the United States' sporting mainstream thanks to a boom in popularity that was perhaps reaching a peak.

This is the story of how it got there.

In 1999, TV producer Steve Lipscomb was working on a one-hour documentary titled: 'On the Inside of The World Series of Poker.'

He'd also read an article in the New York Times that said 20 million Americans were playing poker every week.

The article, coupled with the success of his show when it was released, led Lipscomb to believe there was a giant, untapped market for the game.

So he founded the World Poker Tour (WPT).

"My business plan was: 'If we're as successful as bowling or billiards we'll break even,'" he says now.

"On the other hand, if we end up like the NBA or the NFL, then this is an extraordinary opportunity."

The WPT wasn't the only player at the table. The World Series of Poker (WSOP) had been around since the 1970s, but until the early 2000s existed almost in isolation. You had to go looking for it. It was hardly ever on TV.

By the end of the WPT's first televised season, running from June 2002 to April 2003, its peak of 2.2m concurrent viewers was higher than an average NBA game at the time, according to Lipscomb.

"We blew the doors off," he says.

"We started raising so much money we didn't have to pitch to the TV networks - they eventually came to us. All of these other sporting networks like ESPN and NBC jumped in because they wanted a piece of the pie.

"Whether they thought it was a sport or not was really irrelevant, because all of their audience thought it was a sport."

Not everyone will agree in that debate, but Lipscomb's influence was certainly making poker look like a sport. That was a key part of the plan: to take a card game and shape a familiar televised format around it.

Each WPT show would have two commentators, one calling the action and another taking a more analytical approach. They were filmed with fans in attendance, giving it that live-sport feel. Innovations included a camera fitted under tables to show each player's hand.

A bigger problem was fitting all the key information on screen.

"It took us eight months to get it right," Lipscomb says.

"We had to build tools that would take cards off the screen when somebody folds. When we did it, it was a dance-in-the-halls moment.

"Now you could be in a bar with the TV on mute, look at the screen, and the graphics would tell you everything that was happening. That's when I believe something truly becomes a televised sport.

"I told people we could do this, we could make poker into a sport."

At the same time, the more prestigious and historically respected World Series of Poker (WSOP) was expanding too. Poker coverage had always been limited but, now carefully packaged for prime time TV, it was gleefully unwrapped by the American public.

"Within months of our shows going on air everything transformed," Lipscomb continues.

"We thought of televised poker as a five-act Shakespearean play where everybody but one person dies along the way. We made villains and heroes out of everybody at the table.

"If you asked anyone in 2001 if they knew any professional poker players, they wouldn't. But after the first season of the WPT, the players on those final tables, they were rock stars, man."

One of those 'rock stars' was Esfandiari.

Born in Tehran in 1978, Esfandiari's family moved to the United States when he was eight. The Iran-Iraq war of 1980-88 played a big role in their decision to leave.

Growing up in the US was a tough transition. He says there was a lot of hostility and racism towards Iranians at the time, partly because of the hostage crisis that began at the US embassy in Tehran in 1979, with 52 American diplomats and citizens held for 444 days.

During those difficult early years, Esfandiari was introduced to the game that would ultimately shape his life.

"My dad and his friends used to play poker when I was a kid, but an Iranian version of poker," he says.

"I would always sneak in and try and stay up past my bed time, I thought it was awesome."

By age 19 Esfandiari was playing no-limit Texas hold 'em at his local casino. Having gained a fake ID (many US states require players be over 21) and digested a strategy book on poker, a whole new world was opening up.

"I saw the truth right there at the table, I couldn't believe it," he says. "I was like 'wow, nobody can spell poker here, never mind play it'. It was unbelievable how bad people were. And because of the book I'd read, I was able to earn a bit of money."

The more Esfandiari played, the more he earned. Soon he started to make more money from poker than from his part-time job as a magician.

But attitudes towards the game were often negative. Many people treated those who played it with suspicion.

Esfandiari says: "My friend Phil Laak and I, we used to roam around looking for games. But obviously we would have nights where we would not play poker and we would go out instead.

"On those nights if we ever met any women, back in our single days, they would say 'what do you do?' When we'd tell them, they wouldn't want anything to do with us."

According to Esfandiari, the WPT "single-handedly" and "without a doubt" played the biggest role in changing poker's reputation.

"All of a sudden poker exploded on TV, you had all these celebrities playing and it became a cool thing," he says. "It was no longer looked down on."

A number of factors fused together to form the power behind poker's increase in popularity around this time, known as the 'Poker Boom'.

Movies such as Rounders (1998) starring Edward Norton and Matt Damon brought the game to a wider audience. The growth of the internet spawned online play, making it more accessible worldwide than it had ever been before.

And an accountant named Chris Moneymaker won the 2003 WSOP main event, pocketing $2.5m (2.19m) after qualifying online. It inspired amateur players across the planet; in 2003 there had been 839 entrants, in 2006 there were 8,773 - a record that still stands.

A game once maligned by the general public was being broadcast and making headlines around the globe, beyond poker circles.

And the prize money on offer was going through the roof.

Esfandiari appeared in the WPT's debut season from 2002-2003, but it wasn't until season two that he started to gain recognition.

In February 2004 he outlasted 381 other players to win a $1.4m (1.22m) first prize. Fans took pictures with him, they wanted his autograph and began to follow him as they would a favourite sports team.

"For a kid who was pretty insecure growing up and going through the things I had to experience, it was extremely validating," says Esfandiari, who was 25 at the time.

"People would come up to me and say: 'I love to watch you play, I tune in to watch you play.'"

The $18m win of 2012 was at a WSOP event - the Big One for One Drop, which helped raise a reported $5m (4.38m) for a water charity. It remained a record prize until Bryn Kenney of the US won $20.5m (17.99m) at the Triton Million of 2019.

Esfandiari describes it as "the ultimate, most euphoric out-of-body experience of my life".

"Because it wasn't just me," he adds. "My entire family, my friends, my whole world and everybody in it was up. Financially, socially, everything.

"The whole world was watching. Newspapers in France, Israel, Germany and all over the place were writing that somebody had won $18m (15.7m) playing poker.

"With all the experiences I've had in my life, none of them compare to that first minute after realising I had won that tournament."

Esfandiari, now 43, lives with his wife and children in Venice Beach, California. He says the poker scene has "completely changed" since the early 2000s.

"Back then poker was so fresh that if you won one event you were an instant star," he says. "Fast forward to today, you can win four and nobody knows you."

He believes the standard has also improved - "there are no bad players left" - owing partly to "the internet and the vast knowledge available, all the training videos".

He also believes it isn't as interesting. Esfandiari and others have been critical of some newer players adopting the Game Theory Optimum approach, which heavily draws on mathematics in its strategy. Those who favour it have been accused of lacking charisma and innovation - two of the key elements that helped grow poker's popularity on TV.

That there are players like Esfandiari, players who have enjoyed consistent success over a number of years, supports the case that poker requires skill and strategy. But nonetheless the game always comes with big risks - such as that of problem gambling.

A 2018 study published in Australia found 39% of the regular poker players it surveyed had moderate to severe gambling problems, while around a quarter had caused financial problems for themselves or their households.

Lipscomb, who sold his stake in the WPT in 2009, says they would "spend time making sure, particularly in tournament poker, that you can only pay a certain amount and it's all you can lose".

He also believes problem gamblers are less likely to be found among professional poker players.

One recent case exposes the limitations behind that argument.

Dennis Blieden, a former WPT champion, was sentenced to six and a half years in prison in June 2021 for embezzling $22m (19.3m) from his employer StyleHaul, a media agency, where he was in charge of accounts.

In a letter to the judge, Blieden, 31, outlined how his gambling addiction had started at a young age, before worsening in line with his poker career.

He described how he "idolised" the stars of the 'poker boom' and became "obsessed" with matching their achievements.

With stolen funds he entered high-stakes competition and won $1m (8.77m) in the LA Poker Classic of 2018. The "validation" that brought was "no doubt an accelerant in my gambling", he wrote, adding: "I did everything I could to keep that reputation alive."

Esfandiari recalls a time when as a younger man he worried he might have a gambling addiction. But over 20 years on he says "professional players don't see poker as gambling, it's a calculated risk".

He adds: "For about a month and a half when I was 21, I was playing poker every single day. I was waiting tables, player poker, waiting tables, playing poker, and I realised it was too much.

"I realised I didn't want to end up as someone spending their whole life in the casino, losing all their money, even though I was actually winning. So I decided to tone it down.

"But when you sit down to play roulette, craps or blackjack, any of those sort games, you're against the casino. Every time you bet $100, you're losing two, three, four five bucks mathematically.

"Poker players on the other hand, we believe we are the casino when we sit down.

"When you play poker against good players and you're a bad player, you're going to lose money against the good player. It might not be that day, but by the end of the year the pro will take the money.

"You have to put in the work. You can't just show up and think you're going to beat the best."

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The inside story of the poker boom: 'We blew the doors off' - BBC

It was as if a bottom seed had knocked out the top team in March Madness: At the Sinquefield Cup chess tournament in St. Louis earlier this month, an upstart American teenager named Hans Niemann snapped the 53-game unbeaten streak of world champion Magnus Carlsen, perhaps the games best player of all time. But the real uproar came the following day, when Carlsen posted a cryptic tweet announcing his withdrawal that included a meme video stating, If I speak I am in big trouble. The king appeared to have leveled an unspoken accusation of cheatingand the chess world, in turn, exploded.

Some of the biggest names in chess launched attacks on Niemann in the subsequent days, while others rushed to defend him. Niemann, by his own recent admission, has cheated at online chess at least twice before, when he was 12 and 16 years old. These past offenses, combined with what some believed was lackluster chess analysis in his postgame interviews, have heightened suspicions of foul play. On Twitch and Twitter, players and fans theorized that Niemann might have been receiving secret messages encoded in the vibrations of electronic shoe inserts or remote-controlled anal beads. No concrete evidence of cheating has emerged, and the 19-year-old grandmaster vehemently denied accusations of misconduct in St. Louis, vowing to an interviewer that he has never cheated in an over-the-board game and has learned from prior mistakes.

Whatever really happened here, everyone agrees that for Niemann, or anyone else, to cheat at chess in 2022 would be conceptually simple. In the past 15 years, widely available AI software packages, known as chess engines, have been developed to the point where they can easily demolish the worlds best chess playersso all a cheater has to do to win is figure out a way to channel a machines advice. Thats not the only way that computers have recently reshaped the landscape of a 1,500-year-old sport. Human players, whether novices or grandmasters, now find inspiration in the outputs of these engines, and they train themselves by memorizing computer moves. In other words, chess engines have redefined creativity in chess, leading to a situation where the games top players can no longer get away with simply playing the strongest chess they can, but must also engage in subterfuge, misdirection, and other psychological techniques. In that sense, the recent cheating scandal only shows the darker side of what chess slowly has become.

The computer takeover of chess occurred, at least in the popular imagination, 25 years ago, when the IBM supercomputer Deep Blue defeated world champion Garry Kasparov. Newsrooms at the time declared the match a Greek tragedy, in which a silicon hand of God had squashed humanity. Yet 1997, despite its cultural resonance, was not really an inflection point for chess. Deep Blue, a nearly 3,000-pound, one-of-a-kind supercomputer, could hardly change the game by itself. Its genius seemed reliant on then-unthinkable processing power and the grandmasters who had advised in its creation, to the point where Kasparov, after losing, could accuse IBM of having cheated by supplying the machine with human assistancea dynamic that todays accusations of foul play have reversed.

Read: When computers started beating chess champions

By the mid-2000s, though, upgrades in chess-engine software and commercial hardware made overpowering algorithms more accessible; in 2006, an engine running on a standard desktop computer defeated thenworld champion Vladimir Kramnik. Players had already been using engines to evaluate individual tactics. But Kramniks loss kicked off the first era of computer-chess superiority, in which even chess elites would rely on software to help evaluate their strategies, Matthew Sadler, a grandmaster who has written multiple books on chess engines, told me.

As engines became widespread, the game shifted. Elite chess has always involved rote learning, but the amount of stuff you need to prepare, the amount of stuff you need to remember, has just exploded, Sadler said. Engines can calculate positions far more accurately and rapidly than humans, so theres more material to be studied than ever before. What once seemed magical became calculable; where one could rely on intuition came to require rigorous memorization and training with a machine. Chess, once poetic and philosophical, was acquiring elements of a spelling bee: a battle of preparation, a measure of hours invested. The thrill used to be about using your mind creatively and working out unique and difficult solutions to strategical problems, the grandmaster Wesley So, the fifth-ranked player in the world, told me via email. Not testing each other to see who has the better memorization plan.

Once computers were reliably beating grandmasters, cheating-by-computer became a serious threat, Emil Sutovsky, the director general of the International Chess Federation, told me. The federation implemented its first anti-cheating measures in 2008.

Thats not to say chess was solved (in the sense that a perfect set of moves has been devised for every position), as checkers is; there are more possible chess games than atoms in the observable universe. Sadler believes human frailtythat we arent machineskept chess exciting: People would still forget their pregame analysis, fail to predict their opponents strategy, and end up in positions they hadnt prepared for. The computers in this first era of chess engines were very good on defense, but they still had weaknesses, Sutovsky said, such as struggling to determine the value of sacrificing a piece for long-term benefit.

But that all changed on December 5, 2017, when AI researchers at Alphabet announced a new algorithm, AlphaZero, which had surpassed the best existing chess engine simply by playing games against itselfover the course of just four hours. AlphaZero used a neural network, an approach to artificial intelligence that mimics the human brain and, in a sense, allows a machine to learn. Other chess engines quickly incorporated the new technology, heralding the modern era of total computer domination.

Read: How checkers was solved

In the first era, humans would devise attack strategies, then refine them in games against machines. AlphaZero crushed these earlier engines by playing extremely aggressive chess, Sadler said. The modern, neural-net engines are eager to sacrifice; and they exhibit a strong grasp of openings, positional structure, and long-term strategy. It started to look a bit more [like] a human way to play, Sutovsky told me, in describing this transformation. Or even superhuman, he said: The new chess engines seemed to have insight into the tactical skirmish, but also could plan for some long-lasting compensation for material loss.

To understand just how superior machines have become, consider chesss Elo rating system, which compares players relative strength and was devised by a Hungarian American physicist. The highest-ever human rating, achieved by Carlsen twice over the past decade, was 2882. DeepBlues Elo rating was 2853. A chess engine called Rybka was the first to reach 3000 points, in 2007; and todays most powerful program, Stockfish, currently has more than 3500 Elo points by conservative estimates. That means Stockfish has about a 98 percent probability of beating Carlsen in a match and, per one estimate, a 2 percent chance of drawing. (An outright victory for Carlsen would be almost impossible.)

Where chess engines once evaluated human strategies, the new, upgraded versionswhich are freely available online, including Stockfishnow generate surprising ideas and define the ideal way to play the game, to the point that human performance is measured in terms of centipawn (hundredths of a pawn) loss relative to what a computer would play. While training, a player might ask the software to suggest a set of moves to fit a given situation, and then decide to use the computers sixth-ranked option, rather than the first, in the hopes of confusing a human competitor who trained with similar algorithms. Or they might choose a move tailored to the weaknesses of a particular opponent. Many chess experts have adopted the new engines more aggressive style, and the algorithms have popularized numerous tactics that human players had previously underestimated.

The advent of neural-net engines thrills many chess players and coaches, including Sutovsky and Sadler. Carlsen said he was inspired the first time he saw AlphaZero play. Engines have made it easier for amateurs to improve, while unlocking new dimensions of the game for experts. In this view, chess engines have not eliminated creativity but instead redefined what it means to be creative.

Read: Befriending the queen of chess

Yet if computers set the gold standard of play, and top players can only try to mimic them, then its not clear what, exactly, humans are creating. Due to the predominance of engine use today, the grandmaster So explained, we are being encouraged to halt all creative thought and play like mechanical bots. Its so boring. So beneath us. And if elite players stand no chance against machines, instead settling for outsmarting their human opponents by playing subtle, unexpected, or suboptimal moves that weaponize human frailty, then modern-era chess looks more and more like a game of psychological warfare: not so much a spelling bee as a round of poker.

In that context, cheating scandals may be nothing less than a natural step in chesss evolution. Poker, after all, has been rocked by allegations of foul play for years, including cases where players are accused of getting help from artificial intelligence. When the highest form of creativity is outfoxing your opponentas has always been true of pokerbreaking rules seems only natural.

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Chess Is Just Poker Now - The Atlantic

Russell Crowe will be a guest of honor of the Rome Film Festivals independently run Alice in the City section where his second directorial effort, the thriller Poker Face in which he stars opposite Liam Hemsworth is set to have its world premiere.

Set in the world of high-stakes betting, Poker Face stars Crowe as tech billionaire and gambler Jake Foley, who offers his best friends a chance to win more money than theyve ever dreamed of. But to play, theyll have to give up the one thing they spend their lives trying to keep their secrets. As the game unfolds, the long-time pals will discover what is really at stake.

Along with Crowe and Hemsworth, the cast includes RZA of Wu-Tang Clan fame and Fast and Furious star Elsa Pataky. Stephen M. Coates wrote the screenplay with Crowe.

Romes independently run Alice in the City sidebar, which is directed by Fabia Bettini and Gianluca Giannelli and dedicated to films for children and youth, has scored several coups in recent editions, including the European premiere in 2019 of Disneys Maleficent: Mistress of Evil, attended by stars Angelina Jolie and Michelle Pfeiffer.

Besides the film launch Crowe will receive an award and hold a masterclass in Rome open to film schools and the general public.

We are particularly happy to be able to present and award to Russell Crowe on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of Alice in City. He is an actor who is not only much loved here, but also symbolically linked to our city, Bettini and Giannelli said in a joint statement.

Crowes performance as Maximus Decimus Meridius in Ridley Scotts The Gladiator won him the 2001 best actor Oscar.

Alice in the City will run Oct. 13-23 parallel to the Rome Film Festival.

Poker Face, which is Crowes second directorial effort following 2014s The Water Diviner, is scheduled to release in U.S. theaters via Screen Media on Nov. 16. Itll land on digital platforms on Nov. 22.

After launching from Rome, Poker Face will be released in Italian cinemas at the end of November by Vertice 360.

The Australian actor-director, who besides winning an Oscar for Gladiator is also an Academy Award nominee for A Beautiful Mind and The Insider, recently appeared as Zeus in Marvels Thor: Love and Thunder. Up next, Crowe is starring in Peter Farrellys war drama The Greatest Beer Run Ever and Sonys comic book adaptation Kraven the Hunter. Hes currently shooting The Popes Exorcist, a supernatural thriller directed by Julius Avery.

Rebecca Rubin contributed to this report.

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Russell Crowe Will World Premiere His Thriller Poker Face From Rome Film Festivals Alice in the City Sidebar - Variety

Episode 113 of Wise Kracks is here and joining us this week is a young professional poker player whos accumulated $19M in career earnings! We also talk about NFL Week 2, another week for the underdogs, San Francisco 49ers quarterback troubles, why the Dallas Cowboys winning upset Jon, and where a retired MMA legends career could go next. Here we go!

Your hosts Bill Krackomberger and Jon Orlando discuss a comeback-filled NFL Week 2! With a week for the underdogs, how did bettors fare compared to Week 1?

San Francisco 49ers quarterback Trey Lance is out for the season with a broken ankle, but will it affect their Super Bowl odds?

With Dallas Cowboys star quarterback Dak Prescott injured, Jons faith in his team seems to have been shaken as he placed a bet hes never placed before. How did it turn out for him?

UFC legend Jos Aldo has announced his retirement from MMA competition. Could he be looking to step out of the octagon and into the ring?

The guys are joined by Sam Soverel, a pro poker player who has approximately $19M in recorded earnings! Hes here to talk about the state of poker, having big bets canceled, and when to bet on UFC. All of this and more on this weeks Wise Kracks!

The NFL continues to surprise fans (and upset bettors) with a Week 2 that had its fair share of underdog victories. Bill notes that the Baltimore Ravens and Miami Dolphins game was one to watch, with the Dolphins making a big comeback in the 4th quarter to beat the Ravens 42-38. Jon chimes in.

I was sitting with a bunch of people who bet Ravens they were happy until the wheels fell off and Miami made that comeback!

The Cleveland Browns and New York Jets found the Browns fumbling the lead with the Jets winning 31-30. Bill didnt agree with the Browns endgame strategy, They couldve just ran the clock out I guess its just the athlete in you that makes you want to score.

If theres any piece of Wise Kracks lore that every viewer knows, its that Jon is a die-hard Cowboys fan. So it may come as a surprise that, brace for this, Jon bet against his precious Cowboys!

I did a parlay and picked against the Cowboys for the first time in my life! exclaimed Jon.

With Jon betting against them, he was so confident in their defeat that he told everyone to bet the house against them.

Ultimately, the Cowboys defeated the Cincinnati Bengals 20-17, and it may be the only time a Cowboys win has upset Jon. Bill adds salt to the wound, Dallas dominated that game.

During their game against the Seattle Seahawks, 49ers quarterback Trey Lance succumbed to a broken ankle, an injury in which he will undergo season-ending surgery. With this, their Super Bowl odds went from +2000 to +1800. Bill explains why the loss of Lance doesnt affect their odds much, If any other team lost their starting quarterback, their odds are going way up they have a good backup with Jimmy Garoppolo. With Garoppolo stepping in, the guys are excited to see how the Walter Peyton Award winner will lead the 49ers.

From Week 1 to Week 2, Bill describes this time as one of the biggest overreaction weeks.

Any given week, anything can happen its why I dont bet sides very often.

Joining Bill and Jon this week is Sam Soverel, a poker pro with an affinity for betting on the UFC. As a pro poker player, Sam has approximately $19M in recorded earnings. Looking at his track record, Jon finds something fascinating about this number, Most of the guys who have a high number, it comes from one tournament, but you have multiple million dollar games! Sam nods, Its a consistency thing, the guys that are way up there just play consistently and have done well.

Despite all of his success in poker, Sam isnt much for circuits, I dont really do Europe, Im more of a cash game guy I mostly stick to Las Vegas ones. Jon asks if the bulk of his winnings are from cash games, to which Sam replies that for a while it was from online games, The games are bigger, more for fun.

Although he still plays from time to time, Sams interests have largely shifted from poker to sports betting, particularly the UFC. I like to bet UFC, but my problem is the lines move so much I got buried last week. For Sam, the best time to bet UFC is a week ahead of an event, usually when the market first comes up, Early UFC fights are a soft market.

When Sam bets, he bets big. Recently, Sam tried to bet a $200k parlay which was eventually kicked back to $2k, It was frustrating, I tried to make the bet multiple times after I opened my account and the lines had moved, my pending bet just wasnt there. Sportsbook enemy Bill empathizes with Sam, Trust me, I get limited all the time!

One tactic that Sam uses to circumvent limitations is doing round robins. Theyre a good way to get more money down without the books knowing, Bill says. Sam agrees, I can get down more than $5k with a round robin.

With such big bets, Jon and Bill are curious about Sams bankroll management. Sam explains how he doesnt really have a limit, because even with Bills suggestion of 1% to 3% of your bankroll going towards a bet, its still big numbers for him. Sam discusses how betting sports for as long as he has, has affected his betting,

Eventually youll get to a point where the limit is just what people will take, not your payroll.

When discussing betting, Sam and Bill agree on one thing; you can be more aggressive on something if you have closing line value. However, Sam is always unsure of one aspect, The scary thing is not knowing what your edge is.

Jon poses a final question, Are you getting back into poker? Sam replies contently,

I havent played much poker recently I think Im going to stick to mostly betting UFC everywhere I can.

Welcome to Wise Kracks, the show to know for all things betting, pop culture, tips & more. Your hosts Jon Orlando and Bill Krackomberger go in on the NHL, NBA, MLB, & the NFL, with an all-knowing but fun attitude.

Every week presents a new guest from the world of sports and entertainment that we guarantee will teach you something new. Wise Kracks wants you to step your game up, and with Bill on your side, that wont be a challenge.

A new episode of Wise Kracks drops every Thursday on the WSN YouTube channel, so tune in!

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NFL Week 2 Recap & Betting Tips With Poker Pro Sam Soverel - World Sports Network

Get to Maryland

Four years after its debut, the PokerStars Players No Limit Holdem Championship (PSPC) is finally set to make its return to the poker calendar in January 2023 at the Baha Mar hotel in the Bahamas. A big part of the hype for the first edition and, subsequently, the upcoming one, is the Platinum Pass. Because PokerStars and its live events tend to cater to international players, US-based players are often left out of promotions. Fortunately, that is changing, as PokerStars has announced the first opportunity for players in the States to win a Platinum Pass in a live tournament.

That tournament is a Road to PSPC stop at the Maryland Live! Casino in Hanover, Maryland. The $360 buy-in event begins next week, running September 29 through October 2. The winner of the tournament, in addition to the regular prize money, will receive a coveted Platinum Pass for entry into the PSPC early next year.

The Platinum Pass consists of the $25,000 entry into the PSPC, $1,900 in expense money (read: airfare), six nights in a five-star hotel for the winner and a guest, airport transfers, and Platinum Pass winner experiences during the course of the event. All told, the Platinum Pass is worth about $30,000.

There will be more Road to PSPC events in the United States, but right now, the one at Maryland Live! Casino is the first and only one on the schedule.

In late August, PokerStars announced a route to a Platinum Pass for online players in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and New Jersey. Players can earn points toward a Platinum Pass leaderboard for playing real money games from August 30 through December 10. Both cash games and tournaments count, as do deposits.

At the end of each month, the top 500 players on the Pennsylvania leaderboard, the top 300 in Michigan, and the top 200 in New Jersey will play in a freeroll for qualifiers in their respective states. It is in those freeroll tournaments that PokerStars will award Platinum Passes.

Participants in the US-based Championships of Online Poker (COOP) will also be able to win Platinum Passes. If you havent played yet, its likely too late to compete for a Platinum Pass, as the COOPs end on September 26, but hey, you can still have fun playing in the tourneys. Six Platinum Passes will be handed out at the end of the series to the leaderboard winners in each state.

The original PSPC was a bold idea, a $25,000 live tournament, but accessible to more than just high rollers because of the Platinum Passes. PokerStars ran promos throughout 2018 and they worked, as 1,039 players entered the PSPC in early 2019, 320 of whom gained entry via a Platinum Pass.

The winner of the $5.1 million first prize was Ramon Colillas, who was one of those Platinum Pass recipients. Another PSPC had already been in the works and some Platinum Passes had been awarded, but the COVID-19 pandemic put a halt to live tournaments for much of 2020, so PokerStars had to delay the next iteration until now.

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PokerStars to Award First Live PSPC Platinum Pass in the US at Maryland Live! Casino - Poker News Daily

If youre a poker player and you want to make money, then you need to find the fish. Most players randomly play poker online, not even thinking about what kind of competition theyre going to be up against. This is a real error.

Half of todays game is to seek and destroy. If you want to play online poker for real money, then you need to go to the sites that have the most traffic. By doing so, youre going to find the largest pool of players. When you find the largest pool of players, you will find the most fish or the softest poker game. Lets take a look at where to find the most fish.

The best places to play poker online for real money are Ignition, Bovada, and Intertops.

Ignition attracts a lot of players because you can win 1,000 times your buy-in in a short period of time in a tournament. They will also run a tournament series from time to time in order to attract new players. These new players are often recreational. If you want to take advantage of someone who will be willing to call your all-in with AJ-off while youre holding AA, then you might want to play poker for real money on Ignition. It is considered one of the best online sites because of all the fish swimming around.

Ignition might be one of the best online poker sites for US players, but Bovada can sure give it a run for its money. Bovada has an advantage because it has been around since 2004. Therefore, it has the most US players of all poker online sites. Bovada is also known for having the fastest payouts, which might make it the best online poker sites US players. Americans love money, and they want their money fast. They can find that at Bovada.

If you love Monster Stack tournaments and youre seeking online poker real money, this is the place to go. You will find the game you want at 7 a.m., 7:00 p.m., and 7:30 p.m. All of those are Daily Monster Stack tournaments. This is a limited-time event, but you can safely bet that something similar will launch right around the corner on this poker online site. Bovada likes to take care of its players. Therefore, if the Daily Monster Stack tournaments are a success, they will bring it back or do something similar in the near future.

Intertops is a bit different. If youre seeking a cash game, otherwise known as a ring game, then this is where you want to go. Cash game players tend to play online all day and/or night. Its difficult not to do so if you know what youre doing and your opponents dont. When it comes to ring games, this is one of the top sites out there. Intertops also offers freerolls and sit & go tournaments.

The online game is a bit different than the live game. You see a lot more hands per hour online and people tend to be more aggressive. They also tend to make looser calls. This is because theyre hidden behind a screen and wont be embarrassed like they would in a live setting. This is a tremendous advantage for a patient player. You dont even need to bluff. With the online game, you can be the biggest NIT in the world and still make money. Just sit back and wait for an opponent to make an error. Then start counting your money.

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Best 7 Online Poker Sites (2022) for Real Money

There are many skills you will learn and develop by playing poker constantly. Here are 15 real-world skills you will develop when you play poker:

1. You will learn to control your emotions.

Poker is a game of highs and lows, where one wrong move in your poker hand can cost you the pot. Learning to keep your emotions in check whether youre on a winning or losing streak is an important skill that will help you in all aspects of your life. It does not even matter whether you are playing free poker or not. You will learn to keep your emotions in check when you play poker.

2. You will learn to make decisions quickly and under pressure.

In poker, as in life, sometimes you have to make split-second decisions at the poker table without knowing all the facts. This factor can be daunting, but poker will teach you how to assess a situation and make the best decision, even under pressure.

3. You will learn to manage risk and reward.

Every decision in poker comes with a certain amount of risk and reward. Understanding how to weigh these two factors is an essential skill that will help you make sound decisions in all areas of your life.

4. You will learn to think strategically.

To be successful at poker, you need to think about the moves of your poker hand several steps ahead of your opponents. This strategic thinking will come in handy in all aspects of your life, from your career to your relationships.

5. You will learn to read people.

Part of being successful at poker is being able to read your opponents understanding their tells and using that information to your advantage. This skill will also be helpful in many other areas of your life, such as dealing with difficult co-workers or negotiating essential contracts.

6. You will learn to stay calm under pressure.

Poker can be a very stressful game, and many players have cracked under pressure. Learning to keep your cool in the face of adversity is an essential skill that will come in handy in all areas of your life.

7. You will learn to be patient.

Patience is one of the most important skills you can learn from playing poker. In poker, as in life, sometimes the best course of action is to wait for the right opportunity and not force anything. This skill will serve you well in both your personal and professional life.

Photo from Pixabay

8. You will learn to have discipline.

To be successful at poker, you need to have the discipline to stick to your game plan and not be impulsive in betting all your poker chips in one go. This skill is essential in all areas of your life, from your finances to your fitness goals.

9. You will learn how to handle money.

Poker is a great way to learn how to manage money. From knowing when to place a bet to understanding the value of each chip, poker can teach you valuable lessons about handling money that you can apply to your finances.

10. You will learn how to deal with losses.

No one likes losing, but its an inevitable part of poker and life. Learning how to deal with losses constructively is an essential skill that will help you persevere in the face of setbacks.

Photo from Pixabay

11. You will learn how to be a good winner.

Just as its essential to know how to handle losses, its also important to know how to be a gracious winner. In poker and life its always better to be humble and respectful when you come out on top.

12. You will learn sportsmanship.

Poker is a competitive game, but its important to remember that its just a game. Learning to play fair and take your wins and losses in stride is an important lesson that will serve you well in all areas of your life.

13. You will learn how to have fun.

Poker is a great way to relax and have fun with friends. But even when the stakes are high, its important to remember that poker is just a game. Whether you win or lose, learning to enjoy the process is an essential skill that will help you in all aspects of your life.

14. You will learn about different cultures.

Poker is a global game; as such, its a great way to learn about different cultures and meet people worldwide. This knowledge and understanding will be valuable in your personal and professional life.

15. You will learn how to be a better person.

Poker is more than just a game its a way of life. And like all ways of life, it has the potential to make you a better person. From learning to be patient and disciplined to being able to handle money and deal with losses, poker can teach you important lessons that will help you in all areas of your life. GGPoker, the worlds largest poker room, offers a fun and safe place to play and enhance your poker skills. Sign up now and grab that exciting opportunity to learn and play with different types of players around the world. Remember to stay calm, focus on the game, and have fun.

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15 Real-World Skills You Will Have When You Play Poker - The Bronx Daily

PokerNews is known throughout the world for our industry-leading live updates for both live and online events. In fact, right now we're offering various updates right here.

Over the years, weve captured memorable hands, many of which have become a part of poker history. In this column, we will bring you some of the biggest hands that took place during the recently-completed Luxon Pay Mediterranean Poker Party Merit Cyprus.

Remember, if youre playing an event PokerNews is covering, you can get in the updates via the MyStack App. You can download the app for iPhone or Android now to get started. Then, create a new PokerNews account or update your current one to start updating your status immediately. Your followers can see all the live action that you're involved in.

Click here to download the My Stack app for iPhone, or click here to download the My Stack app for Android.

Check out all updates from the 2022 Mediterranean Poker Party here!

On Day 1b of the 2022 Mediterranean Poker Party PokerNews Cup, it was Level 7 (400/800/800) when there was around 10,000 in the middle in a three-bet pot. Dmitry Koleznev was the aggressor from the small blind.

The flop came and Koleznev down bet to 1,600. His opponent from the hijack raised to 6,000. Koleznev called.

The was the turn and action checked through.

The river was the and Koleznev bet 3,600 in which his opponent thought for a bit before calling. Koleznev turned over his cards one by one to reveal for quad aces for the nuts as his opponent mucked.

On Day 2 of the PokerNews Cup, it was Level 24 (20,000/40,000/40,000) when Dmitry Koleznev opened to 100,000 from the button and Furkan Beg defended his big blind.

Both players checked the flop but Beg came firing for 100,000 on the turn. Koleznev called.

On the river, Beg jammed over the top of Koleznev. Koleznev replied: "I'm sorry, straight flush," as he put his chips in and turned over .

Beg attempted to muck but the dealer turned over his , telling Koleznev: "That's the only card you call me with!"

After the dealer counted out Koleznev's chips, the damage to Beg was an additional 530,000 chips. Koleznev went on to finish as runner-up in the tournament for a smooth $30,000.

In Level 30 (80,000/160,000/160,000) of the PokerNews Cup, just six players remained when Ercan Hasan shoved all in for 675,000 from under the gun and Vittorio Maugini called for 520,000 from the small blind.

Vittorio Maugini: Ercan Hasan:

Hasan was in deep trouble but found hope on the , picking up a flush draw despite Maugini making top set.

All hope was lost on the turn, as the came to give the Italian quads.

The completed the board and Hasan was left with less than one big blind. Hasan busted in the next hand.

In the $10,000 buy-in 2022 Mediterranean Poker Party The One Drop, it was Level 1 (100/200/200), and in first the very first hand of the day with 5,600 in the middle and a flop of .

Albert Daher had checked from under the gun and Luc Bindel bet 1,800 from the middle position. Phil Nagy raised to 6,200 from the hijack only to have Daher to respond with a reraise to 13,500. Bindel folded but Nagy shoved. Daher called with the same stack.

Phillip Nagy: Albert Daher:

Nagy had flopped a set while Daher had picked up the nut flush draw.

The turn was the to keep Nagy ahead but the on the river gave Daher the flush to eliminate Nagy.

"Chips," Nady shouted out for a rebuy.

On Day 2 of the 2022 Mediterranean Poker Party $10,400 MPP High Roller, it was Level 15 (6,000/12,000/12,000) and there was roughly 260,000 in the middle on a board. Aleksey Borovkov, from the big blind, put in a bet of 130,000, leaving 154,000 chips behind.

Akin Tuna, in the button on a similar stack, moved all in over the top of Borovkov, who made the call.

Aleksey Borovkov: Akin Tuna:

Borovkov had flopped a straight but Tuna was drawing to a bigger flush draw.

The river brought the , which had Tuna pumping the air until he realized Borovkov had hit an unlikely straight flush on the river, which whittled him down to about 14,000 chips. A distraught Tuna claimed that he was not going to come back after the dinner break.

Executive Editor US, PokerNews Podcast co-host & 2013 WSOP Bracelet Winner.

Link:

Hands of the Week: Phil Nagy Busts First Hand of Luxon Pay Mediterranean Poker Party - PokerNews.com

Paul Pierce was a great player in the NBA but the story might be different on the poker table, however, he once scooped a sweet $40,000 pot!

While most NBA players excel in just one game, they are never afraid to try out their hands in other sports. Just ask Michael Jordan, who play in the Minor Leagues once.

Spurred by seeing the Greatest of all time take up different sports, players often go this route. Paul Pierce is been among those that wanted to try their hand at different sports. He chose poker and boy was that a bad decision.

Over the last few years, he has appeared on several poker shows and his gambling habit has been talked about a lot. He apparently owed something $180,000 as a poker debt and refused to pay it back.

But today, well talk about his success at the poker table. A time when he won a mammoth $40,000 in a single hand!

Also read: $70M worth Paul Pierce once threw his headband into the crowd just to get it thrown back at him by a fan

Talk about scooping. In the televised hand, Paul Pierces first hand is a pair of Jacks and he has a decision to make. His opponent raises to $20,000. Paul just sat down with $20,000, he would have to go all-in on his first hand!

And, of course, he makes the call. Fortunately for him, his opponent has a King and a Jack, which means he is very far ahead. Take a look at the hand below!

After winning, you can clearly see Paul is overjoyed. The poker royalty around him cheers him on and even starts doing the action of shooting a jumper to hype him up.

Poker legend Phil Hellmuth was also at the table and he even tweeted about the incident.

The aftermath of the night is unclear but it looks like one of the few times Paul won big and his celebrations were justified.

Also read: Paul Pierce lost $140,000 to gambling and is now being sued for $40,000 more

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When $70 million Celtics legend, Paul Pierce scooped $40,000 on a hand of poker - The Sportsrush