The title of the article basically says it all, so here are my choices for the 15 craziest, zaniest, mind-boggling stories from the world of poker over the past year. So in no particular order here are #’s 1-5:

Matt Perrins wins WSOP bracelet after watching YouTube tutorial

Proving ANYONE can win a poker tournament, UK poker pro Matt Perrins decided to play in the $1,500 2-7 Lowball tournament after watching a YouTube tutorial on the game. Perrins went on to win the bracelet in the tournament (of course he won or this story isn’t on the list), which may have been the impetus for Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier to try his hand at 7-Card-Stud (a game he had never played before) where he won his first WSOP bracelet and completed the Triple Crown in the process.

Bottom Line: Poker is most definitely gambling!

Chino Rheem is bad with money!

There were plenty of Chino Rheem stories in 2011, as the term “Getting Chino’d” gained mainstream recognition in the poker world. Chino was verbally berated in a YouTube video while playing high-stakes poker in Vegas; Chino was seen getting KTFO’d in a boxing match by Tom Hall after Hall got some revenge on Rheem after Chino ducked out of some agreed upon appearances; and finally all of the “Getting Chino’d” stories came to light on 2+2, especially after Rheem won the inaugural Epic Poker League Main Event.

Bottom line: NEVER lend Chino money!

Tony G and Phil Laak ARE the PokerStars Big Game

Basically if you don’t have either one of these two players on a televised poker show you don’t have a televised poker show! Between Tony G’s “I’m Qualified” and his never ending barrage of insults directed at Phil Hellmuth, and Laak’s fear of anonymous Italian poker players being trained by Shaolin Monks or having to go without a satchel, these two make for some very interesting television!

Bottom line: Always invite the Unabomber and Tony G!

Lex Veldhuis kicks ElkY in the head

The fight was two years in the making, but in late 2011 we finally got to see two millionaire poker players take part in a kickboxing match! Veldhuis was able to back up his trash-talking by dispatching of ElkY rather easily, proving that he is not the worst practitioner of MMA in the poker world (the jury is still out on whether ElkY can lay claim to this dubious distinction).

Bottom Line: At a table with both men, trash-talk ElkY before Veldhuis!

NFL disallows players to participate in CHARITY poker games

In one of the strangest decisions in NFL history, the league decided that a number of their current players were disallowed from participating in a CHARITY poker game, yes a C-H-A-R-I-T-Y poker game! So instead of playing in the event a number of NFL’ers stood by on the rail as poker pros and celebrities took part in the Starkey Hearing Foundation’s big poker for charity blitz at the Golden Nuggest Casino in Las Vegas in February.

Bottom Line: The NFL truly stands for the No Fun League!

READ PART 2 HERE

READ PART 3 HERE

Tags: Big Game, Boxing Match, Card Stud, ElkY, High stakes poker, Line Poker, main event, Mainstream Recognition, phil hellmuth, Phil Laak, poker players, poker tournament, Poker World, Rheem, Satchel, Shaolin Monks, Televised Poker, Triple Crown, World Of Poker, Youtube Video

This entry was posted on Friday, December 30th, 2011 at 9:02 am and is filed under Poker News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.