World Poker Tour to Offer Regional and National Events

The World Poker Tour has resorted to ripping off ideas from the World Series of Poker.  On Tuesday, the World Poker Tour announced that they will start offering Regional and National “WPT Caliber Events.”  These events will have the WPT brand, but the players will not qualify for a WPT title or for WPT Player of the Year point in the events.  The WPT claims to be creating these events to meet player demand to play in WPT events with a range of buy-ins.

If this sounds familiar to you, that is because the concept is very similar to the WSOP Circuit series.  The circuit started out as groups of WSOP themed events that are played out at locations around the U.S.  The events do not award WSOP bracelets, but they do award circuit rings.  This year, the WSOP added a National Championship race that will lead to a WSOP bracelet event just prior to the 2025 WSOP.

So far there are three events planed.  Two of the events are “Regional” events and will be held in Indiana and Florida.  The last is a “National” event that will be held in February at the Aviation Club in France.   At present, these events are ranging from $1,500 US to €5000.  Some events appear to have preliminary events similar to the WSOP Circuit.

At present, there hasn’t been an announcement by any U.S. poker sites whether they will start holding satellites to these new WPT themed events.  In the past, many sites have held satellite events to WPT Main Events.  However, it remains to be seen whether the demand will make these viable.  The WSOP circuit had struggled in recent years to draw solid numbers for their high buy-in Main Events, thus prompting a revamping to their current structure of holding $1,500 Main Events at circuit stops and offering $10,000 Regional Championships. 

As stated earlier, this is just another example of how the WSOP tends to rip off ideas from the WSOP.  The WPT had previously adopted the concept of awarding its winners with WPT bracelets, much the same as the WSOP has done for decades.  The WPT was blasted for this event, most notably by MAC compatible poker sites supporter and tournament director extraordinaire Matt Savage.  This latest development seems to continue that theme.

Some ideas in the poker world are naturally going to be copied.  For example, the ability to play iphone poker was naturally going to be copied as it makes sense and the only real idea being copied is the medium of play.  However, the fact that WPT looks to have blatantly copied an idea yet again from the WSOP makes one wonder the level of creativity in the WPT organization.  Going so far as to even use the “Regional event” branding makes it look ever more blatant that they were copying ideas.  While that may or may not be the case, the WPT should at least try to make an effort in making the idea look original.

At face value, it is debatable whether this concept will work for the WPT as similar models have not worked out in the past.  The fact that they are looking to use stops around the world may help the concept, but chances are that unless they find their own unique spin for this event, this concept will probably turn out to be short lived.