Ahead of the awards ceremony this Thursday, officials with the Global Poker Index have released the list of nominees for the Fourth Annual American Poker Awards.
The 2018 version of the American Poker Awards, which will be hosted by the World Poker Tour’s Lynn Gilmartin at Andaz in West Hollywood, CA, will hand out awards for outstanding achievement in the world of poker from North America. While the entire list of those who have been nominated does skew heavily to those from the U. S., there are exceptions to the rule. One of them is Daniel Negreanu, who won last year in the “Poker Personality of the Year” category.
This year, Negreanu has once again been nominated for his influence on the world of poker. He is one of the choices in the “Video Blogger of the Year” category, going up against another popular player in Doug Polk, Andrew Neeme and Joe Ingram. Polk and Negreanu will also be up for “Poker’s Biggest Influencer,” joined this time by PokerCentral moneyman Cary Katz and tournament director Matt Savage.
These awards will be voted on by a blue-ribbon committee the day of the 2018 American Poker Awards on February 22 (prediction of the winner in BOLD):
Breakout Player
DJ Alexander
Michael Del Vecchio
Alex Foxen
Art Papazyan
Tournament Performance of the Year
Scott Blumstein (WSOP Main Event)
Darren Elias (WPT Fallsview)
Bryn Kenney (PSC Monte Carlo Super High Roller)
Doug Polk (WSOP One Drop High Roller)
Moment of the Year
70-year old John Smith makes back-to-back WSOP $10K Heads-Up Final Table
Ema Zajmovic – First female player to win an open Main Event on the WPT
Vanessa Selbst and Gaelle Baumann – Selbst loses full house to Baumann’s quads during first round of WSOP Championship Event)
Tom Dwan Returns to the States of America on “Poker After Dark”
Event of the Year
Super High Roller Bowl
partypoker MILLIONS North America
Poker Masters Event #1
WSOP Championship Event
Mid-Major Circuit
Mid-States Poker Tour
RUNGOOD Poker Series
WPTDeepStacks
WSOP Circuit
Journalist of the Year
Drew Amato
Lance Bradley
Bj Nemeth
Steve Ruddock
Jessica Welman
Broadcaster of the Year
Nick Schulman
Joe Stapleton
Lon McEachern
Ali Nejad
Media Content of the Year
Adrian Moreno in Tears following Win in WSOP Little One for One Drop (Amato)
Dead Money: A Super High Roller Bowl Story (Poker Central)
Poker Brat: The Phil Hellmuth Story (Phil Hellmuth)
Resilience Defined: Sheddy Siddiqui Raising his Two Boys (Bradley)
Podcast of the Year
PokerCentral Podcast
PokerNews Podcast
Poker Life Podcast
TwoPlusTwo Podcast
Video Blogger of the Year
Joe Ingram
Daniel Negreanu
Andrew Neeme
Doug Polk
Poker Streamer of the Year
Jeff Gross
Bill Perkins
Jason Somerville
Jaime Staples
Parker Talbot
Industry Person of the Year
Tony Burns
Sean McCormick
Adam Pliska
Matt Savage
Poker’s Biggest Influencer
Cary Katz
Daniel Negreanu
Doug Polk
Matt Savage
In addition to these honors, there will be other awards handed out the night of the American Poker Awards that have already been determined by either points on the Global Poker Index, by a vote of the public or by the selected committee of voters:
2017 GPI American Player of the Year: Bryn Kenney
2017 GPI Female Player of the Year: Kristen Bicknell
Award for Lifetime Achievement
Award for Charitable Initiative
Jury Prize
PocketFives Legacy Award
People’s Choice Award – Poker Personality of the Year
The People’s Choice Award is being voted on at this time. Visit the dedicated page for this award and be sure to cast your vote. It is also the only vote that is handled by the voice of the poker community. Counting that award, there is a total of 20 awards that will be handed out during a very busy ceremony!
The 2018 American Poker Awards will be handed out on February 22 at Andaz in West Hollywood, CA, beginning at 7PM. The ceremonies are expected to be live streamed over the GPI’s social media platforms, but further information on this has yet to be released by the GPI.
