News: Seiver influences $100k payout structure in Florida

In today's Daily Rewind we run into payout problems at the Seminole Poker Open and look forward to PokerStars' WCOOP.

Seiver's payout problems

In the wake of its $2.5 million Main Event overlay, the Seminole Hard Rock Poker Open found itself embroiled in another issue yesterday.

With the $100,000 Super High Roller in full swing (Watch today via live stream, starting 21:00 CET) and nine players fighting for what they thought would be two prizes, a problem arose when Scott Seiver asked to see the payout sheet.

After spotting that the organisers had changed the structure to pay three players, Seiver wanted some answers but was shocked to find out that the Director of Poker Operations was on holiday.

Eventually, however, Seiver successfully argued that changing the payout structure is bad for the game and affected everyone's strategy.

Despite Seiver being happy with the situation, Jason Mo and Ryan Fee were less than impressed and were quick to point out that Seiver is currently the overwhelming chip leader in the event.

Of course, Seiver defended his position by claiming that he was trying to uphold the integrity of the game, but the issue now appears to have caused a mass Twitter debate amongst the game's finest.

Was just told at end of day 1 @shrpo 100k that the payouts have changed and they're changing the format of the tourney. Beyond unacceptable

— Scott Seiver (@scott_seiver) September 1, 2014

After 2 hours, management decided to uphold initial payouts. This preserves game integrity and thank you @shrpo for listening to a complaint

— Scott Seiver (@scott_seiver) September 1, 2014

Get ready for WCOOP

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PokerStars' World Championship of Online Poker is set to return this week with another bumper schedule of virtual MTTs.

Kicking off on September 7 and offering at least $10 million in prize money across 66 events, the online festival will crescendo with a $5,200 Main Event on September 28.

However, before that gets underway, the latest WCOOP will start with a selection of Sunday specials, including a juiced up Sunday Million with a prizepool worth at least $1.5 million.

For those looking to get in on the action, PokerStars currently has a slew of cut-price satellites running throughout the series.

Alpha8's Caribbean adventure

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The WPT's Super High Roller Series, Alpha8, will return to St Kitts later this year according to a recent announcement.

In an effort to give its supporters a Caribbean holiday, the organisers have put together a $100,000 tournament that will be hosted by Bill Perkins and gets underway on November 2.

Playing host to the likes of Olivier Busquet and defending champion Philipp Gruissem will be the Royal Beach Casino and if 2013's event is anything to go by then the next winner should walk away with over $1 million in prize money.

Question of the Day

"Should a player have the power to influence tournaments organisers in the way Scott Seiver did?"

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High Stakes Corner

'punting-peddler' raced to the top of the high stakes leaderboard last night after banking $220,457. That haul came over the course of 861 hands and was enough to put the online pro ahead of 'Trueteller' and Patrik Antonius by a comfortable margin.

Continuing his online downswing in the last 24 hours was Gus Hansen. Despite grinding through 2,885 hands, the Danish pro dropped $362,485 to finish well ahead of 'Sanlker' who incurred a $206,990 deficit.