One week ago today, at the wee hours of the morning, the Primary Bad Beat Jackpot was hit. Our two big winners did not waste any time to pick up their winnings; both of them showed up this afternoon, all smiles, about 15 minutes apart. On Monday, January 7, Amirhossein Shemshaki flopped quad jacks. After that, all it took to break the bank was for him to slow play his monster to the end, letting Darrell Brown catch up with runner runner straight flush. Click here to see the full play-by-play. Both players posed today with their big cheque, just before taking possession of their respective share of the Jackpot. Take a look at these numbers! The Primary Bad Beat, reset at $250,000, awaits the next hit. Being part of the hand will change your yearly budget, but just being in the room when it happens gets you a share! […]
Poker
Poker variety in the WCC
The World Cup of Cards is largely known for offering formats that are rarely seen in poker festivals – tournaments with unusual descriptions and buy-ins ranging from $110 to $330. These events are a great opportunity to play uncommon but fun variants of the game, in the context of a serious festival, with a trophy and increased bragging rights on the line. Let’s take a look at them: Event #1 – $400 + $40 Tag Team The biggest Tag Team tournament to date. Team up! Click here for all the info. Event #6 – $100 + $10 Survivor Plays down to 10% of the field, at which point the tournament ends and every survivor gets an equal share. Event #9 – $150 + $15 Shootout Turbo In true Sit&Go spirit! Win your table and move to the finals, where everyone gets paid! Event #11 – $150 + $25 Strangers […]
Another late-night Bad Beat Jackpot!
At 4:09 this morning, the Primary Bad Beat Jackpot was hit! It had grown to $798,319, more than enough to make the people on table 1 very happy. The hand was played in such a way that nobody could have seen it coming. At showdown, with quads and a straight flush on the table, $30 were in the pot! The table was 8-handed, and after 3 limpers, the small blind completed and the big blind checked, sending 5 players to the flop. Flop: That street was checked around. Turn: As you guessed by now, one of the players – Amirhossein S, first limper – had flopped quad jacks. Seeing that the turn could potentially complete a straight flush for someone, he opted to check again, in case the hypothetical player on a draw would fold. River: Amirhossein couldn’t check again. After both blinds checked, he led out with a $10 […]
You spoke, we listened
About two months ago, our weekday cash game promotions were completely revamped. Today, we’re editing the new lineup with exciting changes that we think will please the majority of our players! As of Monday, January 7, PLO tables will be included in all draws, including Hot Seat Mondays, Cash Splash Tuesdays, and the Super Sunday draws. Sorry PLO players, we couldn’t let you in on the High Hands, but we’re sure you’ll understand! The Monday raffle drum will no longer have 100 ballots tumbling around, but 26 ballots, which will all be drawn every single Monday. The top prizes will be drawn each week! Also, there will be no more gift certificates in the drum; all cash prizes! Here is the new breakdown: 1 x $1,000 2 x $500 3 x $300 4 x $200 16 x $100 Your comments inspired these improvements. Please continue sending them our way, and […]
MILLIONS returns… with a freezeout format!
As you all know by now, MILLIONS returns to Playground in 2019. A 3-Step satellite tree has been brewing qualifiers for about a month, and today, we are able to officially announce a few more details about the MILLIONS North America Main Event: Dates: May 22 to May 27 Buy-in: $10,300 A single Day 1 A $5,000,000 guarantee Format: Freezeout! The trend in tournament poker these past years has been about extending late registration periods, sometimes all the way to Day 2 of an event, as well as allowing unlimited re-entries during that time. Of course, this format is great to create bigger prize pools; double great if you like to come out blazing and try to accumulate a lot of chips quickly, with little regard to your tournament life. After all, providing you have enough of a bankroll, unlimited re-entries allow you to resuscitate as many times as you […]
Bicknell does it again
With every new year, in all forms of competition, we reflect on the accomplishments of our highest achievers. In poker, to a large extent, this means attributing the Global Poker Index (GPI) Player of the Year (POY) awards. In 2018, American William Foxen finished first in front of Stephen Chidwick, David Peters, and high stakes darling Justin Bonomo, while our own Kristen Bicknell, was recognized as the Female Player of the Year… for the second year running! William had an amazing year. After earning $1.7M in 2017, thanks to a 7-figure score in December of that year, he stayed the course and amassed $6.6M in 2018, earning precious GPI points in all the right tournaments, to finish with over 4,000 points and the award! Kristen, from St. Catharines, Ontario, has been in the spotlight for quite some time. She and William travel the world and play the most prestigious poker […]
2018: a very busy year!
As the year 2018 comes to an end, we reflect on the amazing ride we’ve had these past 12 months at Playground. The year had a little bit of everything: 2 Bad Beat Jackpots over $1,000,000, the WSOP Circuit at Playground, the MILLIONS North America with a $10,000,000 guaranteed Main Event, and a new EGD section! The evolution this past year was especially explosive, and as a result, the Playground Complex has more than ever to offer our customers! Jackpots One of the things we’re best known for at Playground are our great poker cash game promotions, and paramount among these is the Primary Bad Beat Jackpot. This year was an amazing year for Primary BBJs – twice during 2018 the jackpot grew to over $1M! A jackpot of $1,375,265 was won on April 27 (pictured), and then in early October the Jackpot had climbed to $1,249,643 when […]
Strangers in the Night: The Gift of Giving!
Strangers in the Night, Playground’s famous charity event, is back on our felts as 1 of 4 multi-day events in the World Cup of Cards. This tournament is always a great opportunity to compete in a light atmosphere, shoot for some big payouts, and do your part to help people in need! The buy-in is $150 + $25, and with $65,000 guaranteed, there is enough in there to play it for the prizes, but there is another incentive: the entirety of the $25 fee goes to the Strangers in the Night charity initiative! Our Director of Charitable Initiatives, Larry Robinson, works closely with the Strangers in the Night Group, and they, in turn, help the Miriam Foundation, the West Island Women’s Shelter, and Lymphoma Canada; all great causes! Event #11 – Strangers in the Night: Day 1A – Monday January 28 at 7PM Day 1B – Tuesday January 29 at […]
The Value of Early Satellites
All of our poker festivals are preceded by a string of satellite tournaments, giving our players a chance to get into the action for a fraction of the buy-in. These tournaments represent a great opportunity to play the bigger events, and possibly experience a tournament breakthrough. The guarantees in these satellites usually get bigger as we get closer to the target event, so how much value can these early satellites represent? The answer is: a whole lot of it! Historical Numbers The intrinsic value of a satellite does not reside in the number of guaranteed seats, but rather in the ratio of players paid, compared to their guarantee. The entries to seats awarded ratio in the early satellites can be as good as 1 in 7 players paid on average, as seen with the WSOP-C Playground last summer and the Winter Festival in January 2018, while the satellites closer to […]
A Thank You Note
The last weekend marked the 8-year anniversary of Playground, and the celebrations were effervescent! 8 years already, what a ride! At the forefront of our celebrations was the Anniversary Series, which provided some rather amazing opportunities. There were 7 events on the schedule, along with a few MILLIONS Step Satellites, each with some unbelievable value. The Playground 200 needs no introduction. Through one Day 1 Online and four live starting flights, 707 entries were accounted for in this edition of our staple event. The hard-fought battle was finally won by Tommy Dion from Granby (pictured on the right), after starting Day 3 with only 6 big blinds! He brought home $15,818. The series also presented the very first MILLIONS Step 3 Satellite. 60 entries were put in, stemming from qualifiers, direct buy-ins, and re-entries. With 15 seats guaranteed, our Step 3 players enjoyed a pretty handsome overlay of $64,500! 15 of them, […]
Antoine Simon is the Champion of Event #7
By the time heads up play arrived, both players were quite fatigued and with the deal in place, there was some fight between the two players – Christopher Turnbull and Antoine Simon – but both were equally easygoing about the whole affair. The mood was light, the players were happy, there was a nice small rail consisting of Sergei Gurin, and the stage was set for the final stretch of this terrific event. Chris scored an early double to take the chip lead, but before long Antoine had doubled back and enjoyed a big lead once again. Eventually, with fatigue getting the best of the players, Antoine limped his button holding and Chris decided to shove over the top holding . Antoine called. The window card told most of the tale on the flop: . The on the turn gave Chris a few more outs, but the on the river […]
Minh Chi Nguyen is the Megastack Turbo Champ
With no deal in place to influence the pace of play and reasonable stack sizes and chip differential between the two players, one would have been excused to assume that heads up play would be an extended affair… but it was not – Minh Chi Nguyen and Guillaume Tremblay obviously came to play and weren’t afraid of a little gambling along the way. Before long, Guillaume was left gasping with just 160K left, and though he doubled once after that, within a few minutes both players were again happy with their holdings. Minh Chi: Guillaume: The flop was dealt: . When the came on the turn, Guillaume got out of his chair and on the river he put-on his coat and went for his payout voucher. Event #6 Champion: Minh Chi Nguyen, $1,985 Final Hand of Play 2nd place: Guillaume Tremblay, $1,525