It’s been almost a month since the last news about the World Series of Poker. The last thing that the poker players heard was that it was “too early to make a decision.”
However, at that point, it indeed seemed like way too early to do it. The coronavirus did not seem like a dangerous threat to the industry, although the majority of live events were canceled throughout the world.
At the time we’ve last heard from the WSOP officials, there were about 6,000 confirmed cases in the US. At the moment of writing this text, the number of confirmed cases increased to 600,000, with more than 25,000 with a lethal outcome.
So, at this point, there are three possible scenarios that could happen with WSOP 2020, and we still haven’t heard even the slightest hint about any one of them taking place.
Cancel the Tournament
One scenario is to completely cancel the 2020 WSOP. It would mean that the next WSOP will take place in 2021. Therefore, everyone hoping to see the most important poker event take place this year would be utterly disappointed in this case.
However, this is the least likely scenario to happen. Simply put, too much money is in the game, and expectations are way too high among poker players to cancel the festival completely.
Gregory Chochon, Director of WSOP, stated in a podcast, however, that no options are out of the question.
Postpone the Festival
The other option is to postpone the entire festival. In that case, it would probably take place a couple of months later. Instead of taking place during the late spring/early summer, it could actually happen during fall.
However, postponing the festival also comes with certain downsides. Namely, many live poker tourneys have already been postponed, so it would be very difficult to respect everyone’s schedule.
Simply put, when there’s a WSOP tournament going on, there aren’t many festivals around the globe during that period.
Hold the Festival Online
The final option is to stick to the announced date but to completely go online. This will not be the same experience as going to Las Vegas to play poker, but it’s the next best thing.
Yet, the biggest obstacle on the way to realizing one such project is definitely law. Although more than 70% of players who go to Rio each year are Americans, there still hundreds of players coming from all parts of the world.
They might not be able to access the online poker version of the WSOP if there are some kind of restrictions in their country. In other words, there might be difficulties along the way, but WSOP organizers were able to work miracles in the past. But they would definitely have an ace up their sleeve to allow everyone in the world to take part in the online version of the festival.
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