After months of buildup and anticipation, the Epic Poker League ’s first Main Event kicked off on Tuesday from the Palms Casino and Resort in Las Vegas, NV. A total of 137 players turned out for this first $20,000 buy-in rake free Main Event. This was just over half of the players qualified for Season 1. Unlike the Professional Poker Tour, the Epic Poker League is not a freeroll.
Per the league’s design, the field in this Main Event was a who’s who of poker. Among the players in the field on Day 1 of the EPL Main Event were Allen Kessler, Isaac Haxton, Eric Baldwin, Michael Mizrachi, Barry Greenstein, Phil Hellmuth, Carlos Mortensen, Robert Mizrachi, Allen Cunningham, Gavin Griffin, Dwyte Pilgrim, Mike Sexton, Erik Seidel, and Ben Lamb.
When registration closed for the event, the prize pool was announced for this first ever Main Event. A total of 18 players will be paid in this event with 18th getting $43,190 and the winner taking home $982,660.
At the end of the day, the leaderboard was giving players flashbacks of the 2011 WSOP. Eugene Katchalov finished Day 1 with the chip lead with 356,300. Ben Lamb continues his dominance this year and finished Day 1 with 287,200. The only multi-bracelet winner this year, Brian Rast, finished with 260,500. Antonio Esfandiari and Noah Schwartz finished the day as the only other players to move over the 200k chip mark.
Over half of the field was eliminated on Day 1, leaving 63 players returning for Day 2 action. By the dinner break, that field had been cut in half, leaving just 30 players in the field. By the dinner break, Brian Rast had moved into the chip lead with 460k, followed by Katchalov in 2nd place. Dan Fleyshman has been making a strong run in this Main Event. He won his seat in the Pro-Am Event that awards Main Event seats to the final table. Fleyshman currently sits 3rd in chips. Sam Trickett, Jason Mercier, and Noah Schwartz are all in the top 10 in chips on Day 2.
The Epic Poker League has aspirations of making itself in “The PGA of Professional Poker.” Players can only play in the Main Event if they meet the league’s qualification guidelines or final table the Pro-Am event. (Pro-Am exemptions are for a single Main Event tournament only.) Qualifications are based on live tournament play and have a strict set of guidelines for each card. Online poker stats do not count, so you will not be seeing players like Sean Deeb or Tom Dwan in the Epic Poker League anytime soon. And you won’t see any players who play free online poker on Zynga and all of a sudden buy into a professional real money poker event.
There will be four tournament series held at the Palms between now and February and players in the Main Event will be attempting to earn a seat into the League Championship on February 13th. The top 27 money winners in the Main Event tournaments will compete in the League Championship freeroll where the top 6 players will split a prize pool of $1 Million. First place will win $500,000 and the League Championship title.
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