News / Chris Edwards / 09 June 2008 / Leave a comment

In 2006 Jamie Gold won the largest poker tournament ever played. 8,772 players entered the $10,000 NLHE Championship Main Event with Jamie winning $12m for this first place win, the largest amount for any televised sporting event in history. The next 11 finishers also became millionaires.

Jamie's win was riddled with controversy. He had entered into an agreement with Bodog and business partner Crispin Leyser prior to the main event to secure celebrities to wear Bodog branded clothing, in exchange for his help he allegedly promised half of his winnings to Leyser. After winning the first prize Leyser claims Gold decided to keep all the winnings and their much publicised legal battle started. Early in 2007 the proceedings came to a close, with Leyser securing an unspecified amount of what he claimed was owed to him. In a recent interview Gold stated that the whole reason behind these events were that he had never won $12m before and was unsure how to deal with it.

This whole ordeal created lots of negativity toward Jamie. This was not helped by his attitude following the win. In one of his more infamous interviews given 3 days after his win he had a lot of strong opinions on himself and his final table players. The only pro on the final table, 5-time bracelet winner Allen Cunningham, did not seem to phase Jamie. 'No offence to Allen, he's a great player, but my style just screwed him up so badly (that) if you saw it in his face he didn't know what to do. He was shaking, he was nervous, upset, I had him completely figured out and he did not have me figured out.' This confident rampage towards Cunningham falls apart when you watch the highlights from the final table. Allen fearlessly shoves top pair with a weak kicker over the top of a flop bet from Jamie and in the best hand calls a massive river bet with Ace high to win the pot. Speaking about that hand, Jamie claims it caused Allen to make mistakes later in the event. Jamie busted Allen's 1010 with KdJd when he caught a King on the flop. Allen went out holding the best hand when the money went in, not a very big mistake.

With all that being said, most people would probably feel invincible after such an accomplishment. I have great respect for Jamie for following his dream of becoming a top professional by playing in any televised event against the best in the world, for any stakes, available to him. This included the $500,000 buy-in High Stakes Poker season 4 finale. He seems to have matured his table talk to include a lot more respect for his opponents. As well as his, he has played in a number of charity tournaments and this seems to be one of his higher priorities after aiming to start his own charity event. I observed him at the WSOPE Main Event and he mostly seemed quiet and reserved until he was in a hand.

Much like other recent amateur main event winners Chris Moneymaker and Greg Raymer, Jamie has had modest results after his win with no big cashes or victories since. He has however been a prominent figure in the poker world and has secured his status as one of the games unique figures.