A Look Back At 2013: The Poker Year In Review

A look at the major poker headlines from 2013 revealed an industry in flux. An increase in the number of live poker tournaments both domestically and internationally failed to drastically reduce participation numbers, pointing to a slight increase in interest for the game as the economy continued to rebound.

However, online poker continues to decline with global traffic falling around 15 percent in 2013, according to PokerScout. But, online poker continues to be an issue for many states looking to find another source of tax revenue. Of the 48 states with some form of gambling (Utah and Hawaii have no gaming of any kind) only three, Nevada, Delaware and New Jersey, are up and running licensed and regulated online poker sites. With numerous federal bills lacking support, these states will have to prove to the rest of the country that online poker is a lucrative endeavor, or it will be several more years until all of the United States can join in on the fun.

The brick-and-mortar casino industry, however, continued to experience huge growth across the country, with casinos opening in Ohio and Pennsylvania. Maryland expanded gambling to include table games and new properties should be up and running there and in New York, North Carolina, Iowa and Massachusetts by the end of next year.

Card Player has sorted through the muck to bring you the most important stories of a year that included both good and bad news for the poker world, as well as a resurgence for some of the game’s most notable personalities and talents.

American Casinos Enjoy Huge Year As Regulated Online Poker Makes Its Debut
The year 2013 was a monster year for the casino industry in the United States.

Nevada, Delaware and New Jersey all kicked off their respective online gambling industries. Nevada did so in April; Delaware began in October; and New Jersey commenced in November.

When Nevada’s Ultimate Poker took its first real-money wager it was the first time a poker site sanctioned by a U.S. state was in operation. Both Nevada and Delaware had legal online gaming prior to 2013, while New Jersey authorized the industry in the early part of 2013. It was a big win for the state, which is home to Atlantic City. The resort town has been slumping heavily for a handful of years, and analysts expected a couple of casinos to close down had the legislature not approved casino games on the web.

The aforementioned three states all have games that are reserved for only people physically within their respective borders, but 2014 could see some state partnerships to increase liquidity.

As for the brick-and-mortar side of things, there were a lot of positive developments.
In November, voters in New York approved a plan that calls for the construction of a handful of Las Vegas-style commercial casinos in the state. The Empire State already has tribal casinos, but the commercial properties signal a new era for New York gaming. Under current plans, there won’t be a casino coming to New York City, but that presumably could happen down the road.

In Massachusetts, gaming regulators made big strides in figuring out who should win the rights to build brand new casinos in the state. As 2013 was winding to a close, both MGM Resorts International and Wynn Resorts Ltd., two of the largest casino operators in the world, looked like the favorites to build in their respective regions. MGM wants to build in Springfield, while Wynn is eyeing the Boston area. The state legalized three such casinos in 2011.

This summer, traditional table games came to the state of Maryland, which was great news for poker players there. Such games were authorized by a statewide referendum in 2012. As part of gambling expansion moves in Maryland, another casino was authorized. MGM looks like the favorite to build a property in Prince George’s County, adjacent to the nation’s capitol. The site is at National Harbor. Over in Baltimore, Caesars Entertainment Corp. broke ground on its casino project in May. The $400 million casino is estimated to be 335,000 square feet and will house between 80 and 110 table games.

Ohio welcomed its fourth Las Vegas-style casino in March when the Horseshoe Casino Cincinnati opened its doors. That property followed Horseshoe Casino Cleveland, Hollywood Casino Columbus, and Hollywood Casino Toledo. Ohio legalized these casinos in 2009.

The state of Pennsylvania just saw one new casino open in 2013, and it didn’t legalize online poker, though it did briefly flirt with the idea and mandate that a study of online games be presented next year. However, it did pass a measure to allow gambling at its bars and taverns. Competition is also heating up for a new casino in Philadelphia, as a decision from the state on who can build is expected sometime in 2014. Steve Wynn decided to ditch his casino plan in the area.

In May, some New Hampshire lawmakers defeated a plan that would have allowed for a single Las Vegas-style casino in the state, but proponents of the idea are currently reworking the proposal and should be pushing the issue again in 2014. New Hampshire wants to keep pace with Massachusetts.

There were some efforts in Texas earlier this year to try and authorize poker, but those moves didn’t pass muster in one of the biggest anti-gambling states in the country.

In Illinois, a gambling expansion bill was defeated last summer and in October state officials rejected a plan that would have allowed existing gambling establishments to stay open 24 hours a day.

In 2012, the U.S. commercial casino industry captured $37.34 billion in gaming revenue, which was the second best ever behind the record set in 2007. While there are no official numbers available yet for 2013, signs do point toward another great year for the industry. As for tribal casinos, the $27.9 billion revenue captured in 2012 was their highest figure ever.

Though they don’t receive as much press, there were rumblings for new tribal casinos in states such as Wisconsin, North Carolina, California, and South Dakota in 2013.

With the onset of online gaming, as well as more brick-and-mortar gambling facilities, overall gaming revenue in the United States should keep growing. Everyone talks about Macau with its more than $40 billion in annual gaming revenue as the top gambling market in the world, but if you think of the U.S. as a whole, it is still by far the top market on the planet.

Return Of High-Stakes Online Cash Game Action

This year marked the return of the high-stakes action on Full Tilt Poker. The site, which is still closed to players from the United States, has been home to the biggest games on the Internet for many years now. Full Tilt was acquired by PokerStars in 2012.
With just a few weeks left in 2013, Niklas “ragen70” Heinecker was the big winner with around $6 million in profits. When you add that to his $4.5 million in live tournament winnings in 2013, he is the top performer in all of poker over the past 12 months.

Heinecker has about double the profits of the second-place Internet earner. That honor goes to Ben “Bttech86” Tollerene. Ola “Odd Oddsen” Amundsgaard also had around $3 million in earnings on the year. Let’s go back to Heinecker for a second. What makes his year even more amazing is the fact that all his profits came in about half a year.

Since Full Tilt Poker returned to cyberspace in November 2012, Gus Hansen has consistently gotten pounded by his high-stakes competitors. As 2013 winded to a close, the wheels had fallen off completely and there were no signs of them being put back on anytime soon. He even took a break.

He lost nearly $8.6 million during the calendar year, which has seen him plummet to $15 million lifetime in the hole on Full Tilt. That’s his worst ever deficit on the software and by far the most in online poker history.

The second worst account ever was noataima, which lost around $7 million.

Hansen’s losses are especially startling when you consider that he was on a $6 million upswing prior to Full Tilt Poker shutting down. Reuniting with his account hasn’t turned out to be so great.

In addition to Heinecker, Tollerene, and Amundsgaard, other winners on the year include Alex “IReadYrSoul” Millar ($2 million), Hac “trex313” Dang ($1.9 million), Patrik “FinddaGrind” Antonius ($1.5 million), Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond ($1.1 million), Viktor “Isildur1” Blom ($1 million), Tom “durrrr” Dwan ($750,000), and Dan “jungleman12” Cates ($735,000).

Phil “Polarizing” Ivey, who is still the biggest winner in online poker history, lost $2.4 million online this year. Ben “Sauce1234” Sulsky, who was the top earner in 2012, dropped $1.5 million this year.

Big Names Make Their Presence Felt In Tournament Poker

By the time December rolls around the top twenty in the Card Player Player of the Year race usually features a mix of a few established pros among plenty of previously unheralded up-and-comers.

The 2013 POY standings, however, look like a who’s-who list, with top television names from the early-2000’s boom battling it out with the stars of the Internet era. This state of affairs is a result of these big names putting up huge results throughout the year, which made 2013 an exciting year to follow tournament poker. Here is a look at the year on the circuit broken down by season.

Winter

Once again the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure kicked off the year, with the very first major event of 2013 being the $100,000 buy-in super high roller. A record turnout of 59 entries in this reentry tournament made it the largest field ever in an event with a buy-in of six-figures or higher. In the end American pro Scott Seiver emerged victorious, earning just over $2 million for the win. Seiver went on to make 10 total final tables in 2013. Bulgarian poker pro Dimitar Danchev topped the field of 987 in the PCA $10,300 main event to win $1,859,000 and take an early lead in the POY race. Rounding out the trio of seven-figure winners at the PCA was Vanessa Selbst, who won the $25,000 high roller event for $1.4 million and as a result overtook Kathy Liebert to become the all-time winningest female poker player in the history of live tournaments.

Later in January the 2013 Aussie Millions continued its tradition of huge events, with Andrew Robl winning the $100,000 super high roller for $1 million and Sam Trickett capturing the $250,000 buy-in event for $2.1 million. Mervin Chan topped a field of 629 to win the $10,000 AUD main event for $1.7 million.

Back stateside Mike “The Mouth” Matusow made his way through the field of 64 in the NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship to defeat Phil Hellmuth for the title and $750,000. This seemingly made-for-TV moment was a fitting end for the return of this unique event, which did not take place in 2012.

As winter began to wind down, Canadian Paul Klann beat online poker pro Paul Volpe to win the World Poker Tour L.A. Poker Classic and win just over $1 million. Volpe went on to finish third in the WPT Bay 101 Shooting Star just weeks later to become a major POY contender.

Spring

Daniel Negreanu got his run to the top of the 2013 rankings started at the inaugural World Series of Poker Asia Pacific, where he won the main event to capture his fifth career gold bracelet and $1,038,825 AUD. Negreanu was far from done in 2013, though.

Up next on the increasingly international tournament circuit was the PokerStars European Poker Tour Grand Final in Monte Carlo. As in previous years, this series hosted a number of gigantic events, including the €100,000 Super High Roller event, won by Max Altergott for €1.75 million, a €25,000 event won by Steven ‘Zugwat’ Silverman, and of course the EPT Grand Final main event title which went to Steve O’Dwyer, along with €1.2 million.

With summer approaching, the World Poker Tour closed out its 11th season with a bang at Bellagio with the $25,000 WPT Championship, won by Chino Rheem for $1.1 million. Rheem defeated Erick Lindgren heads-up to capture his second WPT title.

Summer

With 79,471 total participants in 2013 the World Series of Poker once again proved why it is the marquee poker series, with 62 events paying out more than $197 million in prize money. The long list of notable winners included Matthew Waxman, Cliff Josephy, Mike Matusow, Mark Radoja, Taylor Paur, Davidi Kitai, Martin Finger, David Chiu, Erick Lindgren, Jeff Madsen, Jared Hamby, Steve Gross, Marco Johnson, Barny Boatman, Steve Sung, Matt Perrins, Eli Elezra, and Daniel Alaei.

Tom Schneider kept alive the incredible 14-year streak at the WSOP of at least one player winning multiple bracelets when he won both the $1,500 and $5,000 H.O.R.S.E. events.

Anthony Gregg won the $111,111 One Drop high roller no-limit event for his first bracelet and $4.8 million. In the $50,000 eight-game Poker Player’s Championship Matthew Ashton emerged victorious with $1,774,089 at his fourth final table of the summer.

The centerpiece of not just the summer, but the entire year in tournament poker is still the WSOP main event. This year young pro Ryan Riess topped a field of 6,352 players to win the title of world champion, his first bracelet and the $8.3 million payday, the largest awarded in 2013.

August normally sees somewhat of a lull after the Series, but this year saw one of the largest events take place as summer wound down. A total of 2,384 entries were made in the Seminole Hard Rock Poker Open $10 million guaranteed, $5,300 buy-in no-limit hold’em main event, and in the end Blair Hinkle defeated Justin Bonomo to win $1.7 million.

Fall

In late September Anthony Zinno defeated Vanessa Selbst heads-up in the WPT Borgata Poker Open $3,500 main event, topping a field of 1,189 entries. This was Selbst’s second huge score of the year, and put her near the top of the leaderboard in the POY race.

As the weather continued to grow colder, much of the focus of the tournament world turned towards Europe for huge events on the European Poker Tour and the World Series of Poker Europe. This marked the first year that the WSOPE was held outside of Paris, France. Adrian Mateos, a 19-year-old Spaniard, won the main event for €1,000,000. Daniel Negreanu won his second huge title of the year in the €25,000 no-limit high roller, good for a €725,000 payday and his sixth gold bracelet. In addition to the title, the hardware and the money, the 39-year-old Canadian born poker pro also extended his already sizable lead in the POY race by 1,562 points over his nearest competitor, Paul Volpe. He made seven final tables in total in 2013, with year-to-date earnings of $3.1 million.

German high-roller tournament specialist Philipp Gruissem won his third title of 2013, each coming in an event with a buy-in of $50,000 or higher, when he took down the WPT Alpha8 St. Kitts $100,000 super high roller as November wound down. As a result he moved into the top ten in the POY race, with year-to-date earnings of $4,494,419. He has made seven final tables in total in 2013, each of which earned him a six-figure payday.

It was an action packed year on the tournament circuit, with big money and huge titles going both to old-school champions intent on proving they still have it and to the young-guns who are intent on being the next superstars of the game. If 2014 can even come close to the past year in terms of excitement, we are in for another great year.

Card Player Poker Tour Enjoys Breakout Season

The Card Player Poker Tour (CPPT) saw a breakout year in 2013 with stops spanning the crystal blue waters of the Caribbean to the snow capped peaks of Reno, Nevada and crowning eight main event champions while putting new players in the spotlight.

With eight stops and main event prize pools totalling more than $4 million the CPPT firmly planted its place among the best live tournament series. Three of the seven main event fields, with buy-ins ranging from $1,000 to $5,000, topped $1 million prize pools and four of the seven main event winners brought home six-figure pay days. Notable main even winners included WSOP bracelet winner Allyn Jaffrey Shulman and high-stakes cash game regular Ray Dehkharghani.

Other notable names who took their seats at various stops throughout 2103 include WSOP bracelet winner and Seminole Hard Rock $10 million guarantee winner Blair Hinkle, 2008 third place WSOP main event finisher Dennis Phillips, two-time WSOP bracelet winner Nick Schulman and former Card Player Player or the Year winner Tom Marchese.

The tour, started in 2012, is a series of live poker tournaments started by Card Player Media meant to cater to each casino’s and area’s needs and to offer something for every player in every card room across the United States.

While some tours cater only to super high-rollers, certain geographical areas or local grinders, the CPPT has something for every player. ♠

The Lucky 13 In ‘13

This baker’s dozen all cashed for more than $3 million in live tournaments in 2013. Some found their way into this prestigious group by finishing inside the top three in the biggest event of the year, the WSOP main event, which sported a prize pool of nearly $60 million. Of course eventual champion Ryan Riess had the largest single score of the year at $8.3 million.

Many of the other players on this list took advantage of the continued global growth of super high roller events with six-figure buy-ins and seven-figure paydays.

Others have simply put up a ton of cashes in 2013, with Scott Seiver making ten final tables and Daniel Negreanu, Philipp Gruissem, and Igor Kurganov making seven final tables each.

However they made it to this list, it’s safe to say that these 13 players each had an incredible 2013.

Ryan Riess USA $8,363,580
Anthony Gregg USA $5,827,170
Jay Farber USA $5,174,357
Niklas Heinecker GERMANY $4,546,619
Philipp Gruissem GERMANY $4,494,419
Amir Lehavot USA $3,868,323
Scott Seiver USA $3,831,486
Jeffrey Rossiter AUSTRALIA $3,681,213
Sorel Mizzi CANADA $3,249,174
Tobias Reinkemeier GERMANY $3,211,425
Igor Kurganov GERMANY $3,136,710
Daniel Negreanu CANADA $3,114,058
Chris Klodnicki USA $3,086,229

The Not So Good News Of 2013

Not everything came up roses for the poker world in 2013. Despite modest growth and continued interest in the game, the industry experienced its fair share of black eyes as well. Here is a look at the top five stories we’d like to forget about.

5. Texas Says No To Texas Hold’em

As disappointing as it was to see Michigan begin to stamp out charity poker rooms or Illinois stop gambling expansion yet again, the most disheartening domestic gambling news came from Texas, which failed to consider two separate bills that would have made poker legal both socially and in licensed gambling parlors such as bingo halls, pari-mutuel facilities, and the state’s lone tribal casino.

4. Albania Bans Offshore Online Poker Sites

This year, Mexico banned slot machines and the Australian Prime Minister promised to increase online gambling restrictions, but all of that pales in comparison to the country of Albania, which is going through its own version of Black Friday. The southeastern European country essentially clamped down a $965 million industry by banning online poker sites.

3. Vadim Trincher, Other High-Stakes Poker Players Indicted For Illegal Gambling

It wasn’t a great year for poker players in the court room. Las Vegas legend Archie Karas was arrested for cheating at blackjack in a southern California casino and former WSOP main event champion Greg Raymer went down in a prostitution sting, but those charges were nothing compared with the illegal gambling and money laundering charges brought against Vadim Trincher, Justin Smith, John Hanson, Abe Mosseri, Bill Edler, Peter Feldman, and others for running poker games in New York.

2. Runner, Runner Makes Poker Look Terrible

When a poker film starring Justin Timberlake and Ben Affleck was announced, it looked like a home run. Instead, Runner, Runner flopped and even worse, made poker look terrible in the process. Instead of showing that poker is an exciting game of skill, the writers of Rounders made Runner, Runner focus on the shadiness of offshore online poker sites. Movie rating site Rotten Tomatoes gave the movie a freshness rating of just 9 percent, making it one of the worst pictures of the year.

1. Sheldon Adelson Declares War Against Online Poker

The Venetian Hotel and Casino remains a top-notch gambling destination and the largest poker room in Las Vegas, but CEO Sheldon Adelson has effectively made himself poker’s public enemy no. 1 with his continued battle against online poker. The billionaire casino mogul has vowed to “spend whatever it takes” to stop the spread of online poker in the United States and even launched an anti-online poker coalition to fight the federal legalization of the game.