Patrick Leonard SCOOPs mystery bounty hours after branding them 'stupid'

Patrick Leonard won a $530 SCOOP mystery bounty tournament on PokerStars hours after branding them the "stupidest format of poker ever created." It was his first SCOOP title of the season (his eighth in total) and netted him $26,322 and $9,316 in bounties. The win keeps him in the slipstream of Brazil's 'Internett93o', who's currently at the top of the overall SCOOP leaderboard. 

The irony of his one-two post/win was dulled somewhat in a follow-up tweet where he revealed they're his "most profitable format of poker."

He said, "Recs don’t understand the bounty math, regs can’t afford the variance in them and I get infinite action in people selling to me in them that would never sell in normal formats."

Not everyone agreed with Leonard. In fact, the overriding consensus was against him and for mystery bounties. Shaun Deeb weighed in on the debate.

Pure poker vs. gambling

Leonard doubled down after his win in an extensive post where he admitted that he didn't articulate his argument as well as he could because he "tweeted whilst 20 tabling." 

"Mystery bounties are fun," Leonard said, "but it’s more bingo, slots, pure gambling. The correct play very often, especially at the 'business end' of the tournament is to call any two vs any jam."

"The biggest threat to online poker is regulation," he went on to say. "Certain countries aren’t allowed to play mystery bounties on stars and if they become more and more prevalent the case of poker being a skill game becomes less and less of a strong argument."

"The variance of them is absolutely absurd... I am old, I am boring, but there imo should be some kind of 'pure poker' kept at the heart of the game."

There are seven more mystery bounty events on the 2024 SCOOP schedule, ending in the Final Mystery on May 29, which comes in $530, $55 and $5.50 flavors. 

Lex Veldhuis, who won his first SCOOP title ever earlier this week, just missed out on the final table in the same event, finishing in 11th. That cash sees him in fifth position on the overall SCOOP leaderboard.

2024 SCOOP overall leaderboard