Thanks to his two
victories on the WORLD POKER TOUR, 27-year-old Erick
Lindgren of Las Vegas has captured the Tour's first WPT
Player-of-the-Year honor. Lindgren won two tournaments in
the Tour's second season for a total of $1.5 million in
prize money - the PartyPoker Million and the Ultimate Poker
Classic. He also made the final table at the Grand Prix de
Paris, bringing his total winnings to $1,560,568.
At the Bellagio in
Las Vegas, Lindgren was presented with a crystal
Player-of-the-Year cup that some of his fellow players joked
would be perfect for keeping all of his winnings. He will
also wear the WPT Player-of-the-Year jacket at future
tournaments.
Lindgren entered
and won a $162 satellite tournament on PartyPoker.com, which
earned him a spot on the PartyPoker Million cruise in March.
At the end of day, it was Lindgren who took home the
million-dollar prize.
He also won the
$500,000 at UltimateBet.com's Ultimate Poker Classic in
Aruba on the WPT's stop there in October, as well as $60,568
for fifth place at the Aviation Club de France. The three
tournaments earned him 2400 points in the WPT's ranking
system. 1,000 points are awarded for a victory, 700 for
second place, 600 for third, 500 for fourth, 400 for fifth,
300 for sixth and 200 seventh.
The runner-up in
the scoring was Paul Phillips, also of Las Vegas, with 1700
points for a win at the Bellagio Five Diamond World Poker
Classic and a second place finish at The Bicycle Casino in
Los Angeles.
Erick Lindgren
Biography
"I feel totally
blessed," says Lindgren. "I'm just a really competitive guy
and poker satisfies my competitive nature."
Lindgren plays
poker just like the All-League quarterback and MVP
basketball player he was in high school. Raised in a home of
two boys in the remote town of Burney, CA (pop. 3,000) in
the Sierra Nevada range near Mt. Shasta, competition was the
norm.
Going off to
junior college in Chico, CA, to play basketball, Lindgren
became sidetracked. After playing recreationally at a local
Indian casino, he secured a job as a blackjack dealer. He
soon picked some up pretty handy poker skills, which he
began to apply in earnest. At 21, he was playing poker
full-time and working at a casino in San Pablo, CA as a
"propositional player" - a player hired by a property to
keep the games lively. Before long, he was off and running
as an up-and-coming poker pro, playing tournament poker
regularly. |
