Home / Poker News December 2013 / 2013 Poker Retrospective – Part 2
2013 Poker Retrospective – Part 2
Posted by: Randy Williams - Tue, 2013-12-24 04:29
Time to bring a little more negativity to the table in the second part of our 2013 poker retrospective, going over the most cringe-worthy moments of the year first, but looking ahead to some of the good stuff in later episodes.
The first “bad moment” of this piece is Nate Silver’s Aussie Millions run, which started out well, but ended up crashing and burning in a manner which was all sorts of wrong for the game of poker and the industry in general.
Silver – known for successfully predicting the winners of the 2012 US elections state-by-state – was a special invited guest of the Crown Casino for the 2013 Aussie Millions. The statistician tossed his support behind the “poker is a game of skill” angle, and to that end, he gave several interviews to all sorts of media representatives in the run-up to the
poker tournament.
Needless to say, everyone involved in the tournament (except maybe those sitting at his table) was rooting for Silver to make as deep a run as possible. Unfortunately for everyone though, Silver busted out after a phenomenal Day 1 run, ramming his pocket Ks into another player’s pocket rockets. The result was the effective collapse of a potential promotional gold-mine.
Jason Mercier’s 2013 WSOP run was by no means a bummer: he made a final table and finished in the money no fewer than 7 times, but in the end it made the top of the cringe-worthy pops on account of a prop bet the
PokerStars pro had launched before the Series. Indeed, Mercier had laid down a 3-1 deal on him winning a
2013 WSOP bracelet, accepting pretty much all comers. Well, obviously, he didn’t win any jewelry, so – despite his well above-average run – he may have ended up below the red line on this deal…
Use PokerStars’ online satellites to make your way to the 2014 WSOP for a handful of FPPs.
