The marathon GPL schedule continued on Week 6 with hours upon hours of brand-new poker content to consume.
At the risk of getting repetitive the Moscow Wolverines put in another dominant week that saw them hold on to top spot overall with an astounding 82 points.
The Montreal Nationals, London Royals and LA Sunset were also among the teams that performed well this week but we’re here to take a look at the individual performances.
There was one first-round pick in particular that crushed it for his California-based squad.
1) Fedor Holz
There were numerous poker pros who considered Fedor Holz an absolute steal for the LA Sunset at ninth overall.
Emperor Fedor.
He proved his worth with a monster Week 6 that included an 8-point performance over two 6-Max matches and then a 3-0 dismantling of Jonathan Duhamel during the heads-up portion of the week for a total of 17 points.
Holz pretty much put the LA Sunset on his back and helped them leapfrog the idle Sao Paulo Metropolitans to take third place overall.
Not to mention Holz is just a lot of fun to watch and remains one of the best teachers in the GPL.
So far Holz and Busquet have been heads-up killers for the LA Sunset and both the NY Rounders and Montreal Nationals should be worried as the Sunset are only five points from the top of the standings.
2) Martin Jacobson
Martin Jacobson
Martin Jacobson was regarded as the pro’s poker player when he won the 2014 WSOP Main Event and nothing has changed.
Jacobson was a beast for the Montreal Nationals during the 6-Max and helped the team keep pace with the rest of the league thanks to his 12 points.
The Swede, who was taken 23rd overall, is proving to be a second-round steal.
The only downside? He was pretty quiet most of the time this week. Speak up Martin, the people want to hear the champ’s thoughts!
Meanwhile the Nationals are proving to be a very well-rounded team with players than can hurt you in every aspect of the game whether it’s heads-up or 6-Max.
3) Jonathan Jaffe
Sportify everything!
Wait a minute. Didn’t Jonathan Jaffe get destroyed by Bryn Kenney 3-0 in his only heads-up showing this week?
That’s true. In fact Jaffe was getting beaten so badly that he referred to himself as a human piñata at one point.
Here’s the thing though: it’s not all about who scores the most points on the GPL.
We want to give special attention to players who actually go out of their way to put on a show and capture the attention of viewers.
In that regard Jaffe was an absolute riot.
Jaffe’s dry wit made every loss entertaining. He was even wearing a series of hilarious custom t-shirts like “Sportify Tokers” featuring Bryn Kenney and Jason Wheeler and “Squid Entity 2016”. At one point Jaffe ate Oreos TeddyKGB style for god’s sake.
Now it was obviously a tough blow for the San Francisco Rush who continue to struggle but Jaffe is the type of player that Twitch audiences will tune in to see. More please.
Must-Watch Match of the Week
That Jonathan Jaffe/Bryn Kenney match was pretty darn hilarious if you’re into that kind of thing. If not, you might learn a thing or two from the Fedor Holz/Jonathan Duhamel match:
Honorable Mentions
There were a lot of strong performances this week including the amazing consistent Anatoly Filatov who added yet another 1st and 2nd place finish for the raging Moscow Wolverines in the 6-Max. Speaking of the Wolverines, they are starting to pull away from the pack with a staggering 82 points. Mustapha Kanit was incredibly entertaining as he nearly 3-0ed George Danzer but had to settle for 2-1. Bryn Kenney, like his brother Tyler, was a heads-up boss this week while Jason Lavallee also brought the goods, sweeping end boss Darren Elias of Sao Paulo.. Nice week for London Royals Sam Trickett, too, who went 1st and 3rd in 6-max.
Misclicks
Mustapha Kanit was supposed to play the first 6-Max match this week for the Rome Emperors but had to be replaced by Max Pescatori because he had car troubles. The San Francisco Rush have a lot of good players but are still stalled out in sixth place. You had to feel for Jonathan Duhamel who couldn’t get anything going against Fedor Holz and was visibly frustrated. Celina Lin, team manager for the Hong Kong Stars, managed to pull off a runner-up finish in one of the 6-Max matches for five points but has been running pretty darn bad in the GPL so far. Fabrice Soulier also had a very tough/unlucky weak.
Random Stats
Total number of hands played: 6257
Number of different players so far: 70 (still waiting on Aaron Paul and Sorel Mizzi)
Best player: Anatoly Filatov (33 points / 10 matches, +12 performance index)
Unluckiest player: Fabrice Soulier (1 points / 4 matches, -11 performance index)
Player with most hands: Olivier Busquet (LA Sunset) – 697 (14 matches)
Best weekly performance: Montreal Nationals, week 6 (21 / 23 points)
Team most reliant on 2 players: LA Sunset (Busquet & Holz made 56 / 68 points for their team)
Global Poker League Standings - Week 6
Americas Standings
1. NY Rounders - 73 points
2. Montreal Nationals - 72 points
3. LA Sunset - 68 points
4. Sao Paulo Mets - 62 points
5. LV Moneymakers - 52 points
6. San Francisco Rush - 51 points
Eurasia Standings
1. Moscow Wolverines - 82 points
2. London Royals - 68 points
3. Paris Aviators - 68 points
4. Hong Kong Stars - 58 points
5. Berlin Bears - 51 points
6. Rome Emperors - 51 points
Player Performance Index*
| PLAYER | POINTS | GAMES | HANDS | PERFORMANCE INDEX |
| Anatoly Filatov (Moscow Wolverines) | 33 | 10 | 490 | 12 |
| Olivier Busquet (LA Sunset) | 33 | 14 | 697 | 9 |
| Fedor Holz (LA Sunset) | 23 | 8 | 363 | 3.5 |
| Tyler Kenney (New York Rounders) | 22 | 4 | 420 | 10 |
| Felipe Mojave (Sao Paulo Mets) | 22 | 4 | 429 | 10 |
| Mike Leah (Paris Aviators) | 22 | 7 | 345 | 5.5 |
| Randy Lew (Hong Kong Stars) | 21 | 15 | 678 | -1.5 |
| Anton Wigg (San Francisco Rush) | 19 | 7 | 306 | 2.5 |
| Jason Lavallee (Montreal Nationals) | 18 | 8 | 405 | 3 |
| Jeff Gross (Berlin Bears) | 17 | 5 | 211 | 6.5 |
| Liv Boeree (London Royals) | 17 | 4 | 297 | 5 |
| Sam Trickett (London Royals) | 16 | 5 | 277 | 5.5 |
| Max Pescatori (Rome Emperors) | 16 | 6 | 330 | 2.5 |
| Jonathan Little (Las Vegas Moneymakers) | 16 | 8 | 356 | 1 |
| Justin Bonomo (London Royals) | 16 | 8 | 321 | 1 |
| Pascal Lefrançois (Montreal Nationals) | 15 | 6 | 239 | 6 |
| Martin Jacobson (Montreal Nationals) | 15 | 5 | 203 | 4.5 |
| Dominik Nitsche (Berlin Bears) | 15 | 5 | 331 | 4.5 |
| Tom Marchese (New York Rounders) | 15 | 11 | 489 | -4.5 |
| Jason Mercier (New York Rounders) | 14 | 5 | 194 | 3.5 |
| Vladimir Troyanovskiy (Moscow Wolverines) | 14 | 5 | 285 | 3.5 |
| Alexandre Luneau (Paris Aviators) | 14 | 5 | 229 | 3.5 |
| Anthony Zinno (Las Vegas Moneymakers) | 13 | 5 | 269 | 2.5 |
| Bryn Kenney (New York Rounders) | 12 | 6 | 187 | 3 |
| George Danzer (Paris Aviators) | 12 | 6 | 178 | 3 |
| Kitty Kuo (San Francisco Rush) | 12 | 5 | 305 | 1.5 |
| Mike McDonald (Montreal Nationals) | 12 | 4 | 213 | 0 |
| Thiago Nishijima (Sao Paulo Mets) | 12 | 9 | 333 | -1.5 |
| Sergey Lebedev (Moscow Wolverines) | 12 | 9 | 341 | -1.5 |
| Mustapha Kanit (Rome Emperors) | 12 | 6 | 303 | -1.5 |
| Igor Kurganov (London Royals) | 11 | 7 | 233 | -1 |
| Tony Gregg (San Francisco Rush) | 11 | 6 | 308 | -7 |
| Jason Wheeler (New York Rounders) | 10 | 2 | 142 | 4 |
| Raiden Kan (Hong Kong Stars) | 10 | 2 | 239 | 4 |
| Andrey Pateychuk (Moscow Wolverines) | 10 | 2 | 202 | 4 |
| Davidi Kitai (Paris Aviators) | 10 | 2 | 179 | 4 |
| Scott Ball (Las Vegas Moneymakers) | 10 | 5 | 313 | -0.5 |
| João Bauer (Sao Paulo Mets) | 10 | 5 | 209 | -0.5 |
| Weiyi Zhang (Hong Kong Stars) | 10 | 5 | 211 | -0.5 |
| Celina Lin (Hong Kong Stars) | 10 | 4 | 263 | -2 |
| Daniel Cates (Berlin Bears) | 10 | 10 | 472 | -11 |
| Bertrand Grospellier (Paris Aviators) | 9 | 6 | 376 | 0 |
| Xuan Liu (Montreal Nationals) | 8 | 2 | 106 | 2 |
| Igor Yaroshevsky (Moscow Wolverines) | 8 | 2 | 155 | 2 |
| Darren Elias (Sao Paulo Mets) | 8 | 8 | 383 | -7 |
| Chance Kornuth (LA Sunset) | 7 | 3 | 147 | -2 |
| Todd Brunson (Rome Emperors) | 7 | 5 | 213 | -3.5 |
| Walter Treccarichi (Rome Emperors) | 7 | 4 | 259 | -5 |
| Faraz Jaka (San Francisco Rush) | 6 | 3 | 115 | 1.5 |
| Joao Pires Simao (Sao Paulo Mets) | 6 | 2 | 152 | 0 |
| Timothy Adams (Rome Emperors) | 6 | 6 | 233 | -3 |
| Bill Perkins (Berlin Bears) | 6 | 5 | 229 | -4.5 |
| Brian Rast (Berlin Bears) | 6 | 5 | 190 | -4.5 |
| Jake Cody (Las Vegas Moneymakers) | 5 | 2 | 135 | -1 |
| Dzmitry Urbanovich (Moscow Wolverines) | 5 | 2 | 158 | -1 |
| Chris Moorman (London Royals) | 5 | 3 | 203 | -4 |
| Byron Kaverman (Sao Paulo Mets) | 4 | 2 | 113 | -2 |
| Eugene Katchalov (LA Sunset) | 4 | 4 | 144 | -3.5 |
| Chris Moneymaker (Las Vegas Moneymakers) | 4 | 4 | 197 | -3.5 |
| Bryan Huang (Hong Kong Stars) | 4 | 3 | 152 | -5 |
| Marc-Andre Ladouceur (Montreal Nationals) | 4 | 5 | 219 | -6.5 |
| Jonathan Duhamel (Las Vegas Moneymakers) | 4 | 6 | 189 | -9.5 |
| Vanessa Selbst (London Royals) | 3 | 3 | 74 | -1.5 |
| Dario Sammartino (Rome Emperors) | 3 | 3 | 86 | -1.5 |
| Jonathan Jaffe (San Francisco Rush) | 3 | 6 | 191 | -6 |
| Maria Ho (LA Sunset) | 1 | 1 | 36 | -2 |
| Fabrice Soulier (Paris Aviators) | 1 | 4 | 207 | -11 |
| Dong Guo (Hong Kong Stars) | 0 | 1 | 20 | -3 |
| Phil Galfond (San Francisco Rush) | 0 | 3 | 94 | -4.5 |
| Kevin MacPhee (New York Rounders) | 0 | 2 | 13 | -6 |
*The performance index measures how a player performs compared to his expected value. For example: on average a player will win 3 points in a 6-max tourney. If (s)he finishes first, (s)he’ll earn 7 points, 4 above the expected value, meaning a performance index rating of +4 for this tourney. If a player finishes last, (s)he’ll get 0 points, which corresponds to a performance index of -3.
