Winning Poker Network tournament series to run September 9–November 1
The Winning Poker Network is calling it the "Biggest PKO Series in History," with $50 million guaranteed and an all-PKO format.
WPN announced it's next upcoming major tournament series, as the MoMoMo PKO Tournament Series comes to the network in September. The MoMoMo PKO Tournament Series plays out from September 9th to November 1st, with $50 million in guaranteed prize money awarded over the seven-week series.
All events exclusively feature the Progressive Knockout format, and the series culminates in the $5 million guaranteed 'Carnage' Main Event.
"Throughout the history of online poker, no other site has offered a series this big made up exclusively of Progressive Knockout Tournaments. It's not even close," says the WPN promotions page touting the event.
WPN players were greeted with the news in a pop-up alert that appeared on the network earlier this week. The official schedule for the series is still to be determined, but online tournament players have plenty of guaranteed prize pools to look forward to on WPN in the coming months.
$5 million guaranteed in the 'Carnage' Main Event
The progressive knockout format stands as one of the most popular ways to play tournament poker in 2020. Online poker platforms around the world include PKO tournaments as a big part of major tournament series.
WPN is embracing the PKO format in unprecedented fashion, however. The MoMoMo PKO Tournament Series 'Carnage' Main Event will play out as the "Biggest Single PKO Tournament in History," according to the series promotions page.
"Our multi-day $5 Million GTD Main Event to the series dwarfs any single Progressive Knock Out tournament ever offered," says the promotions page. "Just imagine the size of the bounties down the stretch. Tens of thousands of dollars up for grabs for eliminating a single player! More details on the way, but mark your calendar as this one is going to be epic."
PKO tournaments hugely popular on the modern poker landscape
PKO tournaments evolved from the knockout/bounty tournament format, which places part of each player's buy-in as a "bounty" that can be won by eliminating that player.
Progressive bounty tournaments take that idea another step farther. A PKO tournament splits each bounty into two, and when you eliminate a player, you win half of that player's bounty.
The other half of the bounty then goes on your head, and whoever eliminates you wins your original bounty, plus any bounties you've accumulated up to that point.
The PKO format leads to a massive payday for the tournament winner, as that player collects all progressive bounties when they eliminate the second-place player.
For example, Daniel Smyth won the WPT World Online Championships Event #5: $3,200 Knockout Championship earlier this week. Smyth took home $428,391 with the win, and $204,588 of that total came from collecting bounties, as well as the final progressive bounty.
