It's a brand new year and 2025 is behind us, which means now's a great time to look back at some of the more unusual achievements and moments from a jam-packed year in the poker world.
It’s time to dust off the tuxedo and practice looking humble for the winners of our annual Alternative PokerOrg Awards.
Ladies and gentlemen, we give you…
Best musical number
He can make a figurative song and dance about anything, but at the summer World Series of Poker he proved he can actually make a literal song and dance, too.
Phil Hellmuth swore he had played his last WSOP Main Event and would not be playing in 2025. That promise ended up as broken as his guitar.
Here’s Hellmuth’s WSOP Main Event entrance in all its, erm, glory.
And here’s how the guitar ended up.
Honorable mention: ‘Check raise revolution’
If you were waiting for a poker-themed concept album featuring the likes of Jeremy Ausmus, Greg Goes All-in and Slow Poker (we were), your prayers were answered in March.
Best villain
By the time Will Kassouf exited the WSOP Main Event, it’s fair to say he had worn out his welcome.
Catchphrases such as ‘Nine high like a boss’ and ‘I’ve got the coconuts’ ended up replaced by loud arguments with tournament staff and reported threats to opponents at his table. While some felt his controversial antics actually spiced up the coverage, they weren’t the same ones who were playing with him.
Add excessive tanking to the rap sheet, and Kassouf ended up on the strictest of shot clocks, penalized at multiple turns, and ultimately banned from the rest of the series.
Best supporting actor
What does it take to win WSOP Player of the Year?
Don’t ask Benny Glaser. The British mixed game guru clocked up an incredible three bracelet wins during the series, but missed out on the POY honor thanks to Shaun Deeb’s long list of impressive results.
Biggest marketing spend
Up until 2025, the biggest poker pot ever televised was $3.1 million. Then that figure was left in the dust, with the new record now held by a pot more than 4x that amount.
And there’s no mystery who was playing it. Ossi Ketola is the CEO of an online casino, a controversial figure online — to put it mildly — and the instigator of some of the biggest heads-up poker games ever caught on camera.
A series of huge-money heads-up games saw Ketola bring eight-figures in buy-ins to the table on multiple occasions, and he’s suggested that playing for such eye-watering stakes may be part of a marketing strategy for his business.
We figure that ‘marketing budget’ was around the same as for the movie Magic Mike, but we’re pretty sure which one got more viewers.
Best dressed
Despite what you might think, looking out at a room filled with hoodies and baseball caps, there’s no uniform for poker pros. If that’s your job, you decide what to wear — no wrong answers. Right?
Maybe not. Christoph Vogelsang is known in the poker world for two things: Being a star of the super high roller circuit with over $45 million in live tournament earnings, and showing less skin than a nun in Antarctica who’s allergic to sunlight.
With his hoodie, sunglasses, scarf and face covering, Vogelsang can be a tough player to read and has drawn criticism for his use of fashion accessories. That is, if it’s even him in there?
Honorable mention: Dan ‘Jungleman’ Cates
If you’ve ever come to the table dressed in costume as Willy Wonka, Macho Man Savage, a lephrecaun or a punk rocker, you get a mention here. What can we say; we’re suckers for wigs.
Best action scene
Back in March the WSOP Circuit Cherokee Main Event was the scene of something people may think about, but few actually do.
If you’ve ever flipped over a Monopoly board after landing on Boardwalk one too many times, you might know the feeling. But here’s the thing about poker tables: they’re bigger and heavier than Monopoly boards.
That didn’t stop one man from flipping three poker tables in quick succession, sending chips flying and causing a two-hour stoppage in the tournament while officials did their best to put the room, the tables and the event back together.
Our man Lefty was on the scene...
