Dreams Die for Negreanu
Poker players often have been in the position of “so near and yet so far”. But the position that Kid Poker Daniel Negreanu has just gotten himself into must be excruciatingly painful. He entered the final table of the Vienna stop of the European Poker Tour (EPT) with a considerable chip lead and a bunch of relatively unknown faces. But he blew it all by crashing out in fourth place.
2010 has been a particularly bad year for Negreanu. His annual live tournaments earnings are so far the lowest since 2001. And he has got himself into needless controversies like calling Annie Duke an unmentionable name that has been reported at every poker news portal. This has diminished his reputation as one of the role models of the poker community. He was not inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame. In the Vienna EPT he had a chance to make 2010 count for something, but that was not to be.
Had Negreanu won the Vienna EPT he would have achieved two very special things. There are three major live poker tournament circuits – World Series of Poker (WSOP), World Poker Tour (WPT) and EPT. Winning an event in each of these circuits is winning a Triple Crown in poker. Negreanu has four WSOP bracelets and two WPT titles but nothing so far on the EPT circuit. By crashing out of the Vienna EPT Negreanu lost the chance of becoming only the third player in poker history to win the Triple Crown. The two who have achieved this feat are Roland de Wolfe and Gavin Griffin. At one time Negreanu was number one on the list of players with the maximum winnings from live poker tournaments. But rival Phil Hellmuth, known as Poker Brat, overtook him and since then Negreanu is playing catching up. Had Negreanu won the first prize of €700,000 he would have regained the top spot on the money list. But as things stand Hellmuth will have the bragging rights for now, and though Negreanu may not admit it this will hurt more than missing out on the Triple Crown.
There has been no Tweet so far from Kid Poker after his defeat. His last message was, “5,360,000 good for chip lead with 5 left but stacks are much closer now. Next level is high 60k-120k 15k ante”. For the sake of record, Michael Eiler of Germany took home the Vienna EPT.
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