Card Player CEO Captures World Series of Poker Europe Championship

Las Vegas, courtesy of the World Series, has an iron grip on the poker world each summer. Now, across the Atlantic, it has a European rival each fall.
London, England, was the world’s poker capital last month as the_ World Series of Poker Europe_ descended on the Casino at the Empire. Located in Leicester Square, in the heart of Central London, the Empire hosted a four-bracelet series that drew 1,254 players and paid out a collective $8.5 million in prize money.

Running concurrently across town was the PokerStars.com European Poker Tour London poker festival (see Page 52). The prospects of winning one of the multiple big buy-in events in one of the world’s most dynamic cities attracted top poker talent from around the globe for weeks of nonstop action.

The crown jewel of the 2009 WSOPE was the £10,000 ($15,868) main event. It drew 334 players and took six long days to whittle the field down to a champion.

In the end, Card Player owner Barry Shulman out-dueled Daniel Negreanu in an exciting five-hour heads-up battle to take home £801,603 in prize money and his second WSOP bracelet.

Standouts
Prior to the main event, the WSOPE awarded three pieces of poker hardware. J.P. Kelly won the first event, £1,000 no-limit hold’em (£136,803); Erik Cajelais won the second, £2,500 pot-limit hold’em/Omaha (£104,677); and Jani Vilmunen captured the third, £5,000 pot-limit Omaha (£204,048).

There would be no multiple bracelet winners in Europe, however, as none of these winners could get it going in the main event.

Two starting days — which drew 156 and 212 players, respectively — kicked off the main event. After the fields were combined and they put in a 15-hour day, 92 players remained. Another long day, the fourth, trimmed the field to the money at 36 players.

The fifth day of play reduced the field to the final nine, and all eyes were on Jason Mercier. The Card Player 2009 Player of the Year contender, who’s banked more than $4 million in tournament winnings in the last 18 months, played remarkably well on his way to accumulating nearly a third of the chips in play going to the final table. In particular, he abused Saar Wilf, who was sitting in second chip position with just 18 players left. Eventually, Mercier slid the majority of Wilf’s chips into his own stack, and Wilf exited in 16th place.

With so many notable players remaining on the WSOPE final-table bubble, the Empire was filled wall-to-wall with rowdy fans clutching pint glasses. A steady stream of footballers-cum-poker fans shuffled through to catch a glimpse of Teddy Sheringham, a semiretired Manchester United and English national player who has become a regular fixture on the Euro felt. He put up the best poker result of his career by finishing in 14th place (£40,481). Other notable players who finished high were Tony Cousineau, 13th (£40,481); Ram Vaswani, 15th (£40,481); Doyle Brunson, 17th (£32,198); Liz Lieu, 22nd (£25,918); and Player of the Year leader Yevgeniy Timoshenko, 25th (£25,918).

Final Table for the Ages
The 2009 WSOPE final table will be remembered as one of the most impressive in poker history. It included six WSOP bracelet winners — Daniel Negreanu (4), Chris Bjorin (2), Jason Mercier (1), Praz Bansi (1), Matt Hawrilenko (1), and Barry Shulman (1) — and two members of the 2009 “November Nine,” James Akenhead and Antoine Saout.

Here were the chip counts and seat positions starting final-table play:
Seat 1 Barry Shulman 1,090,000
Seat 2 Jason Mercier 3,198,000
Seat 3 Praz Bansi 1,160,000
Seat 4 Markus Ristola 784,000
Seat 5 Chris Bjorin 518,000
Seat 6 James Akenhead 1,398,000
Seat 7 Daniel Negreanu 438,000
Seat 8 Antoine Saout 701,000
Seat 9 Matt Hawrilenko 674,000

Lots of chips and a slow structure did not disappoint the capacity crowd, as it took 16-and-a-half hours to determine a winner.

Local favorite James Akenhead was the first to depart. He moved all in over Chris Bjorin’s opening raise with the A Q, and Negreanu, who woke up with the K K, reraised all in over the top of Akenhead. The kings held up, and Akenhead was sent home in ninth place (£66,533).

Next to go was Matt Hawrilenko, who moved all in after Shulman opened the action. Hawrilenko was caught squeezing with the J 7 against Shulman’s A Q. A safe board kept the ace high good, and Hawrilenko departed in eighth place (£87,074).

November Nine participant Antoine Saout was felted next in seventh place (£114,228) after he lost a race to Negreanu. Saout went all in preflop with the 5 5 against Daniel’s A Q, which made a flush on the river.

The preflop confrontations continued, with Chris Bjorin being eliminated in sixth place (£150,267) after his all-in push with the A J was looked up by Negreanu’s A Q. This was Bjorin’s third cash at this year’s WSOP Europe — the most of any player. Daniel also busted Markus Ristola in fifth place (£200,367) after calling his preflop push with the A 5, which held up against Ristola’s K 10.

“Kid Poker’s” next victim was Jason Mercier, who was eliminated in fourth place (£267,267). Negreanu raised from under the gun, and Shulman made the call from the button. Mercier moved all in, and Negreanu called. Shulman got out of the way. Mercier was in bad shape with the 7 7 against Negreanu’s 9 9. The nines held up, and the chip leader to start the final table was sent packing, while Negreanu jumped into the chip lead with more than 4.7 million.

Local favorite Praz Bansi had the vocal support of seemingly the entire Empire crowd, but he had a rough go of it three-handed. First, he got Shulman all in and was a big favorite with the A Q against Barry’s A J. But, the board rolled out 5 4 4 5 10, bringing a chop and keeping Shulman alive. Then, Bansi lost a huge pot to Shulman after calling an all-in check-raise with the K 8 on a K 9 4 board. Barry had him dominated with the K J, which held up and left Praz with just 825,000. Shortly thereafter, Negreanu finished him off. Bansi shoved from the button with the Q 2, and Negreanu called from the small blind with the A Q. Third place was worth £360,887 for Praz.

Heads Up
Negreanu had busted six players at the final table, and when heads-up play began, it showed, as the chip counts were as follows:
Negreanu: 6,180,000
Shulman: 3,855,000

A long heads-up battle ensued, lasting nearly five hours. The rapid-fire small ball was punctuated by two memorable and pivotal hands.

First, with Shulman down about 5-3 in chips, a critical double-up left Negreanu short. Daniel raised his button, and Barry called. The flop came down K 8 6. Shulman moved all in and Negreanu quickly called. Daniel’s A A was leading, but Shulman’s A 5 had nine outs to the flush, and the 2 on the turn delivered a critical double-up and left Shulman with a 3-1 chip advantage.

During the next two hours, Daniel hung tough and eventually took back the chip lead after capturing a 2.5 million pot after moving all in on a 10 7 2 flop when his 240,000 bet was raised to 700,000 by Shulman.

Soon thereafter, the hand of the tournament, if not the year, came down. Shulman raised his button and Negreanu called. The flop came J 8 5. Negreanu checked, Shulman bet 300,000, Negreanu raised to 900,000, and Barry moved all in. Daniel weighed his options, asked the crowd if they were ready to go home, and eventually called. He found himself in bad shape, as his Q J was up against Shulman’s A A. With Negreanu needing one of five cards (three queens and two jacks) or a runner-runner flush, the crowd went wild when the J fell on the turn to give Negreanu a huge lead in the hand. Now, it was Shulman who was in trouble, as he needed one of the two remaining aces on the river. When the A♦ came, Negreanu saw his hopes of capturing his fifth WSOP bracelet fade away. Just a few hands later, he was all in with pocket fours against Shulman’s pocket tens, and the match was over, with Shulman the victor.

Despite not winning his fifth WSOP bracelet, runner-up Negreanu secured an impressive consolation prize; with this second-place finish, he became the all-time leading tournament money winner. He now has more than $12 million in tournament winnings, and he made the final table in back-to-back WSOP Europe main events. He finished fifth in last year’s championship.

For Shulman, his attention now turns to his son Jeff, who is one of the November Nine finalists.

“I did my part,” he said in a post-victory interview. “Now, you do your part. It’s your turn to win.”

World Series of Poker Europe Champion Barry Shulman: ALL business ­— at and away from the table
Beginning poker players are often told that the key to beating the game is paying attention to your opponents. Card Player Media CEO Barry Shulman did not get the memo.

A man who once used the poker room at The Mirage as his office to put together real-estate deals says that he has found utter enjoyment in playing poker recreationally for the past five decades.

While poker has always remained a fun, part-time activity for Shulman, his victory in the World Series of Poker Europe main event shows that he has what it takes to compete with just about anyone.

Even if he is busy frantically thumbing text messages on his Blackberry to manage his business empire, he is simultaneously check-raising his opponents all in.

Love of the Game
Shulman, who also publishes Card Player magazine, says that he just loves poker. It was a popular pastime for the 63-year-old executive while he was in high school and college.

“I thought that I died and went to heaven when I saw my first public cardroom while attending the University of California,” he recalls. “I started playing at the Oaks Card Club. They had probably 20 tables of lowball and one table of high draw. I didn’t have enough to buy in for the lowball. The cheapest game was $3-$3 with a $100 buy-in. But they had a $1 blind high draw-poker game with a $60 buy-in. That’s how I started, and boy was it tight!”

Shulman cut his teeth in these low buy-in games for years. After graduating and achieving success in the business world, he dabbled more and more in poker, but usually just on vacations.

“I was real busy working. But on vacations, we used to go to Tahoe, and I just loved playing poker there.”

Years of working as a successful real-estate developer kept him from playing on a regular basis. But he picked the game up again in earnest after moving to Las Vegas in the early 1990s to “retire.”

“I was pretty much retired at the time, but I needed something to do with my brain,” Shulman says. “I love business and love numbers, and figured that if these other guys could win, I could too.”

He started playing $10-$20 hold’em almost daily. Tournaments also were getting popular at this time, and Shulman admits to being bitten by the low buy-in freezeout bug.

“I began playing in one [tournament] nearly every day at the Gold Coast. They had a small event every day at noon, and I was there five days a week, trying to learn the ins and outs of tournament poker. It’s not like we had tons of books, the Internet, or online instruction like players do today to learn the ropes.”

Live action was Barry’s bread and butter, though, and The Mirage was the place to play at the time. He played $20-$40 Omaha high-low daily, more for the social aspect of the game than the potential profits. In fact, he spent so much time in the smoky confines of The Mirage poker room that he had business cards printed that read, “Barry Shulman: Poker,” with the poker room’s phone number.

“This was the mid-1990s,” Shulman chuckles. “People didn’t have cellphones. We would start the game every day at about 10 a.m., and I would grab a seat by the poker room phone.” When the big Vegas poker action moved across Flamingo Road to Bellagio, Shulman followed, playing in the $15-$30 Omaha games.

But the shrewd businessman, who was bored with just managing a few apartment properties around Vegas, saw a wave of momentum behind poker. In 1998, he bought Card Player magazine. “It was crystal clear to me that poker was going to boom,” he states. “Bellagio was opening this beautiful cardroom. The Internet was new, and I thought that would help facilitate poker’s growth. And the ability to use holecard cameras to show poker on TV made it a spectator sport.

“But what really put it over the top for me was the increased popularity of tournaments. The best player doesn’t win every day, and they are fun and offer a big upside with little risk.” Shulman’s crystal ball proved to be correct, and under his management, Card Player grew into a global business with publications spanning 25 countries.

Business At and Away From the Table
Overall, Shulman says poker is similar to running a business, and that is why he thought he could succeed on the felt.

“There are overview skills necessary for success at each, so much so that I think poker should be taught at MBA schools,” he explains. “Both involve understanding risk and reward, risk of loss, odds, protection, and mastering reading people, bluffing, and discipline.”

Despite being a self-described recreational player, Shulman has racked up an impressive $2.87 million in lifetime tournament winnings. He now has two World Series bracelets, with his first coming in 2001 in a $1,500 seven-card stud high-low split event.

But, he admits that over the years, a few additional victories would have been likely if his focus at the table had been solely on poker.

“As a businessman, I’ve made some mistakes through the years at the table by focusing on business and not 100 percent on the hands,” Barry explains. “My son [Jeff] often chastises me for being on my phone doing work in the middle of tournaments. But I just love business, just love making deals.”

Focus was not an issue for Shulman at the WSOP Europe, despite the long hours. The day before the final table was a 15-hour grind. Then, it took more than 16 hours to turn the lights out at the final table.

Anyone who watched the five-hour heads-up match, in which the two competitors ripped through tournament-life decisions at a torrid pace, observed that poker is just as much endurance and concentration as it is having a read on your opponent.

Shulman credits his renewed energy and focus at the table to a workout program, healthy diet, and heavy intake of green tea and honey.

Like Father, Like Son
The biggest story from Barry’s win isn’t limited to just defeating Daniel Negreanu heads up for the championship bracelet and a pile of British pounds. Instead, the focus shifts to his son Jeff, and the possibility that the poker world could have father and son World Series champions.

So, how do their games stack up?

“When both of us are playing our best games, they are very similar,” Barry explains. “We don’t play a lot of hands, we play small pots, we play aggressively when we have big hands, and we are not demonstrative at the table. You won’t see us doing dances when we make big hands. And you won’t see us kicking chairs when we get sucked out on.”

Barry says that one skill he’d like to pry from Jeff’s arsenal is his “soul-read” ability. “He is a master at knowing what other players have. That skill comes very easy to him, and is very difficult for me.”

Regardless of whether or not this mastery propels Jeff to the 2009 World Series championship title and ships him the $8.5 million first prize, it’s been a good year to be a Shulman.

The two already have banked, collectively, more than $2.5 million this year. And from a historical perspective, they have a chance to write one of the game’s most accomplished stories in just a few short weeks.