Epic high stakes cash games & tournaments
We’ve all seen the videos of Dwan, Ivey and Brunson playing high stakes poker, and heard tales of Macau nosebleed stakes that boast big blinds equal to ordinary folks’ salaries.
But what about all the other pros we follow on social media and poker news reports week in and week out? How big have they played? Let’s take a look…
What’s the highest stakes poker you’ve played? How’d it go?
— Daniel Strelitz (@dDeoxyribo) July 15, 2020
First out of the trap was Joey Ingram, the PLO fanatic and poker podcaster-turned-investigative journalist.
Joey recalls a Bobby’s Room waiting list to join back-to-back WSOP Main Event winner and all-round legend Johnny Chan among others. The stakes? $200/$300.
Bobby's Room PLO $200/$300 w/ Johnny Chan and a cast of others.
Waited for hours in the $50/100 game not sure if I would play had I actually got a seat. Had played 99% online at that point. Started winning in that game and said fuck it, I'll play if I get called.
— LEGION | Joey Ingram 🐉 (@Joeingram1) July 16, 2020
Matt Berkey, who along with Ingram was one of the main detectives in the recent Mike Postle cheating saga, took a half buy-in to a $200/$400 Short Deck game and ran it up more than 30-fold in an impressive two-day hit-and-run.
$200/$400 short deck which turned into $300/$600. I had never played before & my backers didn't want the action. Turned $20k into $650k over two days and never played again.
— Matt Berkey (@berkey11) July 16, 2020
Partypoker pro Ludovic Geilich didn’t state his stakes, but it certainly wasn’t a nickel and dime home game as he managed to punt $100,000 (or possibly worse, £ or €) while blind drunk – a strange cross-mixing of two stereotypes by the Scotsman.
Tanned in close to 100k playing plo blind drunk online 🤧
Bad news kicked in the next day obvs— Ludovic Geilich (@Gr4vyBo4t) July 16, 2020
English pro Max Silver recalled a few highstakes punts that went awry, and as with many it may not have been the biggest they’ve ever played, but was certainly the scariest…
have played bigger but these spots always felt the biggest in terms of recklessness, I'm fairly sensible these days even when playing 100k+ with selling etc
— Max Silver (@max_silver) July 16, 2020
In case you’re thinking it’s only testosterone-fuelled males who have the gamble to go big, two of poker’s most successful female players chimed in with highstakes tales.
Round of 100/200/400/800/1600. Game started as 50/100. Got in JJ vs QT for 65k and chopped. I was backed for game but still about pissed my pants.
— Danielle Andersen (@dmoongirl) July 16, 2020
Waited 6 hrs for private $25/50NL, got kinda drunk at $2/5PLO while waiting/didn’t think I’d get a seat. Finally got seat, sobered up, game became $100/$200/$400/$800NL w/ occasional $1600 as I sat. No time to sell action, just said YOLO & made $110k in 1 hour before game broke
— Kym Lim (@KymLim86) July 16, 2020
Macau – the next level
We mentioned Macau in the intro as being beyond most players’ level, but Greg Merson took a shot – presumably after his 2012 WSOP Main Event victory worth $ 8,531,853.
2k/5k/10k HKD with bunch of 20s and some 40s. Had 50% of myself, sat with 4M HKD, down 2M first couple hours, finish up 400k HKD just hours before my flight back to states. Turned a straight flush and got cr by a VIP 4M deep😍.
— GM (@GregMerson) July 16, 2020
That would have been about US$200/$500/$1000 at the time, and Merson sat down with US$½million, eventually walking off with US$50k or so having been down half his buy-in.
It wasn’t only the cash game players who were inspired to share their biggest games and highest stakes. Popular pro and well-respected poker writer Jonathan Little turned the talk to tournament buy-ins…
£100,000 tournament, bubbled with AA vs JJ. Fun times.
— Jonathan Little (@JonathanLittle) July 16, 2020
Elio Fox had a similar tale to tell of tournament woe at the highest level, this time a US$175k buy-in, where the 1st prize was US$1.44million!
250k AUD Australia super high roller bowl. took biggest ever piece of myself. went into day 2 1/5, 3 pay. made a bad 3b and nonsense not AI bet/bet/bet in a 3b pot vs Kahle Burns. he sniffed it out and called me down with A hi missed fd. got fifth. Hated myself for a month.
— Elio Fox (@smokrokflock) July 16, 2020
We’ve all dreamed of playing highstakes poker of course, that one-time ‘bucket list’ $10k World Series of Poker buy-in, or a seat next to ‘Texas Dolly’ and the other greats of the game in Bobby’s Room. Who knows, it may just come true one day!
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