Welcome to Day 1a of the $1,100 MSPT Main Event at Canterbury Park
The final stop for Season 10 of the Mid-States Poker Tour (MSPT) is here as Day 1a of the $1,100 buy-in, $500K GTD Main Event is set to kick-off at Minnesota’s Canterbury Park today.
It’s a special venue for the tour as it played host to the first-ever MSPT stop a decade ago. Since that time, the MSPT has hosted 162 Main Events across the country and recently awarded a milestone $100,000,000 in prize money.
This marks the 18th time the MSPT will have held a Main Event at Canterbury Park. Back in September, Michael Esquivel topped a 472-entry field to capture a $98,113 first-place prize. In the Season 9 finale last December, Andy Rubinberg bested a 977-entry field to win the tournament for $179,776 and his second MSPT title. He talked about the victory in an episode of the LFG Podcast here on PokerNews.Other past MSPT Canterbury champs include Matt Kirby (February 2019 for $99,573), Blake Bohn (September 2018 for $94,568), and Rob Wazwaz (April 2018 for $109,375), just to name a few.
The upcoming Main Event, which requires players to be just 18 years of age to play, will offer three starting flights beginning with Day 1a starting today at 3 p.m. Days 1b and 1c will take place at the same time on Friday, Dec. 6 and Sat. Dec. 7 respectively.
Players will start with 20,000 in chips with blinds lasting 40-minutes with 10-minute breaks coming after every three levels. Play is scheduled through 15 levels unless 12 percent of the field is reached in which play will stop and players will bag and tag for the night.
The surviving players from each flight will then return at 11 a.m. on Sunday, Dec. 8 to play down to a winner with the final table set to be live-streamed worldwide on a 15-minute delay.
Mike Shin Essentially a Lock for MSPT Season 10 POY
For the first time in tour history, the MSPT Player of the Year race is a foregone conclusion headed into the last stop – barring an unprecedented turnout. Mike Shin holds a big lead in the Player of the Year race. His 5,475 points are well ahead of Adam Friedman, who is his next closest competition with 3,500 points. Shin has amassed 11 MSPT cashes in 2019 which includes winning the MSPT Majestic Star back in January for $68,593 and finishing third in the MSPT Venetian over the summer for $334,000. That was the second-largest score of his career behind the $427,930 he received for finishing 12th in the 2016 World Series of Poker Main Event.
Current MSPT Season 10 POY Standings
| Place | Player | Points |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Mike Shin | 5,475 |
| 2 | Adam Friedman | 3,500 |
| 3 | Matt Kirby | 3,425 |
| 4 | Brian Wilson | 3,250 |
| 5 | Brian Hou | 3,000 |
| 6 | Andy Tran | 2,950 |
| 7 | Aaron Johnson | 2,942 |
| 8 | Alex Winter | 2,750 |
| 9 | Eric Baldwin | 2,700 |
| 10 | DJ Buckley | 2,692 |
For more on the MSPT, visit the tour’s website at msptpoker.com
Stay tuned in here as PokerNews will be on the tournament floor bringing you all of the live updates throughout the weekend.