Negreanu denied his vengeance in EPT Barcelona High-Roller

Austria’s Thomas Muhlocker managed to outlast a stacked final table that included quite a few notable names, like 2010 WSOP Champion Jonathan Duhamel, 2013 November Niner David Benefield, GPI stalwart Ole Schemion, and Daniel Negreanu who had one of the strangest runs to a final table in poker history, which I’ll explain below.

After a tumultuous start to the tournament that saw Daniel Negreanu protest a ruling by moving all-in blind (a confrontation he lost when Tim Adams called with Pocket 7’s and Negreanu revealed A3s), the Team PokerStars Pro regained his composure and reentered the EPT Barcelona High-Roller tournament, which turned out to be a pretty good decision considering he would go on to finish the tournament in 2^nd place.

Negreanu was irate over a rule he has railed against in the recent past –the “First Card off the Deck” rule—and it would take him tilting off the remainder of his stack, a few choice words, some time away from the tournament, and a lengthy forum post to cool off. But cool off he did, and after reentering later in the day went on to nearly win the tournament.

The “Forst Card off the Deck” rule became the story of the EPT Barcelona for a day or so –until the Main Event and High-Roller tournaments played out and the riveting and disturbing story relayed by Jens Kyllonen hit the 2+2 forums—and will likely be discussed quite a bit in the coming weeks.

Negreanu’s performance puts him in an excellent position to win one, or possibly all three, of the major tournament Player of the Year awards, as he now sits in first place on the Bluff POY leader-board as well as the Cardplayer POY chart.

As for the tournament itself, the €10k buy-in event drew a sizeable field of 180 entries, creating a prize-pool of over €1.7 million. Here is a look at the final table payouts from the event:

1. Thomas Muhlocker – €390,700
2. Daniel Negreanu – €263,800
3. Jean Noel Thorel – €181,500
4. Joni Jouhkimainen – €148,000
5. Jonathan Duhamel – €118,000
6. Ole Schemion – €90,700
7. Richard Yong – €66,000
8. David Benefield – €47,850

Muhlocker is no stranger on the poker scene, but this is Muhlocker’s first big live tournament win, which comes not long after his previous best score, a 6^th place showing in the 2013 WSOP $5k No Limit Holdem event. His career tournament earnings now stand at over $800k according to his Hendon Mob page.

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