If you’re just talking tournaments at WSOP, then I would guess no one is.

Jason Koon could possibly be close. I don’t know how many rebuys he had in the high rollers , and how many non high rollers he even played.

Seidel was close maybe, but cashed for $200k+ yesterday.

A good place to start is checking Poker News for the people who played the $250k and didn’t cash—especially those that fired 2 bullets.

If you played all the $25k+ tournaments and used max rebuys, I believe that equates to $1.4 million in buy-ins, but I didn’t notice anyone that did all that without at least 1 decent cash.

I believe there are 15 $10k events that dont allow rebuys so $150k total possible on those.

Very few losing players are doing all of the above and grinding a huge schedule of sub $10ks on top of that, but I would guess max possible pain is somewhere around $2 million.


EDIT: Nick Petrangelo could be a possibility as well even with a $180k cash. Not sure how many highrollers rebuys & $10ks he played though.

He is way plus is high rollers if you consider the $10M+ 2nd place in the $1M one drop a few years ago. Presumably most of his high roller action is sold or covered by GG.

zero

I see a lot of people on here presume this and I always wonder why.

I have a hunch there are a few players who lost nearly a million in this year's WSOP.

I agree IWB, when u have a few super high roller tournaments & there's re-buys, it's easy to lose A LOT of money

DNegs isn't the only rich player out there bracelet hunting

Nick Petrangelo is definitely down $500k+, but I don’t think he plays any mixed games or even PLO. So his max pain on High Rollers is around $1 million.

I don’t think he fired 2 bullets in the $250k NL, either.

He played every $25k+ NL high roller, including the Heads-Up Championship and used 2 bullets in at least 1 of the $100k NL events.

With other $3k-10k NL events and the online events he would definitely be close. I just don’t know how many non highrollers he plays.

Joe McKeehen could be down 500k. Played tons of events including some high rollers and his biggest cash was like 57k. Didn't do much this series. Plus he played some mains at other venues and didn't cash in those either.

I don't think GG pays any of Daniel's entry fees.

GG pays Daniel a lot of money, and it is understood Daniel will play a full WSOP schedule.

Daniel losing money at the WSOP is simply a cost of doing business.
And it is fully tax deductible for a professional gambler.

When it is all said and done, Daniel is up plenty of dollars from GG.

I don't think you can deduct gambling losses from ordinary income. Gambling losses can only be offset against gambling income. So Daniel's WSOP losses aren't sheltering whatever GG sponsorship money he receives, afaik.

He would actually have to win at gambling in order to offset the losses from gambling.

This is a really good point. So, let's say GG pays him an income of $2M per year (could easily be higher)...he'd probably take home about 60% of that after federal taxes, SSI tax, etc. (no state tax in NV). So let's say he's left with $1.2M....

You can see how dropping a million at the WSOP could sting a lot!

and gambling losses can't carry over to future years even for pros.

What i'm not sure about is how taxes work if gg buys him into the events and he loses. Say they put him into 1 million of events, he cashes for 0. Is that 0 in income or 1 million? If it's 0 it makes a lot more sense for them to buy him in.

Pretty sure that's not true if you file as a professional only as an amateur. It would cause a lot of issues for all professional players if it was. Ordinary income for a professional is anything gambling related I.E. sponsorship/coaching/consulting money as well as long as you are not actively an employee and considered an independent contractor which I'm sure he is. It all goes on schedule C

This is true but all expenses can.

Let's not turn this into a 'tax debate thread'.

Daniel Negreanu has the best tax accountants and lawyers that money can buy, he pays a smaller % in taxes than any other poker professional.

Daniel is no doubt incorporated, LLC'd, sole proprietorship, etc etc to the hilt, plus any other legal maneuver that will reduce his taxes to a bare minimum.

And the same goes for Phil Hellmuth, and many others.

I seriously doubt the checks Daniel receives from GG say 'Pay to the order of Daniel Negreanu' on the front of them.

Heck, I wouldn't doubt Daniel gets to write off the 'trophy wife' Amanda as a business expense.

You seem to know quite a lot about DNegs lol.

"Daniel losing money at the WSOP is simply a cost of doing business.
And it is fully tax deductible for a professional gambler."

Free rolling tourneys on the government's dime. The idiots in here are unbelievable.

Anyone firing multiple bullets in $250Ks is likely to wind up down over $1M for the series. You only cash in like 15% of tournaments, but you probably won't cash in a $250K. DN has the money from endorsements and past winnings and can sell action, so why not do that? It helps promote GG. Headlines if he final tables high rollers would be huge for GG, and the people that brings in to GG don't care how good he really is. He probably thinks he is at worst slightly $EV- in those. People here want to twist it into he is some huge whale or degen.

I understand the point you are trying to make, but this specific statement is untrue.

There is only 1 $250k buy-in tournament for starters.

But anyway here is a list of players that fired 2 bullets in the $250k:


Michael Addamo
Chris Brewer
Alfred Decarolis
David Einhorn
Henrik Hecklen
Andrew Lichtenberger
Daniel Negreanu
Andrew Robl
Dan Smith
Brandon Steven
Christoph Vogelsang


Despite only 2 on this list cashing in the $250k, I don’t think a single player besides Negreanu is down $1million the series.

It’s possible that Alfred Decaloris lost that much if he played the other high rollers, but I have no clue who that is and don’t think he played much aside from this tourney.

EDIT: Looking at hendon mob, it’s somewhat conceivable that Lichtenburger lost a million on WSOP tournies this year, but he would have had to fire near max bullets on all the other high rollers as he had some decent cashes.

Huh? He’s not free rolling anything on government’s dime

Do we have even a guess how many buy ins he lost? Talking just total $$$ no matter how big it is is misleading. Majority of his 1m loss comes from 3-4 high rollers.

What a great vlog series with lots of drama! Can't wait for next year. GG.

His losing the most is mission accomplished. It is a story and generates publicity. The kind of people GG is trying to attract with him are losing players and can identify with that.

Lol, most of the people in those $250Ks are selling most of their action, so it is misleading to say they are down $500K or whatever for the series.

I hope it becomes a yearly tradition for him going forward, as it’s a win-win for us and him.

Not really a compelling point.

The main thing that makes Negreanu appealing in that 25kfantasy format is that he's one of the few guys who plays high rollers AND a full schedule of other events. Many of the ultra high roller types will only dip into the WSOP for a few events per year. You're not going to see Addamo, Steven, Robl, or Einhorn play the $2.5k mixed triple draw. They aren't putting in enough volume to run the risk of getting stuck for $1M. No one who shows up for only a few events is going to be a stuck a full $1M. It's actually impossible this year.