Player of the Year

The Great Nazari Chase
By Ryan Lucchesi

The first five months of the Card Player 2009 Player of the Year (POY) race has been a contest to catch PokerStars Caribbean Adventure Champion Poorya Nazari. For that win in January, Nazari took home 3,000 POY points and $3 million. Since that time, everyone in the chase has set his sights on taking down Nazari, but no one has been able to catch him. Many players have scored big wins to find themselves close — most notably, Jude Ainsworth (PokerStars Spring Championship of Online Poker champion), who sits in second place with 2,840 points, and Cornel Cimpan (L.A. Poker Classic champion), who is in third place with 2,730 points. Not even the WPT Championship winner Yevgeniy Timoshenko (fifth place) and the EPT Grand Final Champion Pieter de Korver (tied for sixth place) scored enough points to catch Nazari.

The World Series of Poker has begun, and with the multitude of points that are up for grabs this summer in Las Vegas, someone else is bound to join the 3,000 club and pass Nazari for the lead. Dangerous opponents lurking near the top of the leader board include Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier (11th place – 2,102 points), who is seeking his first gold bracelet, and veteran Kathy Liebert (12th place – 2,100 points), who will be looking to capture a second gold bracelet. Be sure to follow all of the WSOP action this summer on CardPlayer.com, to see how the WSOP will affect the POY race.

U.S. Events From Coast to Coast Award POY Points
The period leading up to the WSOP has historically been a quiet one during the course of a tournament year, but as more events popped up all across the country, there were a couple of tournaments of note that gave players their last opportunity to score before the summer. The final WSOP Circuit event of the 2008-2009 season took place at Harrah’s New Orleans, where the $5,000 no-limit hold’em championship attracted 167 players. Jean “Prince” Gaspard tallied 816 POY points for the win. Runner-up Billy Kopp won 680 points, and although this puts him in only 229th place in the POY race, it proves that he is a double threat, as he is in 21st place in the Card Player Online Player of the Year race with 3,538 points. The Borgata $500,000-Guaranteed Deep Stack event attracted 696 players, and Lawrence Rao emerged as the champion, which was good for 960 POY points.

Look Out:
Matt Woodward

Matt Woodward finished second in the 2009 PokerStars European Poker Tour Grand Final in Monte Carlo and took home €1.3 million in prize money. This was the largest cash in Woodward’s young career, but definitely not his first. He has been cashing in poker tournaments since 2005, and has shown particular strength in limit hold’em events. His first cash came in the PartyPoker Million IV, the largest limit hold’em championship in the world. He has also cashed in the top 25 the last two years in the World Series of Poker limit hold’em world championship.

This limit hold’em background has enabled Woodward not to be afraid of playing out of position, which has proven to be valuable in no-limit hold’em events, as evidenced by his recent success. “When everyone is making small raises before the flop, you have to defend your blinds. You can’t just be folding all of your mediocre hands to someone who’s making it just two-and-a-half big blinds to play preflop when there are antes and everything else out there,” said Woodward.

In addition to the Grand Final runner-up finish, Woodward cashed in 19th place in the 2009 L.A. Poker Classic no-limit hold’em championship. Through his live no-limit hold’em experience, he has learned the value of picking up every piece of information he can from his opponents. “I try not to give too much away; a lot of it is picking up on not just physical stuff, but betting patterns. You have to stay focused throughout the day and pick up more on them than they are picking up on you,” he said.

Woodward is now closing in on $2 million in lifetime tournament winnings, and is turning his attention to the WSOP, where he has cashed five times already in his career. “I was pretty confident in my game before the Grand Final, but it definitely helped in giving me a lot of experience and a lot of confidence, and hopefully I’ll make some deep runs at the World Series this year,” he stated. He currently has 2,060 Player of the Year points, which is good for 13th place on the leader board.

Steve Gross Maintains Slight Lead Over Shaun Deeb in Online Player of the Year Race
The World Series of Poker always brings more parity to the Online Player of the Year (OPOY) race. The top players take a much needed summer break from their computer monitors in favor of live-tournament play, and the trailing competitors in the race pounce on the opportunity to make up OPOY points.
Inasmuch as all players in the top 10 are at least 21 years old, you can be sure that they will be making more than a few appearances at the Rio, giving those chasing them a chance to tighten up the race.

Steve “gboro780” Gross still holds the lead in the standings, but Shaun “tedsfishfry” Deeb has closed the gap considerably and is only 34 points behind Gross. What used to be a two-man show has grown, and now includes two new players who are over the 5,000-point mark. Nick “FU_15” Maimone and Nick “Grippolio” Grippo are now within striking distance of the leaders, thanks to solid showings in various rebuy events over the last two months.

Here’s a look at the leader board as of May 27, 2009: