PokerStars Caribbean Adventure 2009

Every January for the past five years, the poker world’s greatest players have flocked to the warm exotic climes of the Bahamas to compete in what is arguably the hardest poker tournament of the year. And 2009 was no exception.

Just under two months ago, 1,374 top online pros, live poker superstars and internet qualifiers headed to Atlantis – the annual retreat for the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure – with one thing in mind: being crowned the unofficial best no-limit Hold’em tournament player in the world. For while the World Series of Poker has been the benchmark for tournament success for nearly four decades, over the last three years the PCA has been widely acknowledged as the toughest test of a player’s live tournament credentials, the record-breaking field full to the brim with the best online and live players in the world. You’d have an easier job finding an edge on a sphere than at the PCA.

The hopefuls come from all over the globe: Europe, Scandinavia, Latin America, Australia, and, of course, North America. And this year, after six days of testosterone-fuelled four-bets and all-in bluffs, it was Canadian Poorya Nazari who emerged the victor, adding $ 3m to his already sizable roll.
At just 22 Nazari continues the trend of extremely young winners, which began with Steve Paul-Ambrose (21) in 2006 and continued with Ryan Daut (22) and Bertrand ‘ElkY’ Grospellier (25) in 2007 and 2008 respectively. So why does this event attract such a young crowd, and why do the kids just keep on winning?

Coming of age

Danny Ryan, a 25-year-old internet legend who plays under the moniker The__D__RY and has profits in excess of $ 1m online, has a simple answer. ‘You can play here when you’re 18. That’s a huge reason for American players, because if you can’t play in Vegas [where you must be 21] and Europe is so far away, this is an obvious tournament to satellite into. This is probably the youngest tournament field in the whole world and also has the highest percentage of what you’d call online players, which combines to change the play a lot. At other European Poker Tour events [the PCA has been an EPT event for the past two years] you get a mix of players with some guys in their forties or fifties who want to see more flops and aren’t willing to play huge pots preflop early on.’

Poker superstar Daniel Negreanu believes it’s the hugely competitive nature of the online game and the egos of the adolescent players that shape the event: ‘For the online community the PCA is the pinnacle – it’s the most prestigious tournament in the world. They see themselves as being the best players in the world so it’s natural that they view the PCA as the toughest tournament. I actually don’t see it that way because I don’t think they all necessarily play that well as far as deeper-stacked poker goes.’
Negreanu’s point represents one side of a debate that’s raged throughout the poker world in the last couple of years: the online players think the old-school live players suck and the live pros believe online upstarts are brainless four-betting maniacs.

Gavin Griffin, who at the age of 27 is neither upstart nor weary veteran, doesn’t necessarily take either side of the argument, but still believes the PCA is the toughest field of its size in the world. And he should know what he’s talking about being the first – and to date only – player to win WSOP, WPT and EPT titles for a combined $ 4.5m. Griffin elaborates: ‘I’d say that 40% of the raised hands on my table were re-raised – it was crazy. There was a lot of three-betting and there wasn’t anybody that I knew or recognised. They were all really young.’

Another guy who knows what it takes to come through a massive field is Peter Eastgate. The 22-year-old Dane, who won more than $ 7m at the 2008 WSOP Main Event in November, and in the process became the youngest ever world champion, is in the Caribbean too.

He’s just busted out of the PCA in 84th place for $ 17,500, but he doesn’t mind me door-stopping him to get his thoughts on the event. ‘The PCA is a lot tougher with a lot more strong players,’ says Eastgate. ‘In the World Series there are a lot of complete dead-value amateurs, but the weaker players in this field have a better sense of what they’re doing. I’d say that in the WSOP Main Event 60-70% have the potential to reach the final table. But here it’s more like 90-95% because there are so many good players and, of course, a lot of pros.’

Just to prove that his WSOP success was no one-off, minutes after chatting to me Eastgate sidles off to investigate whether he can still buy into the $ 5,000 freezeout side event. He can. He does. And he wins, taking home $ 343,000 for his efforts. The guy is hotter than the Bahamian sun.

World domination

Eastgate’s comments on the strength of the PCA field are echoed by Isaac Haxton, who finished runner-up to Ryan Daut at the 2007 PCA for $ 861,789. Haxton sums up the PCA mindset perfectly: ‘There’s a lot to be said for the more aggressive confrontational approach, with lots of three-betting and big pots. It’s more popular among the kids, and frankly it’s easier to do well with this style of play than the small-ball approach. It takes a lot longer to get very good at playing the small-ball game,’ explains Haxton.

While aggressive poker raged throughout the five-day event, there were a couple of tournament veterans in the shape of Dan Heimiller (seventh) and the all-time number one female tournament player Kathy Liebert (12th), who held their own, but the final tables were dominated by young bucks. The final three comprised two 22-year-olds and a 23-year-old, and the action on the last two tables was absolutely electric, with some incredible plays between Benjamin Spindler and Kevin Saul particularly.

For an exercise in big-pot, preflop aggression and balls-out bluffing make sure you catch all the action when it airs on UK TV (dates TBC). For the foreseeable future, at least, it looks like poker is going to remain a young man’s game.

Poorya Nazari Q&A

We catch up with the PCA champ, known online as ‘isuckoutonu’

How did you qualify for the PCA?
I spent $ 3,500 to $ 4,000 trying to qualify for the PCA playing many different types of qualifiers including the $ 33 rebuy triple turbo, $ 100 rebuy, and $ 650 freezeouts. I ended up taking down one of the $ 33 rebuy triple turbos, where I had invested around $ 700 throughout the rebuy and add-on period.

What was the turning point of your tournament?
With 32 remaining players I was 31st and had 250,000 in chips with blinds at 8,000/16,000/1,500. So with about 16 big blinds I had to find a couple of spots to accumulate chips or double-up. I was fortunate to double up twice by the time the blinds hit 10,000/20,000 so I had over one million chips, which allowed me to play a looser style and accumulate even more chips.

The first time I doubled up I found 7-7 in the big blind and shoved over a raise from the cutoff; he had Ac-Qc and I flopped a set, which held. The second double-up was against Kevin Saul. Kevin opened UTG for 52,000, I made it 144,000 with T-T and he flatted my raise. The flop came 9-high, Kevin checked, I shoved, he called with 9-7 and my Tens held. Going from 16 big blinds to over 50 big blinds that deep in the tournament was definitely the turning point for me.

There were a lot of young players at the PCA as well as established pros – which did you find harder to play?
I would have to say the live pros because as an online player I can recognise the various lines fellow online players take, which makes it easier to play against them. The established guys play a little differently, which gave me problems at times.

You were quite aggressive when the action turned short-handed – is that your normal style?
I am looser than most players in certain situations, with short-handed play being one of them. That doesn’t mean I’ll start raising every hand or spewing chips uncontrollably postflop, but I’m actively looking for spots where I feel I can take pots away from people, where most other players would just make the safe play and fold.

What advice would you give PokerPlayer readers who qualify for next year’s PCA?
Run good!