BankrollMob News: Poker, Casino, Crypto & Betting

On Tuesday, the governor of New Jersey, Chris Christie, signed a bill to legalize intrastate online poker in New Jersey, making it the third state to approve such a measure - following Nevada and Delaware.

Read more » New Jersey Legalizes Online Poker

Day 5 of the World Poker Tour LA Poker Classic saw 18 players return to play. Toby Lewis (2010 EPT Vilamoura Main Event Champion) was the chip leader with 1.8 million and his closets opponents were Paul Klann (1,581,000) and Paul "Paulgees81" Volpe (1,581,000).

Read more » WPT LA Poker Classic: Time For The Final Table

It seems like there will be a challenge between Team PokerStars Pro and Full Tilt Poker's The Professionals at the the 2013 EPT London (March 5-16). It started last week with Gus Hansen sending a Tweet to Daniel Negreanu reminding him of a classic hand they played on High Stakes Poker in 2006.

Read more » Full Tilt Poker vs PokerStars

Day 4 of the World Poker Tour LA Poker Classic saw several big names hit the rail, including all 7 Champions Club members: Scott Clements (30th place), Joe Hachem (33rd place), Scott Seiver (52nd place), Phil Laak (54th place), Carlos Mortensen (55th place), John Hennigan (56 place) and recent bestbet Jacksonville Fall Poker Scramble winner Noah Schwartz (19th place).

Read more » WPT LA Poker Classic: EPT Champ Toby Lewis Leads Final 18

On Tuesday, PokerStars began the countdown to its 95 billionth hand. There's up to $1,000,000 in cash to play for, and more than 300 chances to win. All you have to is to play at PokerStars cash game tables and be dealt into a millionth hand from 94,700,000,000 to 95,000,000,000 (e.g. 94,902,000,000). The winner of the ninety-five billion hand will get at least $20,000!

How can I increase my chances of winning? 

• Play on more tables - If you are able to play on more than one table at a time, you will increase your chances of being dealt into a milestone hand.
• Play longer sessions - The size of the prizes depends on the number of VIP Player Points (VPPs) you have earned while sitting at the table. Try to take a seat at a table well in advance of the next milestone hand to increase the amount of your potential prize.
• Loosen up - you earn VPPs every time you contribute to a raked pot. The more pots you play in, the more VPPs you will earn.

Current promotions on PokerStars:

100% Up To $600 First Deposit Bonus!

Leaderboard with $20,800 in prizes!

Daily Freerolls (leaderboard)

Last week's biggest winner online was "kagome kagome" with a profit of $1.2 million. According to highstakesdb, he's real name and age are not known, but Read more » High Stakes: Mystery German Won $1.2 Million Last Week!

Today it's time for the fourth day of the 2013 WPT LA Poker Classic Main Event and 63 of 517 players will return to battle - with Jeremy Ausmus out in front with 1,014,000 chips! Ausmus is best known for his 5th place finish in the 2012 World Series of Poker Main Event for an increadible $2,155,313.

Now he has the chance to boost his bankroll with another $1,004,090. However, there is still a long way to go and there are many great players left in the tournament that he will have to overcome - just to mention a few: Noah Schwartz, Elliot Smith, Joe Hachem, Dan Shak, Ana Marquez and Jesse Sylvia.

Full Tilt Poker recently announced that they will "become the only online poker site in the world to offer prize pool guarantees on every single tournament".

According to the press release, the new schedule will kick-off on the 25th of February and it will include "28-30 Rush tournaments, 15-20 multi-entry events, 10-15 re-entry tournaments, and 6-8 multi-chance tournaments per day.  Full Tilt Poker will also feature at least one guaranteed tournament every ten minutes and up to 225 guaranteed cash tournaments every single day". In March, the guaranteed tournament prize pools will have a total value of more than $25 million!

Full Tilt Poker will also launch a new tournament lobby in mid-March which "will make it even easier for players to find all the tournaments they’re interested in – as well as two new unique tournament formats".

No Full Tilt Poker account yet? Sign-up on this link and get 100% bonus on your first 3 deposits up to a total of $600!

A total of 254 players (24 re-entries) entered the World Poker Tour Baden €3,300 Main Event. Yesterday the final six players returned to the Casino Baden to play down to a winner.

All eyes were, of course, on two-time WPT champ Marvin Rettenmaier, who had the chance to become the third player in history to win 3 WPT Main Events alongside Gus Hansen and Carlos Mortensen.

Read more » WPT Baden: Vladimir Bozinovic Wins The Main Event ($271,258)

On Monday, Walb News reported about a poker game between friends that ended pretty bad. It happened early Saturday morning on Boby Drive in Columbus.

"They had a dispute within the poker game and the gentleman got mad. All I remember is my wife waking up at 3 a.m. and hearing two different kinds of gunshots.  I ran over to the door to see and I watched the party scatter," said neighbour Christopher Rodriguez.

Read more » Home Poker Game Turned Violent

The main event of World Poker Tour Baden is down to 44 players after 2 days of play. German poker pro Bodo Sbrzesny, who finished third in WPT Prague a few months ago, leads the remaining squad of players into Day 3 with 403,000 chips (20k more than his fellow countryman Vishal Pundjabi).

Another German with plenty of chips is Marvin Rettenmaier (248,500 - ranked 10). Besides Rettenmaier, the biggest names left in the tournament are Kara Scott, Paul Berende and Martin Stazsko.

Day 3 starts at 14:00 (CET) with the blinds 1,200-2,400, 400 ante, and the final table will be played on Sunday. 27 of the remaining players will get a piece of the prize pool (minimum cash of $8,634 and the winner will take home $271,258).

Check back on Monday for a recap of how the final table played out.

254 players signed up for the WPT Baden Main Event (Day 1A: 104 & Day 1B: 150). Both starting days are in the books now and there are 131 players remaining. Day 2 starts in just about 2 hours and Kimmo Kurko (picture), from Day 1A, will sit down with the largest stack (149,700). Steve O'Dwyer is ranked 6th with 118,000 chips and Champions Club members Marvin Rettenmaier (86,000) and Lukas Berglund (78,900) are not far behind.

The money bubble will burst when 27 players remain ($8,634). The winner will take home a whopping $271,258 - about 100k more than the runner-up. Check back tomorrow for a Day 2 recap.

After a few months break, season 5 of PokerStars Australia New Zealand Poker Tour (ANZPT) kicked of yesterday. The first day of the ANZPT Perth Main Event saw 67 players. In the end of the day - there were 38 players left, with Peter Woodworth (picture) holding the chip lead (84,025). Day 1B is running at the moment and, according to the latest reports, 139 of 151 players have chips left.

We will be back with another update once Day 1B is over. Stay tuned!

On Tuesday, Chris Ferguson's attorney, Ian J. Imrich, revealed that Ferguson filed for a settlement with the United States Court Southern District of New York. Here are some "highlights" of the settlement:

• Ferguson to hand over at least $2,350,000, along with "all funds in the Ferguson Account (the "Ferguson Account Funds")." I don't know what the figure in those accounts would be. At one point the government was seeking $42mm from Ferguson.Read more » Chris Ferguson Settles Black Friday Charges

BankrollMob is getting close of reaching 500,000 members. The current number of members is 479,331! We're very happy to announce that we will be hosting a competition to honor reaching half a million members.

BankrollMob's Guess date and time of 500,000 members competition is proudly sponsored by 888poker who has donated the prize where you can win a physical seat to one of their SuperStack tournaments (read more on superstack.net) that are played in a number of different casinos around the world (see below). The value of the prize is $190 - $265 depending on the event you choose to play. All you have to do is guess the correct date and time of our 500,000th sign-up!

Read more » Competition - guess date and time of 500,000 members!

American poker profile Gerald Hatten "Jerry" Buss has passed on. In 2012, Buss was in hospital for several months with an undisclosed intestinal problem. After being hospitalised at Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre with an undisclosed form of cancer, he died of kidney failure at 5:55 a.m. on February 18, 2013, aged 80.

Read more » High Stakes Poker Icon Dies At 80

On March 17 it is time for Full Tilt Online Poker Series XXII (FTOPS XXII). It's the second edition of the tournament series since the site reopened for business (number 22 in total). A total of 38 events will be played from March 17 - 31 with a total guaranteed prize pool of $10 million. There are 3 new and exclusive tournament types to be introduced by Full Tilt Poker in the coming weeks, all three will feature in FTOPS XXII (stay tuned for more info).

FTOPS XXII Prizes
Players who make it to any final table in FTOPS XXII will receive more than a nice payday:

• Everyone who makes the final table of any FTOPS XXII event will receive a limited-edition FTOPS jacket*
• Players who win an FTOPS XXII event will receive the jacket, along with a gold FTOPS jersey* and a coveted gold-jersey avatar for use on Full Tilt Poker
• The player who finishes first on the FTOPS XXII Leaderboard will win a custom Full Tilt Poker avatar and a special prize package which includes entry to every FTOPS XXIII event (except the Two-Day Event); the prize package is expected to be worth approximately $11,000 in tournament entries

Click here for a 100% up to $600 Deposit Bonus!

On Monday, Tony G blogged about an insane cash game at Kings Club in Prague, Czech Republic. According to himself, he lost about €500,000 in a €2k/€4k cash game the first day. The same day as that cash game took place he also played a €10,000 High Roller (rebuy) event, but he decided to skip Day 2 and let his average stack get blinded off.

Read more » Tony G Wins €1.85 Million Pot?

Poker's richest weekly tournament, PokerStars Sunday Million, celebrates its seventh birthday on March 3 at 14:30 with a $7,000,000 guarantee tournament (the winner will take home at least $1 million). PokerStars is awarding thousands of seats via low buy satellites to this tournament, including a special 1,000 seat guaranteed $11 deadline satellite on March 3 at 14:25 ET.

You can also secure a seat by playing the $1 satellites under 'Tourney', 'Satellites', or simply buy-in directly for $215 under 'Special' in the poker lobby. May the flop be with you!

Current promotions on PokerStars:

100% Up To $600 First Deposit Bonus!

Leaderboard with $20,800 in prizes!

Daily Freerolls (leaderboard)

Open-Face Chinese poker has become very popular over the past 1-2 years or so. Barry Greenstein is relatively new to the game and recently played it online using a popular App for iPhone/iPad.

"I was told then by some people that many were playing Open-Face Chinese on an app that's available for iPhones and the iPad. So when I got home I downloaded the app, and I started playing just for fun against some people. You can even play against the app itself," Greenstein wrote on his latest blog.

Read more » Barry Greenstein's Warning: "Don't get cheated on the Open-Face Chinese app"

On Sunday, Daniel Negreanu started a mission to raise $100,000 in seven days to help The Children of St. Jude. Daniel promised to match every donation received (up to $50,000 total) and invite 4 persons who donated at least $2,500 to dinner with him in Las Vegas, followed by a poker lesson/fun evening at his house.

Read more » Daniel Negreanu Raises Money For St. Jude Children's Research Hospital

The official schedule for the 2013 World Series of Poker has now been released. The tournament series will include 62 bracelet events and run from May 29 to July 7 at the All-Suite Hotel & Casino. During the opening weekend, a new "Millionaire Maker" (Event 6) will be played. The tournament will have a buy-in of $1,500 and will see one person taking home $1,000,000!

Read more » 2013 WSOP Schedule Released!

A video montage of alleged cheating at the 2009 Partouche Poker Tour Grand Final was uploaded to You Tube on January 28. The man behind the video, Nordine Bouya, claimed that the winner (Paul Pierre Pasqualini) and the second place finisher (Cedric Rossi) used a simple code to signal to each other what cards they had. The video has been viewed over 115,000 times so far and has generated a wild debate.

Read more » Tournament Ranking Site Takes Action Against French Pros

Michael Kuhlman, 36, was shot and killed in his home in Saginaw Township, USA in May 2012 while hosting a poker party. One man was charged in the case, 24-year-old Quintel West, but on Monday the trial was delayed after the defence attorney claimed to have found a witness that could help her client.

Read more » New Witness Comes Forward In Murder Case

After 5 days of play, Matt Giannetti was crowned the champion of the World Poker Tour Lucky Hearts Poker Open at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Hollywood, Florida. Giannetti, who won the 2012 WPT Malta Main Event, brought the largest stack to the final table and remained in the lead from start to finish. Besides that it only took him 6 hands to defeat Lily Kiletto heads-up.

Read more » WPT Lucky Hearts Poker Open: Matt Giannetti Wins His Second WPT Title!