WSOP Error Misnames Negreanu as POY – Robert Campbell Wins!

Robert Campbell Wins 2019 WOP Player of the Year Race

Due to a clerical error, Robert Campbell has been named the WSOP Player of the Year instead of Daniel Negreanu.

Earlier this week, we reported that Daniel Negreanu had earned his third Player of the Year tile from the WSOP – but, that is now no longer the case. Due to a calculation error, Negreanu is not the WSOP POY; instead, it’s Robert Campbell.

When Negreanu won the race, it was unquestioned. He received his congratulations from his peers and fans, and that was it – until a poker report from Russia noticed something a bit off.

Alex Elenskiy posted on Twitter that Negreanu’s points were miscalculated. In fact, he was given points for an event that he didn’t even cash in. On his 68^th cash, he was given 213.1 points that he didn’t actually earn. The points for many players in that event were accidentally fudged.  

Eventually, the WSOP caught wind of the error and checked the numbers. They then admitted that there was a mistake made. The organization then made a tweet about the situation:

We've been made aware of an error on the 2019 POY leaderboard. After verifying results and points, Rob Campbell (@SonicJaxx2019) is the 2019 POY.

We'd like to apologize for this error, and offer our sincere congratulations to Rob!

Please read our full statement below. pic.twitter.com/QqZaczMDJz

— WSOP (@WSOP) November 8, 2019

It turns out that it was a data entry error that was made by someone on WSOP’s staff. As a result, the final totals for the Top 10 players in the 2019 WSOP Player of the Year Race are:

• 1^st place:  Robert Campbell – 3,961.31 points
• 2^nd place:  Shaun Deeb – 3,917.32 points
• 3^rd place:  Daniel Negreanu – 3,861.76 points
• 4^th place:  Anthony Zinno – 3,322.00 points
• 5^th place:  Phillip Hui – 3,186.17 points
• 6^th place:  Daniel Zack – 3,126.13 points
• 7^th place:  Dario Sammartino – 3,091.03 points
• 8^th place:  Chris Ferguson – 2,997.10 points
• 9^th place:  Kahle Burns – 2,983.37 points
• 10^th place:  Dash Dudley – 2,860.79 points

Campbell’s Reaction to His Win

Robert Campbell is pleased with his win, but remained humble. He tweeted a response:

I just want to say thank you to everyone for their overwhelming support! Wow. What an insane 12hours. I for one completely refute the idea @RealKidPoker knew. I know he has his detractors but he loves poker too much to do something like this #wsop #poy

— Rob Campbell (@SonicJaxx2019) November 9, 2019

Daniel Negreanu issued a response stating that it was “an unfortunate situation, but mistakes happen and life moves on”. He remained positive and admitted that he didn’t not feel any negative emotions about the whole ordeal.

The whole debacle is incredible interesting, especially since players have been criticising how Player of the Year points are tallied for quite some time. While the system was overhauled in 2018, it appears that there is still work to be done, as the calculations for POY points are so complicated that no one event noticed that the totals were off until the race was over.

So, next year, we are sure to see a different system for how WSOP players are granted Player of the Year points. It will surely shake things up a little bit.