Once upon a time, on a cloud overlooking The Rhine, a choir of angels dusted their hands with flour and began needing the dough that would create the best poker players on the planet.
Fedor Holz.
Steffen Sontheimer.
Dominik Nitsche.
Manig Loeser.
Koray Aldemir.
Julian Thomas.
Rainer Kempe.
Stefan Schillhabel.
I could keep going, but I need to get this over and done with before my fingers snap in this cold.
Where was I?
Ah yes, angels and dough.
When these majestic creatures landed on earth, they remained as one. Add a hint of Vorsprung Durch Technik, and you have a movement designed to dominate poker.
Some things change.
Some things don’t.
The $300,000 buy-in Super High Roller Bowl V was not a happy stomping ground for the German crew with the seven ITM spots all devoid of a flag containing black, red and yellow.
After the event, the gang scattered like autumn leaves. Some went to feed the ducks, others had dirty sheets to change, and some stayed in Las Vegas hoping to find better luck – like Manig Loeser.
The former Triton Poker Series Champion topped a 1,250-entrant $400 buy-in No-Limit Hold’em Monster Stack event at The Venetian. Loeser picked up $74,323 for the win after beating the Network Marketing God, Eric Worre, in heads-up action.
Monster Stack Final Table Results
1. Manig Loeser – $74,323
2. Eric Worre – $46,063
3. Chris Banks – $33,500
4. Satish Surapaneni – $25,586
5. Eric Baldwin – $19,263
6. Sevak Papelian – $14,656
7. Dominic Guarnieri – $11,306
8. Eidan Azuly – $8,794
The win was Loeser’s sixth of his career, and the second in December, after winning a 42-entrant $25,000 buy-in No-Limit Hold’em event at The World Poker Tour (WPT) Five Diamond World Poker Classic for $321,300.
Here’s a reminder of final positions in that one.
$25k Final Table Results
1. Manig Loeser – $321,300
2. Elio Fox – $308,700
3. Jake Schindler – $168,000
4. Dan Smith – $105,000
5. Cary Katz – $84,000
6. Nick Petrangelo – $63,000
Rainer Kempe Wins GPI Germany Player of the Year
Loeser earned $3,059,305 in 2018, slightly down on the $3,902,718 made in his High Roller breakout year of 2017, and his performances netted him a third-place finish in the incredibly competitive German Global Poker Index (GPI) Player of the Year (PoY) race.
Two people finished ahead of Loeser.
Dominik Nitsche took second.
Rainer Kempe took the lot.
GPI Germany PoY Top 10
1. Rainer Kempe – 3,172.45
2. Dominik Nitsche – 3,147.22
3. Manig Loeser – 3,071.59
4. Jan Eric-Schwippert – 2,991.08
5. Robert Heidorn – 2,349.20
6. Koray Aldemir – 2,238.83
7. Marvin Rettenmaier – 2,172.72
8. Ismael Bojang – 1,994.70
9. Ole Schemion – 1,931.26
10. Robin Hegele – 1,803.23
Kempe made money an incredible 41-times in live tournaments throughout 2018, making 26 final tables, and winning six of them. All told, Kempe earned $5,705,799 playing live tournaments, his second-best haul (the best being a 2016 haul of $6,627,498 the year he won the Super High Roller Bowl for $5m).
How did he beat such a powerful and populous field?
I guess that’s the upside when your friends shift their focus to esports, primed mind and whatever it was Dom did all year https://t.co/x6e7Qs5NvQ
— Rainer Kempe (@GatsbyKempinho) January 3, 2019
And talking about those Esports guys.
No-Limit Gaming Move Into Counter-Strike Territory
2018 was an important year for Stefan Schillhabel who created No-Limit Gaming (NLG) an Esports and Poker organisation backed by his buddies Fedor Holz and Steffen Sontheimer.
They began by creating an impressive roster of poker content providers including the German stars made out of the angel dough, a sprinkling of the best Austrians in the clubhouse, Ana Marquez, Kenny Hallaert and Niall Farrell.
Fortnite star Daniel “likandoo’ Keller joined the team in October, and now they have a Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO) team who will represent NLG at ESL Germany, 99Damage and ESEA.
I wonder?
Is there another choir of angels preparing to mix more dough, this time with a hint of Esports seasoning?
Rainer Kempe hopes so.