Tuesday, February 17, 2009

PokerStars 25 Billionth Hand Prize

Five Players Split PokerStars 25 Billionth Hand Prize - Poker News

The 25,000,000,000 hand celebration at PokerStars got a little bit out of hand Monday morning. The online poker giant gave away hundreds of thousands of dollars over the weekend in anticipation of the milestone hand. Then on Monday morning all hell broke loose at a six-max $1/$2 Limit Omaha Hi-Lo table.

Six players were seated at the table but player “Confederate” decided to sit-out and not post his blinds. That decision cost him at least $20,000. That wasn’t the only drama though. With so many players online, and a PokerStars host alerting the players that the hand was being played at this table, the waiting list for a seat ballooned to 1,600 players. The sudden increase in traffic caused some server issues including the sudden disappearance of one of the players hands."

“NeonFrost” had been dealt cards but after the restart the cards were missing. PokerStars staff reviewed the situation and decided to award the prizes as if NeonFrost had played the hand out and he’s probably very happy that that decision was made. With the board showing 2 7 K A 7 NeonFrost would have made a queen-high flush and “tupapi777″ made a qualifying low.


The two winners split $100,000 cash and each will receive a prize package including a buy-in and travel allowance for the European Poker Tour Grand Final, the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure, the World Series of Poker Main Event and a World Championship of Online Poker ticket. The prize package alone is worth $50,000.

The three other players, “FrtSpnkdMn”, “na47j25s” and “chris12080, split $100,000 between them. Confederate received nothing.