Global Poker Index and The Hendon Mob Announce Categories for Global Poker Awards

Posted by Arthur Crowson . March 25, 2024

The 26 award categories have been announced for the 2021 Global Poker Awards, which will take place live from the PokerGO Studio at ARIA Resort & Casino in Las Vegas on Friday, February 18^th.

With major awards such as the GPI Player of the Year joined by new categories including Best Live Tournament Reporter, a collection of poker’s finest will be expected to gather in Sin City in February.

Big Awards to Change Hands?

With 26 awards being handed out, some of the biggest will be handed out to the players who have performed the best over the past 12 months. The 2021 GPI Poker Player of the Year, as well as Female Player of the Year, Mid-Major Player of the Year and National Player of the Year awards in countries such as Bosnia & Herzegovina, France, Georgia, Lithuania, Russia, Spain and the United Kingdom will all be announced on January 5^th. Others will have to wait until February 18^th to find out if they are victorious.

One category where there is expected to be a new winner for the first time in four years is the Female Player of the Year, which has been won three years in a row by Kristen Bicknell. The three-time winner of WSOP bracelets and partner of Alex Foxen is predicted to fall just short this year.

The Mid-Major Player of the Year award in particular is one that grabs the eye, rewarding as it does players who have won the most by winning during tournaments with a buy-in of $2,500 or lower. This award demonstrates the ability of the Global Poker Index (GPI) and The Hendon Mob (THM) in recognizing that it is not only those who win at nosebleed stakes who deserve to be noticed and represents an effort to make this year’s awards more relevant than ever.

Classic Categories and Players Choice Award

There is bound to be a lot of excitement around the award of this year’s GPI Breakout Player of the Year, with phenomenal players such as Landon Tice bound to be included in any discussion about which players have emerged from the shadows to dominate poker headlines during 2021.

Plenty of other classic categories return, with George Holmes surely in the running for Final Table Performance, a whole host of poker greats hoping to be named Best Vlogger or Best Streamer and a galaxy of presenting stars aligning in hope of winning Best Broadcaster.

One new category which is bound to generate plenty of interest is Best Live Tournament Reporter. With the suspension of many live poker events in 2020, 2021 saw live poker return across the world, with some of the best live reporters in the world donning face masks and clutching their notepad just a few feet from poker greats in order to capture the magic of their perforates in the written word. While there will be many great writers up for the award, it’s hard to see past popular fan and player favorite Christian Zetsche as the frontrunner.

Which Awards Will Be Voted for by Fans?

Three award categories are Fans Choice Awards and will be decided purely by poker fans. The award for Best Hand is going to drive huge discussion in a year dominated by some of the most exciting individual hands recorded in a calendar year.

The People’s Choice for Poker Personality always polarizes fans as they pick between poker players, broadcasters and sometimes straight out celebrities as poker viewers get a chance to shape exactly who poker broadcasters look to work with during the next 12 months.

The introduction of another new category in this section, the Best Trophy award, is a potential goldmine for memes, photos and trophy lifting footage from around the world. There have been amazing – and awful! – poker trophies over the years. We can’t wait to see which trophy eventually wins, well… the trophy on February 18^th.

With other awards such as Poker ICON, Players Choice for Toughest Opponent, Best Event, Best Podcast and Best Industry Person all still on the list, there will be a bunfight for content awards too, with a Best Poker Media Content trophy available for the best photo, written content and video content of 2021.

With voting panel members (including our own Paul Seaton) receiving their preliminary round ballots this week, it’s sure to be an exciting wait for nominees as the start of the year builds up to the 2021 GPAs, which is streaming exclusively on PokerGO on February 18^th, 2022.