Wednesday, August 09, 2006

WSOP ME Payout structure

This is the payout structure for this year Main Event:

1 $12,000,000
2 $6,102,499
3 $4,123,310
4 $3,628,513
5 $3,216,182
6 $2,803,851
7 $2,391,520
8 $1,979,189
9 $1,566,858
12,11,10 $1,154,527
13-15 $907,128
16-18 $659,730
19-27 $494,797
28-36 $329,865
37-45 $247,399
46-54 $164,932
55-63 $123,699
64-72 $90,713
73-81 $65,973
82-126 $51,129
127-189 $47,006
190-252 $42,882
253-315 $38,759
316-378 $34,636
379-441 $30,512
442-504 $26,389
505-567 $22,266
568-621 $20,617
622-666 $19,050
667-720 $17,730
721-774 $16,493
775-819 $15,504
820-873 $14,597


I would like to know who decides the structure and what are the guidelines to make such decision? I just don't understand the need to give 12 million to 1st place. 10 million would be a very nice round number and enough for marketing purposes, hell, even last year's 7.5 million was an insane amount of money. I find ridiculous to win only about $50k if you finish 82-126, you just beat like 99% of the field and you win only 5x your buy in? Let's compare to the 2005 payout structure:

1 $7,500,000
2 $4,250,000
3 $2,500,000
4 $2,000,000
5 $1,750,000
6 $1,500,000
7 $1,300,000
8 $1,150,000
9 $1,000,000
10 $600,000
11 $600,000
12 $600,000
13 $400,000
14 $400,000
15 $400,000
16 $350,000
17 $350,000
18 $350,000
19-27 $304,680
28-36 $274,090
37-45 $235,390
46-54 $173,880
55-63 $145,875
64-72 $124,835
73-81 $107,950
82-90 $91,950
91-100 $77,710
101-110 $65,360
111-140 $54,965
141-170 $46,245
171-200 $39,075
201-230 $33,197
231-260 $28,375
261-300 $24,365
301-350 $21,070
351-400 $18,335
401-450 $16,055
451-500 $14,135
501-560 $12,500


It just does not seem right, if you finish 37th in 2006 you win around the same as if you finish 37th in 2005; but the difference between the number of players was more than 3000 !!! 8773 compared to 5619.

Even more ridiculous is if you finish between 82-90, in 2005 you win $92k but in 2006 you win only $52k, WTF??

I have always been a big proponent of flat payouts, usually this means to take money from the top places, but if there is a tournament where you can do this without affecting the "heavyness" of the top prizes, it's this one. I just don't understand why in the world you want to give 1st place 12 million and take out of the poker economy a lot of money. The wealth should be spread, it's not that I'm a poker communist (if even the term makes sense); it's just better for the poker economy. They should cap the 1st place to 10 million, that's enough money; I think even for the guys at Bellagio that play the big game, 4-8k, they should be happy with that number the one time one of them is going to win in the next 50 years. Why did they decide this structure for 2006? Any of your guesses is better than mine.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

That is wicked bogus. I guess from a business standpoint, they're adopting the "lottery mentality" and trying to entice fresh new blood (do we need more than 8K players in the ME?) by showing such a huge first place prize.

I'd rather have a flatter structure too, that 50-90K difference from last year is just stupid. That's why I prefer cash games to tournaments, because unless you're finishing at the final table, you're usually getting shafted.

I think it would be better to have a slightly flatter structure and announce something like

"over 100 players won upwards of $100,000, including the final 15 who each received more than a Million each!"

Something like that might be more enticing in that people might think they have a shot at a good payday, rather than "if you luckbox your way into 1st place you'll win 12 million dollars you won't know how to spend!"

Anonymous said...

die AJ die

Anonymous said...

David que a pasado contigo y el mundo del poker? estas en el paso, seguiras jugando on line, vas a volver a UTEPno has narrado manos del ME.

Suerte si sigues jugando

Anonymous said...

Sería una lastima si David empieza a jugar menos, me gusta verlo jugar, aunque con la suerte que ha estado tenido desde hace un tiempo quizá un retiro por algun tiempo sería bueno.

Suerte en lo que decidas hacer David.

Jordan Lows said...

I agree with u there just trying to entice dumb players because all they see is that 1st place is 12 million and because they paid 12 mil for first that means they can pay less plus Jeff pollack doesnt even play poker so how would he even know about poker he helped out the NFL and MLB and they think he is qualified to run the WSOP. they should get someone who knows about poker and not about busines in general perhapes a professional player to run it cuz he knows best about for poker