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Poker News Round-up: Week #02The first big tournament of the year is upon us and 1,136 players made the trip to play in the Pokerstars Caribbean Adventure and take in a bit of winter sun in the Bahamas. Part of the World Poker Tour for the past four years, this event switched to the European Poker Tour for 2008 and attracted the largest field in its history, but it was a player who would not be attending that made the news prior to the tournament’s start. Josh Field aka JJProdigy had announced in December that he planned to play in the PCA as his first major live event having turned eighteen one week before the event. For those who don’t know him, Field is a self-confessed multi-accounting cheat who has been banned from Full Tilt, Pokerstars and Party Poker for repeat offences. With the start of his live tournament career imminent, he had made a post on an internet forum confessing his previous indiscretions and asking for forgiveness. Some were prepared to take his comments at face value and give the kid another chance but many saw this as simply a calculated move designed to make his life easier for when he would have to face opponents across the table that he may have previously cheated. A campaign even started with players lobbying Pokerstars to ban Field from playing at the PCA, and having been made aware of his intentions to play, Pokerstars did extend his online ban to apply to their live events as well. That decision didn’t go down too well with Field though as another former multi-accounter Justin Bonomo was allowed to participate. It seems the difference is that one held his hands up when caught, stopped cheating and offered to donate a percentage of future winnings to charity whereas the other continued to cheat at every opportunity and only showed remorse when there was something to be gained by doing so. The ban may actually have been a blessing in disguise for Field though as some of the more extreme online posts made about him had threatened violence if he showed his face in Nassau.  Bertrand 'ElkY' Gropllier But getting back to the tournament itself, there was a $2 million first prize to be had by whoever could see their way through this tough field. Just over half the starting field were Pokerstars online qualifiers and seven of them managed to make the eight handed final table. The UK’s Craig Hopkins was hoping to emulate John Gale’s win in this event from three years ago but the favourite going into the final was the formidable David Pham with a big chip lead. Bertrand Grospellier, a Team Pokerstars pro known as ElkY, made a flying start though and eliminated the first three players to assume the role of new chip leader. After Grospellier had added all Pham’s chips to his own stack with a somewhat fortunate flush on the river he was in a commanding position to win. That task was made a little easier for him when his heads up opponent Hafiz Khan decided to make a massive all in bet pre-flop with 9 3 and ElkY snapped off the bluff with pocket eights to go on and win.  Jimmy Fricke - not a freak Having been rejected by the EPT event, JJProdigy has made his way to Melbourne where the Aussie Millions festival has been more welcoming. The main event does not start until 14th January but the preliminaries are underway and event three produced a noteworthy tale. Last year’s runner up in the main event Jimmy Fricke has been gradually building a name for himself and decided to ask Full Tilt if they would be interested in sponsoring him for this year’s event. Now Fricke is no Patrick Antonius in terms of image and marketability, but he had made a polite request and in turn received a polite rejection email from a Full Tilt employee. However, when Fricke scrolled down the email he noticed the original email sent internally by Howard Lederer had also been attached, in which Lederer advised against giving sponsorship. Out of keeping with the gentlemanly persona normally associated with him, Lederer had tersely described Fricke as a “freak” and a “very weird dude.” Fricke was understandably taken aback and made the comments public knowledge which in turn led to an apology from Lederer, and all was soon forgiven and forgotten. Had Fricke bombed at this year’s Aussie Millions it would probably have stayed forgotten as well, but a win for him in event number three (mixed stud games) saw the old freaky dude story resurfacing. Even worse for Lederer, Fricke was also making headlines for all the right reasons without a Full Tilt patch on show for the cameras.
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