Daniel Cates Takes Home $550,000 With Win

Published on November 5th, 2012 2:40 am EST

Daniel "wooki3z." Cates beat Ben "Sauce123" Sulsky earlier today to take down the first ever All-Star Showdown on Pokerstars. Cates took home $550,000 for his victory, while "Sauce123" walked away with $250,000 for his second place finish.

The final match between Cates and Sulsky took 3,179 hands to complete. The final hand of the match saw the two players get all-in pre-flop holding pocket Nines (Sulsky) and pocket Jacks (Cates). The better hand ended up holding up, and Cates took down the All-Star Showdown and the $550,000 first place prize.

The "All-Star Showdown" matched up eight of the best poker players in the world in a single knockout, heads-up tournament. The eight players were:

Ben "Sauce123" Sulsky
Ben "Ben86" Tollerence
Phil "MrSweets28" Galfond
Daniel "w00ki3z." Cates
Tobias "KTPOTP" Kuder
Alexander "Kanu7" Millar
Alexander "Sussie Smith" Roumeliotis
Isaac "Ike Haxton" Haxton

Each player put up $100,000 of their own money. The winner of the event received $550,000, while the runner-up took home $250,000.

Here is how the matches ended up playing out:

Round 1

"Sauce123" defeated "KTPOKP"
"Ike Haxton" defeated "Kanu7"
"w00ki3z." defeated "Sussie Smith"
"mrSweets28" defeated "ben86"

Round 2

"Sauce123" defeated "Ike Haxton"
"w00ki3z." defeated "mrSweets28"

Final

"w00ki3z." defeated "Sauce123"

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The rules of the contest called for players to start each match with a fixed bankroll amount. The bankroll was divided over four tables, and the winner would be the player who managed to win every last dollar from his opponent. The rules called for the blinds to double after 3,000 hands, and double again after 5,000.

This format resulted in some very long matches. The "Sauce123"/"Ike Haxton" match, for instance, lasted nearly 19 hours.

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All in all, the players seemed to enjoy the "All-Star Showdown", as did the thousands of fans who watched the matches. Let's hope that Pokerstars hosts a similar challenge next year.

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Filed Under: Tournament Results

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