High-stakes Hold'em! 2008 in MarketPulse

Will 2008 be remembered as the year of durrrr?

2008 was the biggest year of online poker ever, and poker fans who visited PokerListings' MarketPulse section would know that better than anyone.

Over the span of the year we saw the rise of Tom "durrrr" Dwan, several of the largest pots ever played online and some incredible losses by the likes of elmariachimacho, lady marmalade and patatino. Here are a few of the stories that grabbed our attention following MarketPulse data throughout the year:

The most feared man in poker.

Ivey vs. seda1

The year began with a hard-fought battle between Phil Ivey and relatively unknown newcomer seda1. Ivey has been known to strike fear into the hearts of even the most seasoned Internet pros, so seda1 must have felt omnipotent when they took Ivey for a $147,000 pot.

Unfortunately for seda1, they lost it all back to Ivey and more when the Full Tilt Pro absolutely pwned seda1 for over $600,000 in one session.

Incredibly, seda1 even came back for more, but ended up losing another $251,935 pot to stone-cold Ivey. There wasn't much mention of seda1 in the online poker world after that session.

The lesson learned? If you ever have the fortune to win a sizable amount against Ivey, it's better not to tempt fate by playing him again.

Online poker frenzy

2007 was somewhat of a hangover year for online poker. The U.S. antigambling law had just been passed, and many were left questioning what it meant for the industry.

Well, online poker was back in a huge way in 2008. All the major rooms including Titan Poker, PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker, UltimateBet and Absolute Poker saw some substantial traffic gains throughout the year.

Full Tilt Poker continued to be the only place for high-stakes ballers like Tom "durrrr" Dwan, Phil Ivey, Phil Galfond and the Dang Brothers. There were numerous record-setting pots raked on the site over the year.

PokerStars hit several milestones, including the world's largest online tournament with 35,000 players and the world's richest online tournament, the WCOOP main event, which had a prize pool worth more than $10 million.

Titan Poker successfully hosted the European Championship of Online Poker III, which saw a record number of players come out to play in the Euro-centric tournament.

A new Dwan?

He had a durrrr-rrific year!

Tom Dwan, known as durrrr online, put together an incredible run of No-Limit Hold'em in 2008. Phil Ivey once referred to Dwan as "The kid that will finally break me," and so far durrrr has lived up to his billing in Hold'em. Dwan played without fear and despite going on a major downswing, or Dwanswong as we like to call it, during the middle of the year he managed to turn it around and finish with approximately $6 million in Hold'em profit.

Dwan had no qualms about playing at the absolute highest levels either. He won, and lost, several pots that were worth well over $600,000. The next step for Dwan is likely taking down a major live tournament, but it's debatable whether Dwan is actually making money by playing live tournaments, because it's time he could spend raking in the dough in the online cash games.

Frenchman on fire

In 2007 there were numerous rumors that David Benyamine was in the hole several million at online poker. In 2008 Benyamine proved once again that he is one of the most dominant online players in the world, especially at Pot-Limit Omaha. In fact Benyamine is said to have earned more than $6 million at the four-hole-card game.

To top it all off, Benyamine also won a bracelet at the 2008 WSOP and is currently dating Full Tilt pro Erica Schoenberg. Life is good for Mr. B!

Anybody up for $20k flips?

How 'bout we flip for it?

In the midst of a high-stakes online cash game this summer Patrik Antonius decided that there just wasn't enough action in the game. The result was that Steve Sung, Jay "pr1nnyraid" Rosenkrantz, Taylor Caby, LoLiNa, John Juanda and Gus Hansen flipped for $20,000 no fewer than 15 times. Three cheers for degenerates!

Top Hold'em players

The top three Hold'em players in 2008 according to MarketPulse were Tom "durrrr" Dwan with $6.2 million, Phil "OMGClayAiken" Galfond in second with $3 million and Phil Ivey in third with $2 million in profit. All the usual suspects like Patrik Antonius and David Benyamine were also in the top 10 moneymakers list. As for losers, elmariachimacho, patatino and lady marmelade each lost millions.

Who will rule 2009?

2009 will mark the second straight year that PokerListings has provided exclusive MarketPulse stats for the entire online poker industry. The upcoming year promises to be another exciting one for online poker, and it's very likely that by the end we could have a race between Dwan, Ivey and Galfond for the top spot in the moneymakers category.

Be sure to keep checking the section throughout 2009 to get the most detailed online poker stats, biggest pots and most exciting poker action.