Tag: GGPoker

And to think, they said that online poker was dead!

An ecosystem riddled with decay.

It doesn’t look like that, today.

With the world unable to commune around the live poker table, poker lovers and professionals alike have been driven to online poker rooms in their droves – online poker rooms like GGPoker.

GGPoker’s life began in the East, but more recently, it has steadily moved its all-seeing eye towards life in the West. The race to become the ‘second-largest online poker room in the world’ has become congested and absorbing.

In a bid to get there nose ahead (PokerScout currently ranks them as the fourth busiest entity in the world). GGPoker has partnered with the World Series of Poker (WSOP) to create an 18-gold ring WSOP Super Circuit Online Series, and they’ve decided to use the new alliance to set a new online record.

While the 18 golden rings comprise the main course, these games sit amid a mammoth schedule that sees 595 tournaments running between May 3 and 31 with GGPoker guaranteeing $100m in prize money, beating the previous record by $15m.

That’s a statement.

The High Roller Scene

One area where GGPoker has applied intense focus has been at the high roller level.

When they first began marketing in the West, they hired Bryn Kenney as their sole brand ambassador, and you imagine he has helped them to move up the grooves in this area.

Since Kenney joined, there has been a steady increase of buy-ins between $1,000 and $5,000, and an unprecedented level of $25,000 buy-in events, making GGPoker a must-have client on the laptop of high stakes players.

You won’t find a WSOPC gold ring on the bucket list of too many high rollers, but that might change because on May 17 there will be a $10m GTD, $25,000 buy-in No-Limit Hold ’em tournament with a gold ring for the winner.

Outside of that monster guarantee, there is the $5m GTD $1,000 No-Limit Hold ’em Main Event, and a nice touch, with a $1,111 COVID Charity event with $111 donated to the Nevada COVID-19 Task Force. There is also a $1m GTD, $10,000 buy-in Pot-Limit Omaha (PLO) Championship, also taking place on May 17.

Here is the full schedule of gold ring events:

May 3

Event #1: $1,111, $1m GTD COVID Charity Event
Event #2: $50, $500k GTD Kick-Off

May 5

Event #3: $210, $500k GTD, Deepstack Bounty Hunters

May 10

Event #4: $200, $500k GTD Monster Stack
Event #5: $500, $2m GTD BIG $500

May 12

Event #6: $210, $500k GTD Deepstack Bounty Hunters

May 17

Event #7: $200, $500k GTD Monster Stack
Event #8: $25,500, $10m GTD High Roller Championship
Event #9: $100, $1m GTD. Mini Main Event
Event #10: $10,000, $1m GTD PLO High Roller Championship

May 19

Event #11: $210, $500k GTD Deepstack Bounty Hunters

May 24

Event #12: $200, $500k GTD Monster Stack
Event #13: $400, $2m GTD COLOSSUS

May 26

Event #14: $210, $500k GTD Deepstack Bounty Hunters

May 31

Event #15: $200, $500k GTD Monster Stack
Event #16: $1,000, $1m GTD PLO Main Event
Event #17: $1,000, $5m GTD Main Event
Event #18: $500, $500k GTD The Closer

The Future is Bright

Since the demise of Full Tilt Poker, PokerStars has had a lock on the high stakes action. It’s not a niche that has ever interested 888Poker, but it is one that’s attracted the attention of partypoker. The partnership with Poker Central saw $36m dished out during a highly competitive Poker Masters Online, and the Super High Roller Bowl Online takes place at the end of the month.

With GGPoker entering the space with a vast array of $25,000 buy-in events complemented by a decent flow of buy-ins between $1,000 and $5,000, high stakes poker players have never had as much food on their buffet.

Nah, online poker isn’t dead.

It’s very much alive.

As any kid who has spent time in a rock pool knows. It helps if there are more than one of you sifting through the pebbles and the sand looking for errant crabs, sea urchins and whelks. 

We learn the importance of networking from an early age. Before you’ve even pushed north of your fourth birthday, you are feeling a biological urge to become tribal. It’s a feeling that mounts in pressure, only subsiding if you find a way to numb the pain of loneliness. 

While systems might not feel biological pain, there is still suffering as a result of an inability to communicate effectively and create networks that create value either through more epic meaning and purpose or increased EBITDA.

GGPoker is a system and one that’s growing. 

It began serving punters in the East, and as we did with Coronavirus, most of us assumed it would stay there. 

Then came the signing of Bryn Kenney.

Given Kenney’s ‘lone wolf’ persona, it was a signing that was as unusual as it was inspiring. 

Then the signings stopped at the All-Time Money Earner. 

Were they hoping that Kenney’s experience and influence would be sufficient enough to crack the Western world?

Learning From The Competition

The signing of Kenney was the ladder that GGPoker used to climb out of the trenches, and into a No-Mans Land where partypoker and PokerStars were busy lobbing grenades at each other.

PokerStars had the most impressive artillery, but there was something savvy and sleek about the way partypoker went to war. You were never going to see partypoker stuff a chloroform soaked rag into PokerStars’ mouth. They were always going to beat them through their mission, purpose and relationships. 

With COVID-19 crushing live tournaments, sending the morose and marvellous to online poker in their droves, partypoker has busted out the moves, leveraging their carefully carved relationships to provide their players with a wide variety of value at either end of the buy-in spectrum.

PokerStars?

Not so much.

If GGPoker is going to get into this war, it’s not bad timing, because they get to learn from the victories and defeats of the PokerStars v partypoker clash, and it will be interesting to see how that develops.

GGPoker’s Ever-Evolving Relationships

After waiting an eternity to add to their ambassadorial ranks, GGPoker’s foot has stepped on the accelerator pedal. 

Daniel Negreanu’s signing was even more shocking that Kenney’s. Negreanu is one of the few professional poker players whose popularity and presence transcends the game. But he was recently divorced from PokerStars, and newly married to Amanda Leatherman and his duties as a husband and hopeful father. 

It was a powerful statement. 

With North America nicely covered, GGPoker focused attention on the South by hiring the Brazilian star Felipe Ramos. A man who has the likes of Neymar Jr and Ronaldo Nazario on his speed dial. 

With the Americas in the bag, GGPoker turned to Europe, and Bertrand ‘ElkY’ Grospellier joined the crew from partypoker. ElkY and Negreanu had both worked together at PokerStars, so I am sure the Canadian gave the hirers his wink of approval. 

ElkY has strong ties with Leon Tsoukernik and the King’s Resort & Casino. The Frenchman calls Prague his home and tutored Tsoukernik through last summer’s Triton Million London event.

Another poker entity that has ties with Tsoukernik is the World Series of Poker (WSOP). GGPoker joined that threesome, by inking a deal with the WSOP to host an 18-gold ring World Series of Poker Circuit (WSOPC) Online Series, and will most certainly be a favourite to host online bracelet events in the coming months. Today, GGPoker announced a partnership with Tsoukernik’s live card room.

And the ranks of the ambassadorial team have also risen.

Tennis legend Boris Becker is the newest brand ambassador for GGPoker and King’s Resort & Casino. Negreanu, Ramos and ElkY have worked with Becker in the past, and it’s the third online poker room that has turned to the youngest person ever to win Wimbledon to try and promote the game to the mainstream after PokerStars and partypoker.

That’s how one became six. 

Bryn Kenney, Felipe Ramos, Daniel Negreanu, Bertrand ‘ElkY’ Grospellier and Boris Becker form an impressive spine. Partnerships with The World Series of Poker (WSOP) and the King’s Resort & Casino strengthen things even more. 

GGPoker is becoming a more impressive animal daily. 

If they ever get to the top, it will be interesting to vivisect to see how vital these early relationships have been.

After strumming along nicely with only Bryn Kenney for company, GGPoker has decided that there’s room for growth on the ambassadorial balance sheet. 

Daniel Negreanu joined from PokerStars in November, Felipe Ramos joined a month later, and in the past few days, Bertrand’ ElkY’ Grospellier has also joined the team. To say the leap from party to GGPoker happened quickly is an understatement. ElkY welcomed Kevin Hart to Team partypoker on April 11, and five days later he was sitting down in the tattooists’ chair having ‘GGPoker’ inked into his nether regions. 

It’s the first time an online poker room has flexed a set of biceps bulky enough to shove PokerStars and partypoker out of the way since the world of online poker received an axe to the head in 2011. 

In a marketing video posted on Twitter celebrating ElkY’s appointment, the French star declared that GGPoker’s software is the best in the business, waxing lyrical on its many features including the ability to stake and be staked using the client. 

Why ElkY?

At no time in the past decade has ElkY been without an employer telling you that there’s something about the man that online poker rooms love, and GGPoker is picking ElkY up during a mini-renaissance.

In October he topped a 2,738 entrant field to win his second World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet in the World Series of Poker Europe (WSOPE) €550 No-Limit Hold ’em Colossus for €190,375.

That was ElkY’s first win in 7-years, followed up with three major final table appearances, including runner-up in a €50,000 NLHE Super High Roller at the European Poker Tour (EPT) in Prague for €501,590 and runner-up in the $1,100 NLHE MILLIONS Mini at the partypoker MILLIONS UK for $93,000.

ElkY sits on top of the French All-Time Money List for live tournament poker with $14.7m. He is also a member of the Triple Crown, winning the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure (PCA) Main Event for $2m, and a World Poker Tour (WPT) title for $1.4m, both in 2008, before winning the $10,000 Seven-Card Stud Championship at the 2011 WSOP for $331,639.

But it’s not ElkY’s prowess on the poker table that ensures online poker rooms keep hiring him. There’s more to him than that. A plus for anyone hiring him is his Esports experience, and his ability to gather a decent following on Twitch – an area that’s going to be ElkY’s focus.

“I expect my career to go to the next level,” said Elky before going on to call GGPoker, “the biggest online poker site in the world.”

Bold claims on both accounts. 

More than a third of the world’s population is enforcing some form of lockdown. Life as we know it will never be the same again. The novel coronavirus is squeezing small businesses into urns. The only people to escape the massacre are the igloo makers in Antarctica.

ElkY’s appointment shows that you can find success even in these most tragic of times. Luck plays a part, for sure, but so does street smarts and savviness. While some ruminate, others rumble. While some become faded wallpaper, others become a brand new lick of paint. 

The world is suffering, right now, but it’s not suffering that leads to hopelessness. It’s suffering that you think is out of your control, and people like ElkY rarely feel out of control.