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Poker Stars Pros Featured in New Movie “Deal”

April 28, 2008

PokerStars has landed even more media exposure for themselves, as many of their major pros are going to be featured in the new poker movie, Deal. Joe Hachem, Greg Raymer, and Chris Moneymaker all make appearances in the movie, mostly at the end of the film when the new pro tries his luck in one of the biggest games in the world.

The plot of Deal is that an ex-gambler trains a young hot shot about the ways of winning big at the poker tables. Burt Reynolds, who plays Tommy Vinson in the movie, quit poker 20 years ago in order to save his family from falling apart. However, when he witnesses Alex play poker, he realizes that he can regain his poker dreams without even gambling by teaching Alex the poker game, and staking him into the biggest tournaments and cash games in the world. Everything is going great, until a Vegas call girl ruins everything…

Michelle (Shannon Elizabeth) is paid by Tommy to give Alex some company, and the two end up falling for each other, or so Alex thinks. Once he discovers that Michelle is just a call girl, who was paid by Tommy, Alex cuts off all ties with Tommy and begins to prepare alone for his shot at the WPT. However, their paths cross again, as Tommy makes a comeback to the poker game so he can play in the WPT with Alex.

The movie promises to be a hit within the poker community, and PokerStars should reap some benefit because all of their sponsored players are in it. To learn more about PokerStars, check out this Poker Stars Download page.

Written by admin · Filed Under US Poker News 

Sportsbook.com Open to US Players and Offers 1K Bonus Promotion

April 25, 2008

Sportsbook.com runs things a little differently by allowing ONLY US players, which seems a little strange, but has proven to be successful.  Sportbook.com isn’t only an online sportsbook, it is also a popular online poker room and online casino. There are different bonuses offered for each depending on which you plan to play.  The biggest bonus offer is for poker players, where they will will be eligible for a special $1000 bonus offer.

Currently, new poker players will receive a huge 100% up to $1000 first time deposit bonus. In order to receive this special offer, head over to this Sportsbook Promo Code page to get all the details. The standard poker bonus offer is only $650, so make sure you use the promo code page to sign up.  You will also find the details on the sportsbook and casino bonus from that page.

You won’t be able to find near as many high limit games here as you would at a site like Pokerstars, however there are still plenty average and smaller limit games. In lower traffic times, you may find it harder to get into a bigger buy-in sit n go. Hopefully traffic won’t be much of an issue in the near future, as Sportsbook.com is growing steadily and seem to have a pretty promising future ahead of them. If you every run into any problems or have any questions, it will be very easy to get that answered through one of three support options, all of which are very quick. Sportsbook.com offers phone, email and live chat support.

Written by admin · Filed Under General Posts 

PPA Eclipses One Million Members

April 22, 2008

The Poker Players Alliance (PPA for short) has finally reached one of its major goals; having over 1,000,000 members enrolled. At the time of this publication there are a total of 1,000,045 total members, and they are sure to see a surge now because of all the publicity they are receiving from hitting this mark.

For those of you who don’t know, the PPA is a banding together of poker players and poker advocates that are seeking change from the USA Government in regard to their stance on gambling. People can join for free at their website, but donations are encouraged because the PPA uses the donated money to lobby for legal change.

The main topic the PPA is fighting is the UIGEA bill, which is a bill that took a harsh swing against USA poker players by shutting down their methods of depositing at poker sites. Although there are currently work-arounds, it is still much harder for a person to play Internet poker in the USA then it was pre-UIGEA. The PPA feels this is a violation of our freedoms, and wants to change the laws.

Also, in anticipation of the upcoming presidential election, the PPA has formed a voter registration drive called “If you play, have a say.” Their goal for this committee is to recruit 100,000 new voters who play poker, and educate them on the UIGEA and what actions they can take to help everyone out. If you plan on attending the 2008 WSOP, make sure to keep your eyes out for the voter registration booths that the PPA will have there.

Written by admin · Filed Under US Poker News 

Pacific Poker Launches New Bonus

April 18, 2008

For quite a while Pacific Poker has offered one of the smallest first time deposit bonuses out there, a 25% up to $100. Even though this was one of the smaller bonuses offered, they did allow you to play with you bonus money at the tables to “release” it, making it a top bonus offer. Most rooms won’t let you touch your deposit bonus money until you release it.

Pacific Poker finally updated their bonus offer to compete with many of the other top Internet Poker rooms. Pacific Poker is now offering a 100% up to $400 bonus to all new players. Players will still earn an instant deposit bonus that can be used at the tables right away, which will still be a 25% up to $100 offer. The additional bonus will be an extra 75% bonus up to $300, which will be put into a pending bonus account and will need to be released.

The additional $300 bonus offer will take a bit of playing to release. Players are required to earn 14 Comp Points for every $1 they have the $300 bonus offer (not including the 25% up to $100 offer). The bonus will be released in one lump sum, so quite a few points will need to be earned before receiving this bonus. Players will have a total of 30 days to earn this bonus before it expires.

If you are interested in taking advantage of Pacific Poker’s new deposit bonus, take a look at this Pacific Poker Review to get all the details.

Written by admin · Filed Under General Posts 

PokerStars Announces Battle of the Planets

April 14, 2008

PokerStars is running a unique promotion this year that will pay out over $3 million to the top sit and go players on the site. The promotion is called Battle of the Planets, and is only for sit and go players. What it is is a sit and go tournament leader board that ranks the top sit and go players each month. Plus, they break it down by having a different planet for different levels of buy-ins, so even low limit players can take part in this promotion.

The different planets run from Mercury to Jupiter with all sorts of sit and go ranges in between. For example, Earth is for sit and go’s between $10 and $19.99, while Saturn is for sit and go’s from $100 to $299.99. As expected, the higher planet you compete in, the bigger the stakes are. At Jupiter, the maximum level, each orbit winner receives $5000 for the month.

Another way Stars is letting everyone compete is by having two different orbits for each planet level. The first orbit, the low orbit category is for players who log 20 sit and go’s a month, and the high orbit category is for players who play over 100 sit and go’s a month. This allows recreational as well as professional players to both compete.

If you are one of the top finishers throughout the month you’ll be eligible to compete in the $50,000 triple shootout Battle of the Planets. This is a freeroll designed to reward the top players. Check it out today, or head over to this Internet Poker site for more info.

Written by admin · Filed Under US Poker News 

Titan Poker Completes Omaholics Promotion

April 7, 2008

Titan Poker has wrapped up their first running of the Omaholics promotion, which was a huge event targeted to Omaha poker players. More specifically, this promotion was only for Pot Limit Omaha players, and rewarded $100,000 total to players. During the promotion, Omaha traffic at Titan Poker increased a huge amount, and you could find Omaha games running at every stake throughout the day and night. Now we’ll get into the promotions details…

How it worked was that the more you played Pot Limit Omaha, the better chance you had to win a piece of the $100,000 prize pool. There was a leader board that ranked players based on the amount of raked Pot Limit Omaha hands they played, and at the end of each month a portion of the money was paid out. For February there was $40,000 paid out, and at the end of March the remaining $60,000 was paid out to the top players.

Also, to reward the sharks, they divvied the prize pool up based on what stakes you were playing. The higher stakes you played, the more money you could have won. For example, the top player of $0.10/$0.20 - $0.25/$0.50 was rewarded with $900 at the end of March, but the best player at the $10/$20 or higher level was rewarded with $3600 at the end of March.

The top prize winner, sendmemore, played 16,833 raked hands at the $10/$20 or higher level and received a cool $3600 deposited right into his account at the end of March. What a nice prize, congratulations!

Titan Poker is always running these sorts of promotions, so make sure to check them out and see what they have going on at the moment. Good luck!

Written by admin · Filed Under General Posts 

Party Poker Offers Bad Beat Jackpot

April 1, 2008

Party Poker is now offering the ability to play at bad beat specific tables. Of course, you will only have the opportunity to win the bad beat jackpot if you are at one of these special table. There aren’t too many of these tables compared the amount of total tables offered at Party Poker. However, you should be able to find at least 100 of these tables at most hours. When playing at one of these tables, Party Poker will take $0.50 from the pot of any raked hand and put it into the special bad beat jackpot.

For anyone who isn’t familiar with a bad beat jackpot, it’s a special jackpot that gets funded from every raked hand at these special tables. The jackpot is awarded when you lose with a hand of four of a kind 8’s or better. Of course, if you lose that hand you will probably lose your entire table amount, but that will probably be nothing compared to the size of the bad beat pot.

Whenever a hand qualifies as a bad beat, 70% of the total bad beat pot will be slip up amongst the tables as follows: 50% of that amount will go to the loser of the hand, 25% to the winner, and the remaining 25% will be split up among the rest of the players. The reason that only 70% of the total pot is distributed is because the remaining 30% is distributed as follows: 20% is put back into the pot for the next time and the other 10% is retained from Party Poker as a fee, which seems quite steep to me.

The Party Poker Bad Beat Jackpot is 100% optional. If you are not interested in taking part in this, then simply avoid any of these specific tables. If you haven’t sign up at Party Poker before, then you are eligible for a special $150 first time deposit bonus. Just check out this Party Poker Bonus Code page and you will find all the details for this offer.

Written by admin · Filed Under US Poker News