When it comes to playing the Spring Championship of Online Poker (SCOOP) at PokerStars, most are in it for the money.
And why wouldn’t they be? Poker’s a game that rewards mastery with cold, hard cash, and there’s a whole lot of it there for the taking every spring.
But there are other reasons to get excited about a series like SCOOP. It regularly attracts the world’s most accomplished players, for one thing. Pull up a virtual chair and you never know who’ll be at your table. Then there’s the chance to win prizes without even playing, as in our exclusive Pick 3 for SCOOP 2026 contest.
The fact is, though, that SCOOP is a major stage; a series where accomplishments matter, records are kept and stories are added to a deepening lore, running now for 17 years and counting. Score 100 points at your local court and you’re a local hero. Do it in the NBA and folks will still be talking about it 60 years later.
Patrick Leonard may not draw a lot of obvious comparisons with Wilt Chamberlain, but his achievement this week puts him firmly in the conversation for the greatest SCOOP players of all time.
Three days, three titles, three different games and more than $45K in winnings. And second on the all-time SCOOP leaderboard.
Skortsov and Bruschi among other multiple winners
The British player with the nom de guerre of ‘pads1161’ is now behind only Simon ‘C. Darwin2’ Mattsson, whose 14 SCOOP titles have marked him as the man to beat in the all-time record books.
Tied with Leonard on 13 is Andre ‘Premove’ Skvortsov, who picked up his most recent two wins last week. Skvortsov started Thursday with 11 SCOOP wins, played both the medium and high editions of the no-limit Omaha hi-lo event, won them both, and by bedtime was second on the all-time SCOOP leaderboard. Now, Leonard is level with Skortsov.
Another well-known British player picking up some SCOOP silverware was Ian ‘Simpioni’ Simpson, who won his very first title — plus some $17K — in a $55 Deep Stacks event.
Finishing just outside the final table that Simpson won was Renan ‘Internett93o’ Bruschi, who alongside ‘king153246’ has won an incredible four SCOOP events during the 2026 series so far.
The big hitters are truly proving themselves during this series, again and again.
It's a good thing we gave them their own category in the Pick 3 draft.
Leonard was the most-drafted player ahead of the series kickoff, but so far it's the man known as 'FAL1st' who has been scoring the most points for his fantasy teams. FAL1st was the 3rd most drafted of the big hitters but, at time of writing, has collected more points than anyone else in our Pick 3 squad.
Bruschi and king153246 are the next best performers, followed by Leonard and Niklas 'Lena900' Astedt. This means that the top 5 best performers among the bit hitters so far are exactly the players you thought would be!
You obviously know your stuff.
Your next smart play is snagging a cheap entry to the $109 SCOOP Main Event, with $1.5M GTD, in our special PokerOrg satellites on PokerStars. The next one runs this Saturday — see below.
