Dutch Celebrity TV Host Alberto Stegeman Wins the Master Classics of Poker Main Event

Frank Op de Woerd

Nov 30, 2018 3 min read

Dutch Celebrity TV Host Alberto Stegeman Wins the Master Classics of Poker Main Event

Alberto Stegeman might not be a household name in the international world of poker; he is in his home country of the Netherlands. And that was even so the case before he won the Master Classics of Poker Main Event in Amsterdam for €240,183 tonight.

Stegeman is an award-winning journalist and tv show host from the Netherlands who's anything but new to poker.

Stegeman is an award-winning journalist and tv show host from the Netherlands who's anything but new to poker. After playing some major tournament throughout the world in the few moments of spare time he has, he has now taken down the biggest score of his poker tournament career.

Stegeman joins a list of elite poker players who have edged their name into MCOP history by winning the Main Event. Such famous Dutch poker players like Noah Boeken, Ruben Visser, and David Boyaciyan have taken down the event before, as did international stars like Ole Schemion, Robert Mizrachi, and Ram Vaswani. One of the longest-running poker tournament series in the world - this year was the 27th consecutive time the event ran - has crowned a new winner — his name; Alberto Stegeman.

2018 Master Classics of Poker Main Event Final Table Results

Position	Player	Country	Prize in €	Prize in $
1	Alberto Stegeman	Netherlands	€240,183	$271,017
2	[Removed:172]	Austria	€160,432	$181,027
3	Teun Mulder	Netherlands	€111,418	$125,721
4	Joey Vittali	Netherlands	€80,216	$90,519
5	Henri Piironen	Finland	€59,842	$67,529
6	Jasper Meijer van Putten	Netherlands	€45,987	$51,894
7	Danilo Velasevic	Serbia	€36,324	$40,990
8	David Algarra	Spain	€29,222	$32,976
9	Pascal Baumgartner	Switzerland	€23,983	$27,064

2018 Master Classics of Poker Main Event Final Table Recap

The final table was two hands in when the first player hit the rail. Having to start short, Pascal Baumgartner had to make a move soon, and he chose king-queen to do so. Unfortunately for the man from Switzerland, [Removed:172] found ace-king and wasn't folding. Baumgartner flopped a queen but Kramer hit his flush on the turn, and Baumgartner exited in ninth place.

Spanish player David Algarra was next to go. With just a few big blinds left, he shoved with ace-nine. Henri Piironen had raised with aces and made the quick call. The board brought no connection for Algarra, and he went to the payout desk to collect eight-place money.

Danilo Velasevic was short stacked and lost queen-jack to ace-four to make the tournament six-handed.

EPT Prague winner Jasper Meijer van Putten didn't have his day. He first lost nines to aces in an unavoidable spot and went broke with ten-jack to ace-eight.

After Henri Piironen's exit in fifth (ace-queen lost to tens) and Joey Vittali's bust out in fourth (ace-nine against ace-ten), the tournament got an interesting dynamic with varying stack sizes. That was all after Alberto Stegeman had won with jacks to kings preflop all in, the jack on the river saved him.

Kramer played aces a bit more passive, probably waiting for one of Stegeman's signature overbets.

[Removed:172] had grabbed the lead in the tournament early on. The only player to play back at him in the "Era of Kramer," was the start of day chipleader, Teun Mulder. The young Dutchman, an online cash game specialist, ended up coming short in the final stage of Holland's most prestigious tournament. He got shorter and shorter while Stegeman collected all of the chips. In the end, Mulder shoved with ace-five, and Stegeman called with ace-six. After the flop, turn, and river Mulder had nothing to show for while Stegeman started stacking.

Stegeman started with a 7-2 lead over Kramer and grinded his German opponent down with some extraordinary bluffs and big overbets. At one point, Kramer was down to just six big blinds, but a comeback was in the making. Kramer doubled twice and made himself a real contender, till faith struck. In the last hand, Kramer played aces a bit more passive, probably waiting for one of Stegeman's signature overbets. When it came, though, and the push and call followed, it turned out Stegeman had flopped a set of nines. Kramer turned some additional outs, but the river paired the board and Stegeman was declared the winner.