16 Mar
PokerStars offered $9 million in guaranteed prize money yesterday in the 9th Anniversary Sunday Million and 50,432 turned out to take a shot at that massive prize pool.
The result was that the guarantee was shattered by more than $1 million, with $10,086,400 up for grabs. That allowed 8,397 players to finish in the money after doling out the entry fee of $215.
Grabbing the most money was not the tournament winner. ‘BRAYDEN93’ of Mexico outlasted the field and took home $597,719, but a deal among the final seven players saw the runner-up emerge with the most cash.
A huge lead in chips by Greece’s ‘kelly_koulis’ when negotiations began allowed the no. 2 finisher to earn more than the winner – $725,267. Also of note is that ‘kelly_koulis’ won a seat in the event through an $11 satellite, creating an astronomical return on investment (ROI).
It took just shy of 15 hours for ‘kelly_koulis’ to claim that prize and a bit less than that for the final tablists knocked out prior to him or her. Third place and $567,978 went to ’tiltinha’ of Brazil, while ‘PSMozak’ will likely add some cash to Bulgaria’s economy after finishing 4th and winning $542,539.
The pride of Argentina, ‘sonmonedas,’ rode to 5th place and $413,610, just ahead of ‘salaliitto’ from Israel, whose 6th place finish was good for $394,207. PokerStars blog reported that Canadian player ‘ModzillaPL’ earned $336,550 after being the first player knocked out in 7th following the seven-player deal.
Prior to the deal that took just eight minutes to accomplish, Bulgaria’s ‘bari_nikolov’ was eliminated in eighth and will log on to PokerStars today with a bankroll swollen by $119,523. Landing at the final table but going no further was ‘Kokli_1,’ a Czech Republic native who outlasted 50,423 players and earned $87,247 as a result.
Nine years of weekly Sunday Millions have now generated over $688 million in prize money. By the time the PokerStars 10th Anniversary Sunday Million rolls around in 2016, that amount will be way over $700 million.
