The global online cardroom and casino PokerStars has announced the preliminary schedule for its Spring Championship of Online Poker (SCOOP) and has guaranteed the series for a total of $55 million USD in prize winnings. This year’s SCOOP is the biggest and longest, running across 3 weeks from 30th April to 23rd May. With a total of fifty–seven events in the series there’s an opportunity for all players who fancy their chances of getting rich in 2017!
PokerStars has confirmed that this year’s SCOOP will be the most accessible Spring Championship yet, offering buy-ins starting low at $5.50 to $530 for high. In general, medium buy-ins will be approximately 10 times larger than low and high buy-ins will come in around 10 times higher than medium. The schedule includes a number of old favorites amidst unique new games such as ‘Win the Button’ tournaments and a NLHE 100% progressive knockout event, where the buy-in serves as a ‘bounty’ per player and the only way to win is to completely eliminate the opposition. The focus for these events? Fun!
The first week of the championships is dedicated to Event #1, a series of three phased tournaments with buy-ins of $11, $109 and $1050 and the opportunity to enter on multiple occasions. Qualifiers for Phase 1 will be played throughout the week leading to the event’s final (Phase 2) on 21st May. One of the mid-week highlights is the $25,000 buy-in 8-Max High Rollers tournament on 10th May, which is sure to draw in some of the best professional online poker players with a guarantee rumored to be at around the $2 million mark.
The series starts in earnest from Sunday 7th May with events following a typical PokerStars’ Sunday Majors (Kick off, Warm-Up, Sunday Million etc.) with low, medium and high buy-ins offered for each. On Monday a No Limit 6-Max Progressive KO Omaha Hi/Lo event takes place along with the first of three ‘Win the Button’ tournaments (with the remaining to be found during Events #42 and #50). The 2017 SCOOP will feature three high roller events in total, with buy-ins starting at $1050 and reaching $25,000 for the 8-Max tournament.
A number of novelty events will be held throughout the series, offering amateur players a chance to get a taste of the action as well as experienced pros. Monday 8th May will see a Fixed Limit and a ‘Bubble Rush’ tournament taking place, and the 100% progressive knockout event commences on Wednesday 17th May. The climax of the series will be the Main Event weekend on 20th – 21st May. Tournaments will feature buy-ins of $109, $1050 and $10,300 for the ‘High’ Main Event, which is also likely to be guaranteed for $6 million with around $1 million paid to the winner.
In previous years’ Championships PokerStars has run some excellent online promotions alongside, giving away $400,000 in Main Event entries in 2015 and a special ‘SCOOP Spin & Go’ event in 2016 that offered a higher than average probability of winning one of the Main Event entries. Members of the platform will usually be notified by newsletter about any promotions that are running for PokerStars SCOOP 2017, and readers wanting to stay in the loop should keep an eye out here for the latest developments and updates.
