At the 2012 World Series of Poker (WSOP), five new gold bracelet events will be held. The new tournaments comprise a wide variety of games and genres and include a $5,000 Mix-Max No Limit Hold’em event, a $2,500 Four-Max No Limit Hold’em event, a $1,500 Ante-Only No Limit Hold'em event, a $1 million Big One for One Drop charity poker tournament, and a $3,000 Heads-Up No Limit Hold’em/Pot Limit Omaha contest. PocketFives sat down with WSOP Tournament Director Jack Effel (pictured) to get the inside scoop on the new additions to the 2012 WSOP schedule.PocketFives: Thanks for joining us, Jack. Tell us about the brand new $5,000 Mix-Max No Limit Hold’em event, which will feature nine-max, six-max, and heads-up poker.
Jack Effel: The Mix-Max was a brainchild of mine when we were trying to come up with events for WSOP Europe last year. In 2011, we could only have Omaha and Hold’em in France, so I said why don’t we have several variations of No Limit Hold’em in one event? We can play nine-handed on Day 1 and then change it from there. Daniel Negreanu had the idea of seeding the final 32 like the NCAA Tournament. We think it will be extremely exciting.
PocketFives: We know a lot of PocketFives members are looking forward to the $3,000 Heads-Up No Limit Hold’em/Pot Limit Omaha tournament. How did that come to be?
Jack Effel: It’s a new spin on two of the most popular games out there. Lots of people have asked for Heads-Up PLO in the past and we know that the popularity of short-handed games has trended upwards. We wanted a new twist on these two versions of poker. What better way to do that than heads-up where you alternate between games? I think it’ll be a challenging competition.
PocketFives: In a recent PocketFives interview with poker pro Christina Lindley (pictured), she said she was fired up for the $2,500 Four-Handed No Limit Hold’em tournament. Why was that added to the WSOP schedule?Jack Effel: Last year, we had four different six-max events and we know that four-max is starting to grow on people. Plus, we’ve seen it online a lot. So, we decided to try a four-max event. It’s an opportunity to showcase a new variation of short-handed poker. It’s skillful because you’re making a lot of decisions. We’re expecting to see 1,000 or more players in it.
PocketFives: We’ve seen ante-only tournaments online, and now we’ll see a $1,500 Ante-Only No Limit Hold'em event at the 2012 WSOP.
Jack Effel: This event has been played in several places around the world and is popular online. Other places play it with a constant blind throughout the entire duration of the tournament, but we wanted a twist on it. If it’s ante-only, it should just be ante-only and have a bring-in like in Stud. Everyone will ante every hand and the person to the left of the button will have the bring-in. With everyone anteing every hand, there’s not just two blinds in the pot. You have to make more strategic plays and get in your opponents’ heads.
PocketFives: Explain why the $1 million One Drop event should be a gold bracelet event when its field is capped and the buy-in is prohibitively high for most people to afford.Jack Effel: It is a lot to afford, but we feel the elite will play it. It’ll be elite versus elite, which means it’ll be a very difficult bracelet to win. We feel from a pure competitive standpoint, it’s worthy of a bracelet. We do want to control the number of players in it from the get-go to see how well it does and how well it’s received. We have between 20 and 30 players registered now and I think it could be sold out by the time the WSOP begins this year.
PocketFives: Why is there a cap on how many people can enter the $1 million buy-in event (48 players), which will be broadcast on ESPN?
Jack Effel: It’s a prestigious event and we want to keep it somewhat exclusive. $1 million is a lot for anyone to pony up, so the first 48 guys who have the brass and backup to do it, we’ll allow them in. If there’s an overwhelming response, we may consider lifting it the next time we have the event. Our goal here isn’t to break the poker economy, but to create a special event that will award the largest first place prize ever in a poker tournament and support our #1 charity.
Read Part 2 of this interview.
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