For those who thought the $250,000 Super High Roller event we saw at the Aussie Millions was getting ridiculous, the WSOP and Cirque du Soleil founder/high stakes poker fish Guy Laliberté have trumped anything previously imaginable with a $1 million buy-in, Super Duper High Roller tournament that’s set for next year.
What’s amazing is that people are already rushing to front the fortune of a buy-in since Bobby Baldwin, Johnny Chan, Daniel Negreanu, Gus Hansen, Patrik Antonius, Tony G, Phil Ruffin and Andy Beal are already willing to compete in the tournament. If the event is to meet its 48-player cap, that would create a $48 million prize pool for the select few involved. What’s bad about this is that the winner is almost guaranteed to top the all-time money list, provided the amount of entries gets anywhere near the capped number.
Honestly, it was going far enough when Erik Seidel basically skyrocketed into the all-time money lead courtesy of excellent showings in four High Roller tournaments. And while I’m certainly not taking anything away from Seidel because he’s had an amazing year, as well as a stellar career, the high roller stuff is starting to make a mockery of the all-time winnings list.
But if this Super Duper High Roller event gets off the ground, you might as well throw this entire list out the window. And just imagine if somebody like Andy Beal or Phil Ruffin were to win the tournament; this person would suddenly have one of the most coveted honors in poker. You might as well throw that $10 million buy-in tournament off of Casino Royale into the mix, which would officially put Daniel Craig at the top of the HendonMob rankings.
The only good thing that can come out of the aforementioned high roller tournament is the charitable cause involved, which is Laliberte’s One Drop foundation. The purpose of One Drop is to provide clean drinking water to underdeveloped countries, and 11% of the buy-ins will go to the cause. So assuming 40 people bought in, there would be $4.4 million going to One Drop. And I suppose it’s worth violating the sanctity of tournament poker records to help out those in need.
I agree, these “all time highs” may be more a statement of inflation than actual earnings. I think a scoring system of placements in tournaments irregardless of the buy in should be in place, something that would take into account field size, structure, starting chips etc.
I like the idea of poker tournaments contributing portions to charity. That gives a better face to poker, helps people out. I just don’t see a down side to it.