WSOP.com has officially become the first online poker operator to launch the hugely popular Mystery Bounty format in the regulated US market. The games are currently available only to players on WSOP Michigan but they are expected to be rolled out in other states at some point in the future.
Mystery Bounty Tournaments Available on WSOP MI
The launch of the Mystery Bounty format on WSOP MI had gone under the radar, though it’s believed the tournaments were deployed just a week ago. For as low as $10, Michigan players may take a shot at Mystery Bounty tournaments running daily on WSOP MI, with guarantees of between $1,000 and $5,000.
The tournaments allow unlimited re-entries, with players kicking off the action with 8,000 in starting stack played to eight-minute levels. Bounties come into play beginning at level 17.
What Makes Mystery Bounties Different from Regular Bounties?
For those who are still new to Mystery Bounties, they work just like regular bounty tournaments with half of the buy-in going into a bounty pool. The main difference is how they’re played.
Unlike standard bounty tournaments, Mystery Bounties involve two phases. In the first phase, no bounty is awarded for eliminating an opponent. The bounty portion only kicks in in the second phase. The mystery element comes in the form of randomly-assigned bounties on each player’s head. The amount can go as high as 50x or 1000x the buy-in which makes the tournament more exciting.
The format has already been launched by various operators in the dot-com market, including GGPoker, 888poker, and Winamax.
The 2023 World Series of Poker (WSOP) festival is set to kick off on May 30 at Horseshoe on the Las Vegas Strip. As usual, the schedule will be headlined by the Main Event which costs $10,000 to enter.
The WSOP US network is once again offering players the chance to secure a seat into the prestigious event for a much cheaper price through its freeroll deposit bonus promotion.
How to Enter
WSOP.com is running a 2023 WSOP $10,000 Main Event Seat Freeroll for its players in New Jersey, Nevada, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. To enter, players across all four states simply need to make a deposit until January 28 using the code “WIN10”. Qualified players will battle it out on January 30, with the winner taking home a $10,000 buy-in for the 2023 WSOP Main Event.
The operator will give away a total of three seats – one for the merged pool covering New Jersey and Nevada, with the other two to be awarded in Pennsylvania and Michigan.
The 2023 WSOP Main Event gets underway on July 3.
Other Key Tournaments at 2023 WSOP
The final schedule for the 2023 WSOP has yet to be released, but a number of key tournaments have already been confirmed apart from the Main Event. They include the $1,000 Mystery Millions, $300 Gladiators of Poker, $400 Colossus, and the $1,500 Millionaire Maker.
The second edition of the prestigious PokerStars Players Championship (PSPC) is finally happening this month! All eyes are on the upcoming tournament which takes place from January 30 to February 3 at the Baha Mar resort in the Bahamas. It will be part of a bigger festival, the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure (PCA).
Who Will Be The Next Ramon Colillas?
As we all know, the inaugural PSPC in 2019 was won by a former fitness trainer from Spain who qualified for the event via PokerStars’ Platinum Pass promotion.
Dubbed the new Chris Moneymaker, Ramon Colillas, then relatively unknown in the poker world, topped a field of 1,039 entries at the 2019 PSPC to win $5.1 million in first-place prize. He was among the holders of a $30K Platinum Pass ticket awarded by PokerStars.
Now, the operator has given away more than 400 Platinum passes to lucky players and they will be aiming to pull off another rags-to-riches victory in the second running of the popular tournament.
Other Key Events at PCA
The PSPC will serve as the headline event of the PCA festival but there are other key tournaments to watch for, including the PCA Main Event, PCA Super High Roller, and PCA Mystery Bounty.
PokerGO is upping the ante for the 2023 PokerGO Tour (PGT) Championship, with the tournament now carrying a massive prize pool of $1 million. That’s double the figure won by Jason Koon during the 2022 season.
2023 PGT Championship
The 2023 PGT Championship will see more players competing for the $1 million pot, as the top 40 players on the PGT leaderboard will earn automatic entry into the event. PokerGO will also be awarding extra seats into the tournament via special events throughout the year. In the previous campaign, the PGT Championship was only open to the top 21 players.
To qualify for the $1M PGT Championship freeroll, all you need to do is to earn enough points to make it to the top 40 of the leaderboard. You may also win your way into the tournament via special promotions that will be hosted by PokerGO.
New Events for 2023
The 2023 season of the PGT officially kicks off with the PokerGO Cup on January 11. Two of the most popular events on the tour, the US Poker Open and Poker Masters also return this year, with new events also added to the line-up, such as the PGT Mixed Games which takes place in February.
The 2022 World Poker Tour (WPT) World Championship was a massive success, with Canadian player Eliot Hudon ultimately taking the title for a whopping $4.1 million. The rest of the players who made it to the final table of the record-breaking event also walked away with seven-figure payouts. Ireland’s Stephen Kehoe wasn’t one of them, but he was a big winner as well after turning his $550 satellite ticket into a huge $269,900.
Kehoe Eliminates Michael Gathy
Kehoe qualified for the historic $15 million-guaranteed WPT World Championship via a $550 satellite on WPT Global. He won his ticket on his second attempt and he made sure to put it to good use.
The Irishman managed to reach Day 5 of the tournament at Wynn Las Vegas, and along the way, he eliminated four-time World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet winner Michael Gathy and also doubled through Benny Glaser who ended up as runner-up finisher to Hudon.
Future Plans
Kehoe’s hopes of winning the title ended through an all-in battle with Michael Rocco, the latter making a set on the flop to defeat Kehoe’s king-jack. The Irish poker pro finished in 14th place for $269,900, the largest cash of his career.
It was indeed a memorable one for Kehoe and now he’s keen on taking part in more $10,000 buy-in events and playing regularly at WPT Global.