Sexton's Corner
Source: Vol. 12 - Poker's Seven 'Majors' - PokerNews.com ()
Only one poker player in the World has won both the WSOP Main Event and the WPT Main Event in Poker History - Carlos Mortensen. This has to be considered one of poker’s most amazing feats! If the modern poker world had its version of golf’s Grand Slam, the four events would have to be:
1. WSOP Main Event - LV 2. WPT $25,000 Main Event
3. WSOP $50,000 Horse Event 4. WSOP Europe Main Event
Imagine the prestige, if any one poker player in today’s world won all four of these events!! This may be such an exclusive club, that there will never be one member. If you go back in time, there was only one poker player who won the WSOP Main Event and the
Super Bowl of Poker - and he won both of these Championships three times each! This created a large part of the mystique of the legendary Stu Ungar.
Even if you go back in time to Bobby Jones’ Grand Slam in golf, the Masters and PGA didn’t exist yet. His four majors consisted of The US Open, US Amateur, British Open, and British Amateur. At the time, they were golf’s biggest four events. My point is, majors in all sports have a way of evolving over time. Change is inevitable - and so it is, in the poker world.
There used to be big events in the past in poker called the Grand Prix, WSOP’s Hall Of Fame, Amarillo’s Super Bowl of Poker, and the Super Stars of Poker at Caesars in Lake Tahoe, plus others. We would need an expert committee to research and go back in time to put majors of the past in the poker world in perspective. Is it fair to say the four events listed at the top are the only majors in poker, with a life expectancy of one year (WSOP Europe), two years (WSOP HORSE), and six years (WPT) so far? The great players of the past, wouldn’t have even had a chance to play them, and the reverse is true for our young super stars of today. They had no chance to play poker’s biggest events of yesteryear.
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