Kristen Foxen Wins PGT Kick Off Event as Comeskey and Spragg Dominate Global Poker Award Nominations

Poker, golf and freshwater fishing don’t usually go together, but in Texas this week, they certainly do. Elsewhere, there was a huge win for Kristen Foxen in Las Vegas as the 2023 GPI Female Player of the Year prepare to accept her award. The Global Poker Award nominations were released and two other female players, Caitlin Comeskey and Marle Spragg, dominated the categories with three nods each. It’s all in this week’s Tight Poker News!

Who Runs the Poker World? Girls!

We kick off this week’s round-up of the exciting action by running through the poker world’s headlines, as our own Alex Robinson brings you all the headlines from an incredible period in poker.

Let’s start with ‘Poker Mommaa’ Kasey Lyn Mills. Not content with winning her first-ever World Series of Poker Circuit event for the top prize and the glamorous ring that comes with it, Poker Mommaa shipped another one just two days later. Perhaps taking her inspiration from America Ferrara’s iconic speech in the movie of last year, Barbie, Mills explained just what it meant to her on her Instagram page, drawing praise from all the poker world.

Kristen Foxen proved that she is a superb poker player as she won the final event of the 2024 PokerGO Kick Off festival. Taking on Daniel Negreanu heads-up, Foxen showed her poker chops, taking the lead from a losing position and sealing the deal live on film as she won the $165,000 top prize. Oh, and she cracked her husband’s aces on her way to knocking him out and claiming the crown. Ouch!

Kristen Foxen (@krissyb24poker) closes it out in the PGT Kickoff finale!

Foxen controlled heads-up play and defeated @RealKidPoker to take the title and $165,000 top prize.

She also collects 330 PGT points to move to second on the PGT leaderboard.

📺 – Event Replay:… pic.twitter.com/KGLQi3sFWh

— PokerGO (@PokerGO) January 17, 2024

Elsewhere, in the nominations for this year’s 5th annual Global Poker Awards, both Marle Spragg and Caitlin Comeskey came out top of the pile in being nominated for three categories each. All three are the same as two of the highest profile female players and content creators in the game will go head-to-head for the trophies in the Best Short-Form Content Creator, Best Video Content and Best X/Twitter Personality categories. Claws out.

Online Poker Hits the Bunker, Texas Takes the Fairway

Online poker has long been a source of major controversy in the poker world, with the entire United States going dark in 2011 on what is now referred to as ‘Black Friday’. Back then, it was the actions of a few unsavoury men who took down Full Tilt Poker in the scandal that denied Americans the chance to play online.

Opening back up state by state, online poker is making a very staggered return and 13 years on, only a handful of states permit poker. Many players were hoping that New York would be the next to consider opening back up to the game again, but New York’s governor looks to have taken online poker out of her budget. The bill may yet make it through congress and isn’t drawing dead, but we just lost a few outs on the flop. Never feels good.

In Texas, outs might not refer to the river, but maybe the lake. We’ll explain. A $1,500-entry tournament pitches poker players into a Poker, Golf and Fishing tournament. Yes, we’re serious. Think you’re on the hook or holding the rod? Well, the PGF U.S.A. Tournament takes place between March 9-31, with golf taking place on March 30^th and Poker on March 31^st. We’ll promise not to criticize your swing, re-raise or… cast?

https://twitter.com/LodgePokerClub/status/1746932350754128164

Teaching a Lesson

Ask a teacher what they’d most like and a reduction in hours, better working conditions or the Pokermon app to crash might be just three of their answers. For Ankansas high school teacher Todd Tucker, however, the answer was simple – a major poker title. Winning $73,000 at the Run Good Poker Series (RGPS), the Southerner told reporters he’ll likely be spending his winning on his two daughters.

“I’m just a family man from Arkansas,” he humbly declared. “I grew up in Boonesville, Arkansas, I live in Van Buren, Arkansas, and I teach in Alma, Arkansas. I’ve got two girls who are involved in all sorts of things, so most of the money will be spent on them.”

Dad points and poker bragging rights. What a guy.

It was at the felt that this week’s Hand of the Week made a mockery of believing in top pair. Holding just ace-king, one player thought that on a board showing A-9-8-7-7, it was good enough to call for a pot worth an astonishing $798,900.

Can next week get any crazier? It’s impossible to say. But with everyone wading in to discuss the merits of the Global Poker Awards, debating over which Foxen is better and playing in the PokerGO Cup, we wouldn’t bet against it… not with our money, anyhow.