On April 5, PokerGo will livestream the first annual Global Poker Awards Presented by PokerStars in Las Vegas. The awards ceremony. which is replacing the American and also European Poker Awards, will honor the biggest stars in the game.
Poker Central released just a few details about the event. Twenty poker industry stars will take home some hardware. The nominees and categories will be released in the coming weeks, according to the poker channel.
A nomination panel will be hired to choose the finalists for each category. The winners will then be chosen by a jury panel made up of industry experts. Poker fans can watch the ceremony live on PokerGo April 5. You need a paid subscription, however. Or, like with Netflix, someone else’s password.
Honoring Poker Greats from Around the World
In recent years, the Global Poker Index has honored American and European poker stars separately. This year, however, GPI is merging the awards shows to celebrate the best of poker globally. PokerStars, the world’s largest online poker site, is sponsoring the event.
The poker awards shows in year’s past have honored both players and also media personnel. Last year’s big winners included vlogger Andrew Neeme, Bryn Kenney, and Kristen Bicknell.
Category Predictions
We don’t have any inside info on the categories. And, for all we know, Poker Central hasn’t even selected the categories yet. But we can project a few that were included in previous GPI awards.
The first is the GPI Player of the Year, which needs no voting process. Alex Foxen, based on points accumulated throughout 2018, won that award. His girlfriend, Kristen Bicknell, earned GPI Female Player of the Year for the second consecutive year.
Another likely category is the Poker Broadcaster of the Year. Nick Schulman won it last year and, given that Poker Central is running this show, there’s a better than even-money shot he goes back-to-back. Not that he isn’t a worthy winner, however.
Video Blogger of the Year is another category we expect to see. And although there are so many excellent vloggers out there (Brad Owen, anyone?), Neeme is in a category of his own.
One final category prediction is Poker Streamer of the Year. While we’re partial towards are ambassador, Jeff Gross, we wouldn’t be surprised to see Bill Perkins take this one down.
