MILLIONS North America Returns to Playground from May 13 to 26
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For the third year running, partypoker LIVE and Playground are teaming up to present MILLIONS North America, the second event in the 2019 MILLIONS Tour. This year’s series will be held from May 13 to 26 at Playground, which is located in Kahnawake, just outside of Montreal, Canada.
This edition of MILLIONS North America - named GPI American Event of the year in 2017 - features twelve tournaments with a total of over $8,000,000 in total guaranteed prize pools. $5,000,000 of that figure is guaranteed in the Main Event - a tournament that has become a key date on the global poker calendar following the success of the first two editions in 2017 and 2018.
There are two other events on the schedule with Million Dollar guarantees: the Montreal Open ($1,100 buy-in) and the High Roller ($10,300 buy-in.)
In addition, two Super High Roller tournaments have been added to the schedule - each with a $25,300 buy-in. These marquee tourneys are complemented by seven other side events and a comprehensive satellite schedule designed to get as many players as possible around the tables no matter what bankroll they bring to the tables.
The Event: MILLIONS North America
The MILLIONS North America itself is a $10,000 + $300 NL Hold’em tournament featuring a huge $5,000,000 guarantee and, by popular request, a player-friendly new format. The new format has raised eyebrows throughout the poker world as it represents a major change in the MILLIONS Tour.
John Duthie, president of partypoker LIVE, explains: “Our MILLIONS Season 2 tour [was] very successful, however, we pride ourselves on listening to player feedback and continually improving our offering to ensure we provide the best live tour in the world.”
John Duthie: “We want the MILLIONS brand to be synonymous with being one of the most prestigious live competitions in the world.”
Poker players - pros and recreational players alike - have long been concerned with “re-entry creep” - the tendency of events to allow more and more entries in order to hit seemingly impossible guarantees. “Listening to player feedback” in the case of the MILLIONS tour meant moving in the opposite direction. MILLIONS North America and other MILLIONS Main Events around the world now feature a $10,000 buy-in (in local currency) and just two Day 1s, with a single entry permitted per flight.
Duthie continued: “We want the MILLIONS brand to be synonymous with being one of the most prestigious live competitions in the world. We hope these changes will allow us to improve and build our MILLIONS tour to make it the best LIVE experience for our players.”
The North American event in the MILLIONS Tour - now in Year 3 - has already established itself in poker history. The two events have paid out a total of $15,409,750 - a remarkable figure for just 2 individual tournaments. Prize money like that attracts players like nothing else can.
The More Qualifiers the Better
Along with limiting the number of entries and increasing the buy-in has come a renewed commitment to ensuring that as wide a range of players as possible are able to play in the event. Between Live and Online satellites, by the time the MILLIONS North America rolls around, there will be at least 200 qualifiers in the field. Players of all backgrounds and bankrolls will hit the felts and join the action this year.
There are already 88 qualifiers booked with seats in the Main Event, and as MILLIONS draws nearer, there will also be a series of direct satellites as well - there are 70 seats guaranteed via the Direct route!
For those who can play on partypoker, there are also Online Satellites culminating with a weekly MILLIONS North America Final Phase that guarantees at least five seats into the event, every Sunday. The catch? Players must play their way into this Final Phase via one of the 20 Phase 1 tournaments held every day of the week. If the $200 + $15 buy-in is beyond a players’ budget, he or she can qualify for Phase 1s via $11, $22, or $44 satellites instead - there’s literally a way into the MILLIONS for players with any size of bankroll.
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Marquee Side Events
In addition to MILLIONS North America, the series will include two other events with $1,000,000 guarantees.
$1,000,000 gtd $1,100 Montreal Open
The first of these is the Montreal Open, which features a buy-in of just $1,000 + $100 and gets underway on May 17. Players can also increase their potential ROI by qualifying via satellite. There are nine satellites (a total of 85 seats guaranteed) being held in the days leading up to the event.
The Montreal Open features 7 Day 1s and is an unlimited re-entry event - so players will have plenty of opportunities available to play their way into Day 2 and - eventually - into the money. In addition to the “normal” prize pool in the Montreal Open, there will also be 15 Main Event seats up for grabs in the tournament - so the players that go the deepest in the event will also play their way into the MILLIONS North America! The old cliché about bagging two birds with one stone comes to mind…
$1,000,000 gtd $10,300 High Roller
The second event boasting a Million Dollar guarantee is the $10,300 High Roller tournament, a 3-day event beginning on May 23. Although the High Roller buy-in is the same as the Main Event, it definitely counts as a proper High Roller due to the unlimited re-entries that are permitted. If history is a guide, this will be a star-studded tourney with “vedettes” of the international poker scene throughout the field.
Two $25,300 Super High Rollers
There have been two late additions to the schedule: two $25,000 + $300 Super High Roller events. The first one will play through on May 19-20 and the second will be held on May 25-26. Considering the players that will be in attendance for MILLIONS, these are sure to be blockbuster events as well!
Other Side Events
Seven additional events round out the 2019 MILLIONS North America schedule, beginning with the event that kicks off the entire series, the Playground 200. This is big-event poker for a small buy-in. One of the trademarks of the Playground Poker experience is that they run every event, whether the buy-in is $220 or $25,300 - with the same care for detail, the same skilled dealers, and fully modern tournament structures. The Playground 200 is no exception.
Other side events include a $550 6-Max, a $660 “Big Bounty” (bounties are $500 each), and closing the series will be a $330 PLO Bounty event.
MILLIONS North America runs from May 13 to 26. Visit Playground.ca for more information.
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