NAPT Retrospective: PokerStars’ Entrance Into North America Live Tournaments

PokerStars Festival New Jersey wrapped up earlier this month, kicking off with the promise of a week filled with poker, games and PokerStars hospitality in the U.S. market.

While the festival focused on the enjoyment of the players, it’s fair to say that some goals were hit and others fell a little short of being met, but it wasn’t hard to see there’s a lot of potential for success there.

While the main purpose of the week was to regain a foothold in the market and lay the groundwork for future PokerStars events at Resorts Casino Hotel by providing a great experience for those who come to the event, it was also an opportunity to reflect on the history of PokerStars live events here in the U.S.

Back in 2010, the live poker scene in the United States was considerably different. As the regulatory picture had yet to come into sharp focus, both PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker were still sponsoring a variety of poker TV shows and the game wasn’t far from its boom period in the post-Moneymaker years.

The word that comes to mind is robust…The tour was primed for early success.

The World Poker Tour and the World Series of Poker were both drawing huge numbers in the United States. The World Series of Poker Circuit and Heartland Poker Tour were battling for the regional markets. Meanwhile, the European Poker Tour was one of the strongest live brands out there and PokerStars had established presences in other regions with the Latin American Poker Tour and the Asia Pacific Poker Tour.

A move to the United States market was a natural transition. Garry Gates took on a role as media coordinator for the nascent tour and he recalled how the landscape of U.S. poker appeared at the time.

“The word that comes to mind is robust,” Gates said. “Four years prior, Jamie Gold topped the biggest WSOP Main Event field in history and lots of poker content was carried by TV networks. The tour was primed for early success.”

To make a big splash and ensure monster numbers at the opening event, PokerStars unveiled the North American Poker Tour with one of the strongest established names in the industry, the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure, serving as the first event.

Here we’ll take a look back at the history of the NAPT with a brief glance at each of the stops in its short history.

2010 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure

PokerStars definitely scheduled a soft launch for their big North American foray, moving their flagship PCA event from the EPT banner to the new NAPT. The $10,300 Main Event was a hit, as usual, with the Bahamian destination tournament drawing its usual strong field of 1,529 at Atlantis Resort & Casino.

A slew of young American players made final table appearances, and when the dust settled, it was 19-year-old Harrison Gimbel setting a record for the event’s youngest winner after taking down a $1,000 live satellite. He bested opponents like Ben Zamani and Ryan D’Angelo, both of whom would go on to become regular faces at WPT and WSOP final tables in recent years. Zamani looked like a strong favorite for WPT Player of the Year. Gimbel has since added another $1.5 million in cashes to his ledger, including a WPT title earlier in 2016 at WPT Rolling Thunder.

Official Final Table Results

NAPT Venetian

The NAPT then headed from the islands to the mainland, with its first stop in Sin City. At the Venetian in Las Vegas, the NAPT’s second stop, the first $5,000 Main …

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