Welcome to the 2014 Borgata Winter Poker Open
The tournament director's voice is filling the venue here at Borgata in Atlantic City, N.J., and players line the back wall as they prepare to take their seats for Event 1 of the Borgata Winter Poker Open. PokerNews will be on location, bringing you live updates throughout the tournament series, which culminates with the $3,300 re-entry main event starting Jan. 26. Other highlights of the two-week-long series include a $1,500 Heads-Up event and a $1,000 Six-Max tournament.
Last year, Andy Hwang topped a final table that included former WPT champion Matt Salsberg to take home a $730,053 first-place prize in the main event.
The first event, which is set to begin just minutes from now, is a $500 re-entry tournament with a $2 million guaranteed prize pool, so over 4,000 entries are expected. Roughly 700 entrants are registered so far, according to a tournament official, who said he expects the field to top out around double that number today, the first of three heats.
The button will start in Seat Six, and the tournament director has just instructed dealers to begin the tournament. Players will begin with stacks of 20,000.