Biggest online pot ever!

Poker News / Dave Allan / 17 November 2009 / Leave a Comment

Patrik Antonius cracking a wry smile

Earlier today, at a Pot-limit Omaha table with $500/$1,000 blinds, the largest pot ever seen online took place between Patrik Antonius and the mystery man Isildur1.

Not a day goes by recently that the unknown Swede is mentioned in poker news bulletins and today is no different but this time it was he who was on the receiving end of a financial battering.

The two high-stakes cash gurus were doing battle over four tables of $500/$1,000 PLO and there had already being a number of pots in excess of $100,000 when the following hand developed between two of poker's most aggressive players.

Isildur1 was in the small blind with a stack of $450,494.50 and Antonius was the big blind with a stack of $439,479.50 in front of him. Isildur1 raised his button to $3,000 and Antonius flat-called.

The flop came down Qs7h5h and Antonius elected the check. Isildur1 showed no sign of slowing down and fired out a $5,000 bet, which his Finnish opponent check-raised to $21,000. After a brief pause the mystery man made the call.

Then came a flurry of action as the Ace of diamonds arrived on the turn, started by a $48,000 bet from Antonius and a raise to $192,000 from Isildur1. When Antonius, often referred to on a number of forums as "God", shoved all-in for $415,479.50 the watching railbirds went into a frenzy and their excitement could not be contained when Isildur1 made the call, creating a pot of $878,958.50!

Isildur1 showed AsKsQdTh whilst Antonius held AhQc9s6h. The Swede was actually a 53.74% favourite over Antonius with him being able to spike a non-heart king or Jack to sccop the pot whilst Antonius had outs to a flush draw and also a gut-shot straight draw. It was the latter that came in when the 8d arrived on the river to send the pot in the direction of Mr Antonius.

The monster pot exceeded the previous largest PLO pot, which was played by Ilari "Ziigmund" Sahamies and Tom 'durrrr' Dwan at $702,925 and eclipsed the previous biggest online pot of all-time contested by Di "Urindanger" Dang and that man Dwan at $723,938.

With Isildur1's eagerness to play multiple tables of the highest available stakes, it is likely that this record pot will be beaten soon, in fact I think it is a case of when rather than if. The real question is will we get to see a $1,000,000 pot develop before the end of the year?