News this afternoon the 2020 WSOP is being moved to as-of-now undetermined Fall 2020 dates answers some questions and opens up a new batch of the same.
Players now have a definitive answer, there’s no full World Series of Poker in Las Vegas this summer with live-table bracelet events. The dates for its Fall restart, however, have not been provided.
Making the announcement some 40+ days before action was set to begin allows players to now cancel all flights, hotels, AirBnB reservations and more they may have been holding on. The challenge now shifts to all other poker tours and poker rooms with traditional Fall dates or ones with March/April/May events already postponed.
No location can move forward at this time with potential Fall dates until there’s at least tentative actual dates from the WSOP, for relatively few outside Las Vegas would consider holding a major event against the poker world’s yearly top-drawing tournament series. There’s no fault or blame, just some delays atop already-existing delays as poker tours and poker rooms look at what the new-normal may be for live-action poker tournaments later in 2020. What types of new room layouts and safety precautions are obvious intense discussions, this is a look at how scheduling plays a small part as well.
In conversation last week with poker friends, I offered up speculation the timeframe from Thanksgiving weekend to mid/late December could be a possible landing spot for the 2020 WSOP. Many tours tend to go quiet after Thanksgiving and Las Vegas definitely has a downturn in tourist travel as Christmas draws near. That would place the 2020 WSOP at the end of the Fall, but again remember, this is solely me typing away letters that form words, with nothing from anyone in the industry offering up dates of their own.
Let’s take a look at US-based ‘traditional’ late September-through-late December (Fall) series and see what may be looking at further potential shifts should the WSOP take place in 2020 and be on their original dates. I’m not including any WSOP Circuit events, for that entity would cover its own schedule as part of the WSOP altering its own dates.
Late September includes the Wynn Fall Classic, and being in Las Vegas, those dates would not be in conflict with WSOP, for they would draw from players traveling for WSOP. The Venetian’s Deepstacks Series III is in September and it would benefit as well from an early Fall WSOP shift.
WPT has early Fall 2019 series begin at Maryland Live and bestbet Jacksonville, with WPT main events early October for both. Those events would appear to need to pause and see where WSOP lands before potentially locking in 2020 dates at this time.
HPT was in Black Hawk and Pittsburg late in September 2019, but their schedule tends to move a bit each year so their dates could be more flexible than most for this and their traditional October date in Florida.
Other October events from 2019 included RunGood series in Iowa, Louisiana and Oklahoma, MSPT in Michigan – and there’s the WSOP Europe that runs in October and November that’s likely to be affected.
November brings the already-moved RunItUp Reno spring dates reset to Oct. 30-Nov. 9; HPT’s championship is often held in November; the Venetian Deepstacks IV is the full month of November and would be fine with a WSOP during this time; WPTDeepStacks is at TVPokerRoom (a room that was to host the WPTDS Season Championship that’s also still on hold); MSPT was in Iowa and Wisconsin, and the world’s largest poker room, the Commerce Casino in Los Angeles, holds a November LA Poker Open.
The WPT’s Rock ‘n Roll Open at Seminole Hard Rock in Florida could be the series with the most at risk should the WSOP slip to late in the year, as their 2019 dates were Nov. 20 – Dec. 4.
December is normally a quieter-than-normal month for poker tournament series across the US, with Las Vegas the location for the WPT Five Diamond at the Bellagio and the Wynn having its most-of-December Winter Classic.
Whatever dates the 2020 WSOP does land on, a number of pre0existing series are likely to shift while others already postponed that were looking for new dates may fall off completely or shift yet again.
I don’t envy anyone right now trying to not just come up with what the new poker playing criteria are going to be, but to juggle the ever-moving parts of what the new nationwide tournament calendar is going to look like.
Dan is the founder of PokerLiveUpdates, a veteran poker tournament reporter who can be found wandering somewhat aimlessly through tournament arenas worldwide. As a founding member of FunTour2.0, he searches for the best in craft beer at all locations in the poker world.
