PokerStars
Plans To Spread The Wealth With “Double Bubbles”
More people, more payouts may make for more tournament poker.
PokerStars wants more people to feel the thrill of cashing, even minimally, in a new type of tournament they’ve dubbed their “Double Bubble” tournaments. In traditional modern day poker tournaments one can expect the money bubble to happen right around 10-12%. PokerStars wants to payout a little more than that – they want to pay 50%.
The ever-present Lee Jones took to the PokerStars blog to announce the trial run of a tournament where 50% of the player pool is going to make at least their money back.
As time has progressed, most of us in the business have come to believe that paying out more of the field is better. That is, increasing the number of players who get something back is preferable to putting an extra bonus on top of the already staggering size of the prizes at the top.
So instead of a select few walking away with their coffers filled, half the field will at least break even and then, once that bubble has burst…it’s a traditional race to be part of the, now, top 8% when you begin to make money.
Obviously, these tournaments aren’t going to return massive prizes at the top – if you want to go for the big brass ring, sign up for one of our regular tournaments. But if you want some good fun with nominally a 50% chance of getting your money back, and the chance to still win some nice prizes deep in, maybe Double Bubbles are just the thing for you.
Read: Double Bubble: What if we paid half the field?
PokerStars plans on rolling this out at the 2015 PCA in the live arena to see how it plays out.
MILLIONS Online Will Return in 2019
After setting several records, partypoker is set to host MILLIONS Online once again in 2019.
A historic moment was created on December 4 as partypoker pulled off an incredible feat by setting the record for the biggest tournament in the history of online poker.
A total of 4367 entries were made across the five starting flights of the $5300 buy-in MILLIONS Online to create a mammoth prize pool of $21,835,000.
Portuguese player Manuel “Sheparentao” Ruivo living in the Netherlands took down the event last night with a massive $2,329,943 first-place prize which is also a record for the biggest prize ever awarded in an online poker tournament. He made a heads-up deal with Pim “ForMatherRussia” de Goede from Malta who also took home well over $2.3 million—the second biggest prize ever.
Two more players pocketed seven-figure prizes including the Slovenian player 'Scarmak3r’ who finished third for $1.3 million by qualifying via a $5.50 feeder satellite and winning almost 250,000 times the buy-in.
Apart from setting the record for the biggest online tournament prize pool and awarding the biggest prize, MILLIONS created several other mind blowing records.
Here are the following records which MILLIONS created:
The room has already made its plan to host another MILLIONS Online tournament in 2019.
“...following on from the success of the 2018 $20,000,000 GTD MILLIONS Online. 2019 will end with another phenomenal MILLIONS Online festival, where multiple millionaires will be made,” party wrote on its website.
However, no further details have been revealed yet including what the guarantee will be. Looking at how it went down, partypoker could return MILLIONS Online with yet another $20 million guaranteed if not more.
If they do, we’ll find out soon.
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