The HAND
Perhaps we cannot start this overview with a different moment than the legendary play of Robbi Lew and Garrett Adelstein. The hand, which is still resonating in the poker world, has resulted in the FBI investigation, a lie detector test, or ejection of one staff members. And a clear result? Still not in sight....
Boom of Mystery Bounty format
Like a few years ago, the whole world suddenly talked about Short Deck poker, this year it was a discipline called Mystery Bounty. Thanks to this addition, the traditional bounty tournaments are complemented by a gambling element, when you get an envelope with a mysterious reward for eliminating your opponent. From the small clubs, this format gradually came to the series such as EPT or WSOP, where we also witnessed the first million bounty, which was taken by Matt Glantz.
Who is the biggest winner of 2022?
During 2022, the name of Daniel Negreanu, who has had a good roller coaster ride, was mentioned very often. After two years of darkness, as he called them, the tables finally turned, and Pokerkid won the SHRB for a record $3.3 million, which broke the bad luck and ended the year 2022 with a profit of 1.6 million.
Nevertheless, the world rankings for 2022 belong to other names. In the GPI ranking the title Player of the Year goes to Stephen Song, from the WSOP series the title of the player of the year was taken by Dan Zack, but the valuable double for himself was won by Stephen Chidwick, who won both in PGT scoring, but also in the Card Player PoY ranking (5 titles, 25 final tables and $6.2m to win). As regards the purely value of cash outs, according to Hendonmob, Espen Jorstad ($10.529.466) Sam Grafton ($8,418.423) and Jason Koon ($8.323,248) were mostly successful.
(almost) Record breaking Main Event WSOP
After a forced Covid break from Live Poker, everyone looked at Las Vegas this year, where the first WSOP promised a good dose of action without restrictions. Many predicted that records would fall one after another, and that it will finally be able to break the 2006 record ME. This year's numbers were breathtaking and thanks to the total 197.626 entries and prize pool worth 347.9 million dollars really did brake the record. However, the record from the ME in 2006 (8,773 entries) remained untouched. The brutal 8,663 entries took care of the historically second largest Main Event, and its champion Espen Jorstad ($10,000,000) is no longer necessary to introduce.
Jungleman's back-to-back triumph
One of the main drivers of the annual WSOP is $ 50,000 Poker Players Championship, a tournament that boasts the title of the most demanding event in the world. Not only the high entry fee and top competition, but also the fact that you will have a mix of nine poker disciplines in this tournament, bring together a truly unique event that will verify the skills of even the best poker player. Winning this tournament is a sign of quality in the highest poker circles, and if you manage to win it for two consecutive years, that is really something. And that is exactly what managed to do Dan "Jungleman" Cates, who after five days and 7-hour heads-up finally coped with all the rivals and took the trophy and $1.44 million.
Cheating scandals
This year, there were various cheating scandals, in which the very resounding names of the world poker appeared. First was Bryn Kenney, who was accused of practicing a cult and taking hallucinogenic substances, but the current World Two fought to purify his name, which he also managed. On the contrary, Ali Imsirovic and Jake Schindler preferred to hide their heads in the sand, for which they recieved a ban on GG, EPT, Triton or all events from PokerGO production.
