Thursday, January 29, 2009

POLL - Format for Mixed Games Championship Tourney

There have been some requests to reconsider the format change for the Mixed Games Championship Tourney. It was changed from HORSE to PLHE to maintain the "Top 9" concept for the final - HORSE only seats 8 at a table. But this isn't Russia - we can do what the people want. So say what you want - please vote in the poll over on the right. The results will be tallied next week and the Championship format set based on the poll. Thanks!

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Championship Tourney Changes and a Scoring Change

Scoring Change
Last season we attempted to accommodate late-joining players by "seeding" them with a few points. This season and going forward we will instead drop the lowest score from everyone's 10-week season. This is a simpler system will still help late joiners, but will also be fair to everyone else since it can be difficult to attend every tourney for 10 weeks. Starting after Week 5 the points listings will reflect the dropping of the lowest score for each player.

Championship Tourney
We are making some changes to the Championship Tourney to make it more competitive and meaningful. It will still consist of the Top 9 8 players from the season and the players with the most points going into the Championship will still have an advantage, but there will now be more opportunities to gain in points. The rest of this post outlines those changes.

Top 9
We originally set the mixed games Championship format to be HORSE, but HORSE only seats 8 at a table and we want to keep the Top 9 concept across seasons. Therefore, the Championship Tourney format for mixed games will be PLHE.


Top 8

Based on league player's feedback, we will stick with the HORSE format for the Championship, with the Top 8 from the league advancing to the final.

Championship Buy-in
Since there are only 9 8 people in the Championship Tourney the buy-in will be $10+1 to increase the tourney payout.

Bounties
There will still be a bounty on everyone in the Championship, but it will be a weighted bounty based on the leaderboard going into the tourney, as follows:

Place Bounty
1) 8 pts
2) 7 pts
3) 6 pts
4) 5 pts
5) 4 pts
6) 3 pts
7) 2 pts
8) 1 pt




Bonus points
There will be additional bonus points for finishing in the money in the Championship, as follows:

Place Bonus
1) 20 pts
2) 10 pts
3) 5 pts

Comments welcome, as always.

Week 1 Results

Wow, what a great turnout for the kickoff to Season 2! 22 players went at it in the HORSE tourney, and there are still more players interested in the league. Thanks for playing everyone!

We are going with cash bounties this season, and Biggfella brought down the first one, taking out last season's champion, EJ89. Not content with freerolling the tournament, Biggfella proceeded to win the tournament as well, making him next week's target. xICEPICKx chipped out second, and LaxStarr1995 took down third.

Results:


The leaderboard:

biggfella(1) 41.9
xICEPICKx 28.17
laxstarr1995 22.08
c2d2 18.45
nekendrick 15.98
hvillethugg 12.73
RLD93 11.58
FiveFingerz 10.63
BmoreBilly 9.83
EJ89 9.14
ravensfutbal 8.54
potnets 8.01
XPreacherX 7.54
degenizens 7.11
goateedude 6.73
themerk08 6.38
rusdog13 6.06
raquel1988 5.76
highslot84 5.49
HiRoller88 5.24
Arcturus 5

Next week's format is everyone's favorite, Razz.

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Game Day!

Season 2 kicks off tonight with Game 1 of the 10-game season. The format for the season is mixed games, and we get started tonight with HORSE, which consists of rotating limit games of Holdem, Omaha H/L, Razz, Stud, and Stud H/L.

If you haven't joined yet, the league fee is $15 which goes entirely into the season prize pool. The $15 can be sent by PokerStars transfer (preferred) to potnets (Severna Park), or by PayPal ($16) to wawhite at gmail dot com. Full season details here.

Thursday, January 22, 2009

Season 2 Ready To Get Underway

Season 2 of the MD DonkFest Poker League will get started Tuesday, January 27. If you haven't joined yet, now is the time to do it. The league fee is just $15, all of which goes into the league prize pool. To join, transfer $15 on PokerStars to potnets (Severna Park).

The league seasons alternate between NL Holdem and Mixed Games - Season 2 will be Mixed Games. The first tournament of the year will be HORSE. Don't feel intimidated if you aren't familiar with some of the other games - they are fairly easy to figure out and being a friendly league you can always ask for help. Learning some games beyond Holdem is a great way to improve your poker skills overall.

There will be changes to the Championship Tourney posted shortly that will make the Championship more competitive. The points leaders will still have an advantage, but others will have more of a chance to make up ground. Stay tuned...

Here is the schedule for Season 2:

Week 1: HORSE
Week 2: Razz
Week 3: Holdem Lim
Week 4: Omaha H/L Lim
Week 5: Stud
Week 6: Holdem NL Heads Up
Week 7: Omaha PL
Week 8: HOSE
Week 9: Holdem PL
Week 10: Stud H/L

Championship: HORSE

Finally, if you know others who would like to play please feel free to invite them - the more the merrier...

Wednesday, January 21, 2009

EJ89 Crowned Season 1 Champ

The Season 1 Championship featured a 2 point bounty on all players. HiRoller88 announced early in the tournament that he would need all of the bounties to have a chance at 3rd place in the league. He then proceeded to scoop all but one of the bounties while steamrolling to a convincing win in the tournament. The bounty points combined with the first place win moved him into the 3rd spot. Nice job!

EJ89 continued his league dominance, placing second and easily maintaining his overall league lead. EJ89 is our Season 1 League Champion.

Potnets came back from near elimination early on, rebuilding a 140 chip stack and hanging on to take third place. That was not enough to hold on to the 3rd place spot in the league, however.

Maddoggy44 was knocked out early on when a flopped full house was bested by a better full house. Maddoggy44's second place points in the league were not in danger, however.

The Championship Tourney results:




The final Season 1 league points:

EJ89 (2) 181.75
maddoggy44 (1) 156.23
HiRoller88 (1)
145.83
potnets (2) 141.98
themerk08 127.89
nekendrick 119.62
laxstarr1995 (1) 118.91
Ehonda500Mob (1) 104.94
ravensfutbal 101.33
UAEgreg 91.29
A7X CHAPTER4 89.10
nutzforU(1) 81.68
raquel1988 78.62
BaltoBruiser 67.27
FiveFingerz 62.55
xICEPICKx (1) 61.23
Craig1625 (1) 50.00
Kore89 32.09
mxrider 19.93
DarkRattler 7.02

EJ89 wins $155, maddoggy44 wins $93 and HiRoller88 wins $62. Congratulations! The money will be transferred sometime tomorrow.

Championship Tourney Tonight!!

The Championship Tourney for Season 1 is tonight. Everyone participating should have received the password for the tournament by email - please contact me ASAP if you did not receive it.

Following tonight's tournament the final point totals will be tallied and I will post the final leaderboard and league winners. Thanks again to everyone who participated!

Sunday, January 18, 2009

Season 2 League Rules and Details

Updated 2/3/2009

The league details for Season 2 (this post will be kept up to date with the latest information):

The league will have a $15 league fee which will go completely towards the league prize pool.

Alternatively, a $2 fee can be paid to play in a single weekly tournament. This will allow latecomers to still get in, and possibly encourage occasional players. This obviously is more of a pain to manage, so it is hoped that most will pay the season fee instead.

All league fees and payouts will be processed via PokerStars transfers. To pay a league fee initiate a transfer to player "potnets" (will show city as Severna Park). Please take care to ensure the transfer is going to the right place. Other payment methods can be accommodated but PS transfer is strongly preferred.

All players in the weekly tournament will earn points, with significantly more points going to the higher finishing places. Points accumulate over the season to determine a champion at the end with the most points. The lowest score for each player over the 10-week season will be dropped, to accommodate late-joining players and people missing an occasional tournament.

LEAGUE FEES MUST BE CURRENT BEFORE EACH TOURNAMENT STARTS IN ORDER TO EARN POINTS IN THAT TOURNAMENT. NO EXCEPTIONS.


A league "season" will consist of ten weekly tournaments followed by a championship tournament.

League format:
A weekly private tournament on PokerStars for $5+.50
Tournaments for Season 2 will be a variety of mixed games
Tournament will be Tuesday nights at 9pm EST
Tournament password will be made available on the league blog prior to the tournament
Every league member who plays will get league points, with points ramping up the higher you place
Bounty: For Season 2 there will be a $5 bounty (no points) on the winner of the previous week. In the event of consecutive wins the winner gets the bounty. The bounty will be paid via transfer following the tournament. The week 1 bounty is TBD (likely to be the Season 1 Champion)
At the end of the season, the Top 8 players in points will play a Championship Tourney, which will also add to the points total

The bounties and bonus points for the Championship Tourney are as follows:

Bounties
There will still be a bounty on everyone in the Championship, but it will be a weighted bounty based on the leaderboard going into the tourney, as follows:

PlaceBounty
1)8 pts
2)7 pts
3)6 pts
4)5 pts
5)4 pts
6)3 pts
7)2 pts
8)1 pt


Bonus points
There will be additional bonus points for finishing in the money in the Championship, as follows:

PlaceBonus
1)20 pts
2)10 pts
3)5 pts

The season ends after the championship tournament, with the league prize pool distributed over the top 3 point leaders. The number of payouts may be adjusted depending on how many people are in the league.

Two new policies to be aware of for Season 2:

1) Sitting out - Any player that registers for a tourney but doesn't actually play any hands (i.e. sits out until blinded off) will receive last place points for that tourney. It is OK (and even encouraged) to register to get 5 points for a tourney you can't attend, but it isn't fair to get more points than an active player in that case. You must actually play at least one hand in a tourney to get more than last place points.

2) Non-league players - Non-league players are welcome to play in any regular league tournaments. This only increases the weekly prize pool, and league points are only awarded to active league players. No league points will be awarded retroactively should a player later join the league. Of course, anyone playing in these tournaments is welcome and encouraged to join the league!

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Season 1 Championship

The Season 1 Championship Tourney has been set. Due to a conflict in scheduling for some next Tuesday the tournament has been set for Wednesday, January 21 at 9pm. Thank you to everyone for accommodating the date change.

The Championship tourney will feature a 2-point bounty on every player. Knock a player out, you bank 2 points. The winner of the tournament will keep their own 2 point bounty. So that is 18 additional point up for grabs.

The 9 players invited to the Championship Tourney are:

EJ89 (2) 163.54
maddoggy44 (1) 149.89
potnets (2) 137.89
themerk08 122.28
nekendrick 114.62
laxstarr1995 (1) 108.91
HiRoller88 104.83
Ehonda500Mob (1) 96.52
ravensfutbal 94.08

The password will be sent to those players by email. Congratulations and good luck!

Week 10 Results

First of all, thanks to everyone who played for making our inaugural season a success! Hopefully everyone had a good time and we can keep this league going and growing.

Week 10 brought our regular season to a close. Nekendrick scored the 5 point bounty when he took out laxstarr1995. AX7CHAPTER4 took down third in a valiant effort but came up just short of making the top 9. EJ89 closed out a very impressive season that included 2 wins by taking down second. Potnets became the league's second 2-time winner by finishing with the win.

The results:



The regular season Top 9 that will play in the Championship Tourney:

EJ89 (2) 163.54
maddoggy44 (1) 149.89
potnets (2) 137.89
themerk08 122.28
nekendrick 114.62
laxstarr1995 (1) 108.91
HiRoller88 104.83
Ehonda500Mob (1) 96.52
ravensfutbal 94.08

Congratulations!!

NOTE: There are some scheduling conflicts for some of the players next Tuesday. We are in the process of rescheduling and will announce the new date shortly.

Season 2 (mixed games) will start after the conclusion of the Championship Tourney. See this post for details, and if you know anyone who would like to play please spread the word!

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Game Day!

Tonight is Week 10 of Season 1 - the last chance to get points and make it into the Top 9 for next week's League Championship tourney.

Following tonight's tourney I will create next week's championship tourney and email the password to the Top 9 players. That email should go out some time tomorrow - contact me ASAP if you are in the Top 9 and do not receive it.

If you do not make the Top 9 but plan on railing the tournament (or are in the Top 9 but have a short attention span), why not check out a fun $10 tournament at 8pm being hosted by our NY friends. Details can be found here.

Season 2 is fast approaching!

Registration is now open for Season 2 of the MD DonkFest Poker League. Season 2 will feature a mixed games format and will be a lot of fun. Details are here. To register for Season 2 transfer $15 on PokerStars to potnets (Severna Park).

Monday, January 12, 2009

How NOT To Name A Poker League...

Early on, I thought the league name made sense. Coming from the ashes of the old MD Poker web site, it seemed natural to continue with the MD theme with the poker league. So the MD DonkFest Poker League was born...

How naive, in the modern Internet age. Since this first season of the league started a couple of months ago, we have had players from a number of states, including a rowdy contingent from the Rochester Poker Tour site that Merk has landed at. Indeed, we have had visitors from quite a few states (and DC):

California
Colorado
Connecticut
District of Columbia
Florida
Georgia
Illinois
Indiana
Kansas
Louisiana
Maryland
Michigan
Missouri
New York
North Carolina
Pennsylvania
South Carolina
Texas
Virginia
Washington
West Virginia

But that only covers the U. S. of A. From the far-flung reaches of the globe we have had many curious onlookers:

Rio De Janiero, Brazil
New Zealand
Chilliwack, British Columbia
Sydney, New South Wales
Montevideo, Uraguay
Douglas, South Lanarkshire
London, England
Sheffield, UK
MedellĂ­n, Antioquia
Uppsala, Uppsala Lan (Sweden)
Budapest
Opava, Moravskoslezsky Kraj
Renningen, Baden-Worttemberg
Barnsley

What they are looking for, I don't have a clue. But if they pay their league fees they can come from Mars... :-)

Friday, January 9, 2009

Payouts

There have been some inquiries about how the payouts will work after the season. The details are found in this post. With a prize pool of $310, it will work out to:

1st: $155
2nd: $93
3rd: $62

Thursday, January 8, 2009

MD DonkFest Season 2!!

Season 2 is fast approaching, and league fees are now being accepted. Season 1 was a lot of fun - we are hoping for an even bigger turnout for Season 2. Season 2 Week 1 will kick off January 27 at 9pm EST.

League fee: $15, all of which goes into the league prize pool. The Season 2 prize pool will have an additional $50 added to it.

Preferred payment method is via PokerStars transfer to potnets (Severna Park). Please make sure you transfer to the right account!

Based on earlier polling, Season 2 will feature a mixed games format. Season 3 will be back to NL Holdem, Season 4 mixed, and so on.

Season 2 schedule:

Week 1: HORSE
Week 2: Razz
Week 3: Holdem Lim
Week 4: Omaha H/L Lim
Week 5: Stud
Week 6: Holdem NL Heads Up
Week 7: Omaha PL
Week 8: HOSE
Week 9: Holdem PL
Week 10: Stud H/L

Championship: HORSE

League Policy Updates

1) Sitting out - Any player that registers for a tourney but doesn't actually play any hands (i.e. sits out until blinded off) will receive last place points and all players finishing below that player will move up a place. It is OK (and even encouraged) to register to get 5 points for a tourney you can't attend, but it isn't fair to get more points than an active player in that case. You must actually play at least one hand to get more than last place points.

2) Non-league players - Non-league players are welcome to play in any regular league tournaments. This only increases the weekly prize pool, and league points are only awarded to active league players. No league points will be awarded retroactively should a player later join the league. Of course, anyone playing in these tournaments is welcome and encouraged to join the league!

Finally, thanks to everyone who helped make Season 1 a success, and good luck in Season 2!

Wednesday, January 7, 2009

Week 9 Results

Week 9 was the Attack of the Bubble! 2 of the 3 top finishers were on the Top-9 bubble going into tonight's contest, and are now in the Top 9 heading into the final week. Laxstarr1995 finally woke up and played some poker, taking down first after a grueling heads-up battle. EJ89 continued a solid season, adding a second place finish to go along with two previous wins, and ravensfutbal took third and also scored the bounty on maddoggy44.




Updated Top 9:

EJ89 (2) 144.05
maddoggy44 (1) 140.75
themerk08 114.19
potnets (1) 108.25
laxstarr1995 (1) 102.96
nekendrick 97.30
Ehonda500Mob (1) 96.52
HiRoller88 94.34
ravensfutbal 87.53

On the Top 9 bubble:

UAEgreg 86.29
nutzforU(1) 81.68
A7X CHAPTER4 74.10
raquel1988 71.37

Next week is Week 10, the final regular season game before the Championship game for the Top 9. Also, keep an eye out this week for Season 2 details.

Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Game Day!

Week 9 of Season 1 is tonight, with a 5 point bounty on last week's winner, maddoggy44. There are only two weeks left before the championship playoff with a number of people on the top-9 bubble, so getting points tonight is critical! Good luck everyone!