The PokerStars All Star Showdown begins this weekend. Eight players will each put up $100k to play a Heads-Up format tournament consisting of deep stacked matches played over four tables. Recently signed PokerStars Team Online Pro Isaac Haxton was the first to sign up for the event.
Haxton will be competing against: Phil Galfond (mrSweets28); Benjamin Sulsky (Sauce123); Alexander Millar (Kanu7); Alexander Roumeliotis (Sussie Smith); Tobias Kuder (KTPOKP) and two other as yet unnamed players.
First place gets more than two thirds of the prize money with the winner taking home $550k.
A random table draw will create a first round of four heads up matches. Each match will be played over four tables with starting stacks of 1000bb. After 3,000 hands the blinds will double. Each match ends when one player has all the chips.
There will be one match played every day from October 27 until November 4 except for a two day Halloween break. Each match will start at noon (EST).
The format has been designed to attract fans and poker aficionados to watch the matches live on the PokerStars client. Viewers do not need to sign up for an account in order to catch all the action.
As a marketing tool, this type of event has a lot of potential. Unlike the infamous Durrrr Challenge, poker fans have the certainty of knowing when each match will be played and when the tournament will end.
The only element lacking will be a simultaneous commentary, although one could be added later as is currently done with the Sunday Million final table replays which can be seen on YouTube and poker video sites as well as the PokerStars site itself.