The First Ever American Poker Awards Were Held on Friday
This past Friday night, family, friends and fellow poker players gathered in a large hall to talk about everything poker, and to hand out those awards that are possibly going to be the biggest achievements they receive from the poker industry. With much more attention put on the gambling and casino world these days, they have came together to provide a ceremony, that they are hoping to do every year, to honor those that have done the best that they can at the tables. Those winners are who are going to receive the awards being handed out.
The Details
They held a day of conferences for everyone involved, they planned day and night for this and held it in the grand room at a hotel in California. They even splurged and had a party the night before, so that everyone was able to enjoy their time in the area and even meet with some of the players, some of which many of them have faced in tournaments in the past. During the ceremony, 13 awards were handed out to those poker players that took over the tables and dominated the game.
The list of winners that were awarded with the awards that night are as follows:
▪ Poker’s Best Ambassador: Daniel Negreanu
▪ GPI Player of the Year: Dan Colman
▪ GPI Female Player of the Year: Vanessa Selbst
▪ Breakout Player of the Year: Brandon Shack-Harris
▪ Lifetime Achievement Award: World Poker Tour founder Steve Lipscomb
▪ Industry Person of the Year: WPT President Adam Pliska
▪ Media Person of the Year: Online Poker Report’s Chris Grove
▪ Tournament Performance of the Year: Mark Newhouse in WSOP Main Event
▪ Media Content of the Year: Brad Willis for PokerStars Blog’s “WSOP 2014: Stages / Never Stop Fighting”
▪ Event of the Year (buy-in over $2,000): World Series of Poker Main Event
▪ Event of the Year (buy-in under $2,000): WSOP Monster Stack
▪ Charitable Initiative of the Year: “All In” for Kids Poker Tournament Presented by CHOP & WPT Foundation
▪ Innovation of the Year: Twitch for Live Streaming Poker
All of these players and foundations were awarded with the new statues and can now say that they have actually won something from the tournament. This is a big thing for those players that have never been recognized other than during the wins that they have had at the tables. It also gave everyone a chance to meet with one another and actually get to know one another for who they are, and not by just the skill that they have to beat at the table.
