Annie Duke, the poker player who
reached the finale of 2009’s “Celebrity Apprentice,” says
Texas hold ‘em pros are embracing her new league for the game’s
elite. She’ll soon find out if TV viewers feel the same.
Telecasts of “Epic Poker League,” which restricts its
main tournaments to qualifiers, premiere Sept. 30 on Discovery
Communications Inc. (DISCA)’s Velocity network and Oct. 8 on CBS Corp. (CBS)’s
namesake channel, according to Duke, the Epic league’s
commissioner and co-founder of parent Federated Sports & Gaming
Inc. in Los Angeles. A focus on top professionals will
distinguish it from rivals, she said.
“Every other sport, even snowboarding and skateboarding,
had a format where the best players in the world could play
against the each other,” Duke, 46, said last week in an
interview. “There’s a lot of value to limiting your field, both
for the player experience and for the fan experience.”
Poker companies are trying to spur growth in an industry
whose popularity, according to the American Gaming Association,
soared from 2003 through 2007. The U.S. Justice Department’s
April 15 crackdown on poker betting online thinned out the
televised competition as sponsors vanished.
Networks canceled shows, including one on ESPN following
the North American Poker Tour, after 11 people connected with
gambling websites that had backed TV events were indicted on
charges including bank fraud. World Series of Poker and World
Poker Tour, which welcome amateurs, remain on ESPN and Fox
Sports Net.
Equity Financing
Duke ranks 83rd in career tournament winnings at $4.3
million, according to the Hendon Mob poker database. She co-
founded Federated Sports with Executive Chairman Jeffrey Pollack, a former president of the World Series of Poker, and
Michael Brodsky, David Goldberg and Jeffrey Grosman, former
executives at Youbet.com, the horse-race betting site acquired
in June 2010 by Churchill Downs Inc. (CHDN)
Federated Sports, formed in December, raised $1 million of
a planned $2.5 million equity financing from investors led by
billionaire J.B. Pritzker, according to a July regulatory
filing. The company has since amassed “significantly more than
what we contemplated,” according to Goldberg, co-chief
executive officer with Brodsky.
Broadcasts, culled from Epic’s tournaments at the Palms
Casino Resort in Las Vegas, will air Friday nights on Velocity,
a channel targeting upscale men that replaces Discovery’s HD
Theater, and weekend afternoons on CBS, with the league
promising novel statistics and Olympic-style personality pieces.
One is on Eugene Katchalov, who ranks third in the world under
Epic’s Global Player Index and who fled Ukraine with his mother
as the Soviet Union collapsed, coming to the U.S. almost
penniless in pursuit of the American Dream.
$20,000 Buy-In
The league, which started in August, requires players to
come to the table with $20,000. Entry is open to 252 season-one
qualifiers, plus nine finalists each from Epic’s Pro/Am events,
in which amateurs can participate.
Epic is purchasing slots from CBS in an infomercial-style
“time buy” and giving the show to Velocity for promotional
purposes, the Wall Street Journal reported July 27, citing
people familiar with the plans.
Pollack declined to comment on the specifics.
“The deal we’ve signed works well for everyone involved,”
he said in an interview. “We’re on TV, which is important, and
post-April 15, pretty significant.”
Federated will generate revenue from corporate
sponsorships, event licensing and social gaming as well as media
rights, Pollack said. The company bought Heartland Poker Tour,
which brings regional tournaments to casinos, in June and
started a Facebook game in late July. It hopes to expand the
Epic league to the East Coast, Europe and Asia.
Entries Decline
Daniel Negreanu, the world’s ninth-ranked pro under Epic’s
index, is skipping the tournaments in favor of what he described
as easier competition at open events. He noted entries dropped
to 97 players at the second main event, held Sept. 6-9, from 137
at the debut contest.
“They aren’t generating any momentum,” Negreanu said in a
telephone interview from Montenegro.
Without Cinderella stories emerging from the amateur ranks,
Epic may pull in poker die-hards while failing to attract casual
viewers and premium sponsors, he said.
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