There was a press release today announcing that Pokerstars will be sponsoring the GPL

https://www.globalpokerleague.com/20...ve-team-poker/

Above link is the official statement from the GPL

Kill the European Poker Tour and then sponsor the GPL...

Someone's got to foot that cube shipping bill. Excellent use of resources by PokerStars. #DanielWasRight #EntrepreneurLife

in a world where you can create almost anything you want digitally, who has time for a physical CUBE?

I'm just hear because this thread is gonna blow up.

In my opinion, another terrible decision.

Next step: PokerStars BUYS GPL/GPI and ditches foolish cube.

Alex to make nice profit.

Amaya confirms their poor judgement and disregard for the poker Eco system .... Again

Also Amaya throws out another **** you to sne's , they would rather burn money sponsoring a play money league that gets 200 viewers than give a fair % back to the guys who make them tons of money in rake.

From the other side of things, didn't Alex say at the start that he didn't want any advertising because he didn't want sites to influence the direction of the league. I'm pretty sure he was very strong on that at the beginning, but I guess as money runs out, you gotta change your positions.

Wonder how much PokerStars paid to be the only sponsor? $

Or is it possible all they may have had to agree to do is have Neymar and Ronaldo make a tweet about the GPL, or something like that?

Quick! someone link amaya that alex dreyfus thread. or the new episode of polkernews

I remember being cautiously optimistic when Amaya bought Stars. Oops.

What a waste of money.

wow this is pretty sick. scum gets in bed with scum, not surprising i suppose.

Even putting the scummy stuff to one side for a second, is anyone interested in the GPL at all?

Watching a play money poker league? No, No not really

Even for people that find watching poker entertaining, it is not good TV

Pretty funny how they go from having one of the best tv-formats ever for poker (the big game) to finding no better use for their money than sponsoring the GPL.

Do NOT use account $$$ to swap with Dreyfus plz

And soon you can win your own spot from spins.

Is poker actually being sportified in any way with the GPL?

In sports athletes put their assets on the line (their body) to compete with the best at the highest level, whereas the GPL although it has some top players is also debatably populated journeymen (and celebs), putting nothing on the line competing not at the highest level in a play money tournament.

Would it not be best to sportify poker (or e-sportify poker) by having players create teams of 5 players (similar to a big e-sport like Dota or LoL) and they enter their own teams into a league with a grand prize by bidding for a place in the league.

They therefore have to have confidence that they are +EV and willing to stake their own capital on it (similar to poker tournament rather than freerolling $100 an hour for a prize they have not contributed to). You could argue that only 1 or 2 teams will join then (because others realise they can't compete with the best) but if you have an established Grand Prize and use a bidding process you will always fill up the entire league as the overlay on the grand prize will make it +EV and teams will compete for a spot pushing bids to the highest possible level (while still being considered +EV).

The GPL can then have its own famous stars of poker created by them being the best players (similar to how every other massive e-sport does it), rather than having somewhat well known players forced upon viewers as poker stars.

There is too much variance in poker for it to ever be considered a sport imo

But sure... A grand prize... better commentary... maybe involving the twitch stars tonka,polk,carver,staples would be a good way to get the twitch community on board as well...

Big thing for me is money... Watching poker for no amounts of money doesn't make sense

what does the winner of the GPL get for winning the league?

I always go the impression that Amaya was helping out with the bills from the onset. Alex sidestepped where the money came from so this official news doesn't really shock me.

Instinctively I don't think it's money well spent... but time will tell I guess.

I find it hilarious that this guy spent 5 minutes in a 2p2 ****post thread and actually came up with a better format for GPL than Dreyfus

hahahahahah so funny pokerstars is like **** the pro's in every aspct

even when they find the owner unrespectable hahahahaha

Stick to mma business and economics not your strong suit.

You have to be able to see the silver lining in any situation. Many fail to see the obvious with this recent development. It creates the perfect opportunity to finally answer that question that has vexed us all: Who's better, the best play money players or the best real money players?