An Inside Look at the Global Poker League, Part 1: Aware of Needed Improvements

The Global Poker League (GPL) is in its relative infancy with just four weeks of action under its belt and the fifth week currently running. With one month of running time in the books, PokerNews talked with Mediarex Sports & Entertainment CEO Alexandre Dreyfus, whose company owns the GPL, The Hendon Mob, and the Global Poker Index (GPI).

In Part 1, Dreyfus opened up about his vision, discussed the draft, and talked improvements to the league.

It’s All Finally Happening

Dreyfus began by explaining to us that in his mind the GPL is embarking on something the poker world has never seen before.

“What people need to understand is that GPL is a project that took two years to get off from the ground and every single aspect of it is new, including doing a draft, doing a league, doing team play, and doing the daily live streams with commentary for online play,” shared Dreyfus. “Everything we have done has never been done before.”

Although the claim made by Dreyfus that this is all new, one could argue many of these aspects have been done before. There have been league formats with things such as the Premier League, Poker Superstars Invitational, and the Epic Poker League, and with those in mind, we followed up with Dreyfus.

“As far as I know, there was never a real organization that set up a year-long season with daily and weekly content including live streams with the player being paid to play with no buy-in and being promoted as a league and not just another poker tournament,” Dreyfus responded. “If you want to look at the Premier League, Poker Superstars Invitational, and Epic Poker League, what we do and what has been done by these guys in the past is a totally different world.

“Because of the technology, what we do right now would have never worked 10 years ago. That is the reality. In terms of what we do when compared to what has been done in league formats, I don’t see any similarities. What we are doing is a storyline and narrative. Every day, every week, you can talk about ‘Hey, I just saw what happened yesterday,’ and when you follow sports or entertainment content the marketing goal is to create a habit. And a habit is something you do every day or every week.

“What we aim to do with the GPL is for you to be hooked to watch GPL whether its one, two, or five matches per week, every week. Then you can talk about that with your friends or you can read about that on PokerNews or PokerListings. Our success in two, three, or five years will be our ability to create a rendezvous like any other sport where friends will say, ‘Did you see what happened yesterday?’ It’s not done by far.”

Dreyfus expanded about some of the leagues in the past stating that, “The Premier League was matches over two-to-four days once, twice, or three times per year, but there was no storyline. Every single event was independent of each other. Poker Superstars Invitational I don’t remember, since I was probably not born when it happened, and the Epic Poker League is the same story [as the Premier League]. We are talking about a buy-in event where it is just a bunch of individuals.”

Next, there have been team-play events before such as Dream Team Poker or the World Cup of Poker. In regards to those, Dreyfus shared that while it is true that team play in poker is nothing new, that the GPL takes it to a new dimension primarily by attempting to provide a better fan experience and a longterm storyline.

“The World Cup of Poker was a promotion of PokerStars and there was not a legitimacy of the choice of players,” Dreyfus said. “And neither was Dream Team Poker. Meaning that the manager or team captain was chosen with no idea why and that guy was just choosing his friends with no legitimate story behind it. To participate in the World Cup of Poker, you had to play in a freeroll on PokerStars and then you represent your country.

“I’m sorry that is not how we see what we are doing. We have a model which collects every live poker result in the world. On top of that, we have the GPI rankings. If the formula good or bad if irrelevant. It gives a picture of who are the best poker players in the world. The fact that someone is first or fifth or the other way around is irrelevant to the big picture. You have an authority and concept that tells you that we have the 1,000 best poker players over the past three years. Then you choose the best poker players from that group of 1,000. That’s why we did the draft.”

The GPL Draft

As for the draft, which was certainly an exciting part of the GPL process and really played into the lead up of the league, Dreyfus pointed to its importance in helping develop a narrative of the league. If we’re going to think of the GPL as a book, the draft was the first chapter or two.

“There was a real logic, storyline, and narrative,” he said. “With all the best poker players that played the WSOP, WPT, EPT, etc. coming to be part of a pool of players. We had 203 sign up and these players become draftable. They are picked up by the team managers to win.”

“The fact that there was other team events in the past, yes, we haven’t invented poker. Guess what? On GPL we also play with cards. Again, this is irrelevant as you can’t compare the Dream Team Poker that was a primary kind of thing that lasted one and a half years with a global scale of 12 teams that are branded. The GPL focus is not an event for players, it’s an event for fans and spectators. Our goal is to shift from a player and customer experience to a fan experience. Our goal is not to compete with the World Series of Poker or the World Poker Tour. …

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