The Million Dollar Tourney

At the 2012 WSOP there will be a $1 million buy in tournament to support the charity One Drop

The Canadian company Loto-Québec has announced that it is buying a million dollar seat at the most expensive poker game in history. The event is a three day tournament slated to run during the WSOP 2012 and will raise money and awareness for the One Drop charitable foundation, the foundation is the brainchild of the founder of the Cirque de Soleil, Guy Laliberte, and aims to provide clean drinking water to the poverty stricken.

Players in the tournament will start out with $3 million in chips and the event will be televised by ESPN. Laliberté, who is going to be playing in the tournament said that "We wanted to jump right away into a deep-stack environment." Roughly 11.11 per cent of the proceeds will be awarded to One Drop, the tournament will not be held with less than 22 players and the highest possible is 48 players. The final table is to be held on day three.

There is no shortage of potential players at this incredibly high stakes level with billionaires, pro players and TV stars being expected to vie with one another for a seat at the table according to Mitch Garber, CEO of Caesars Interactive Entertainment Inc. & World Series of Poker. Garber is a native of Quebec and sees the tournament as helping to help rebuild the glitz of a Las Vegas hurt by the economic downturn. Laliberte is well known for his love of high stakes poker so it makes sense that he would be involved in such a venture.

The exact details of qualification for the tournament have yet to be worked out, though it is looking like there will be a pyramid structure of qualifiers with a range of buy ins, as is normal for high stakes tournaments. The winner of the 2010 WSOP Main Event, Jonathan Duhamel, has agreed to be the spokesman for the event and may even play.
Laliberte said that "The key to success is to find creative ways to put people into this tournament ... and get exposure for One Drop". The Big One for One Drop is scheduled for noon, July 12, 2012 at the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino. This massive tournament is likely to take the WSOP up a level in terms of stakes, being able to offer such a huge event will only add to the prestige of the biggest, most prestigious Poker Series in the world.