Poker legend Patrik Antonius has won the largest poker pot in U.S. live stream history, scooping nearly USD$2 million after an epic hand against Eric Persson.
The hand occurred on the third and final day of PokerGO's No Gamble, No Future cash game with Antonius collecting USD$1.978m (AUD$2.894m) after incredibly having Persson drawing dead on the turn.
The Sporting News explains all the details about the hand and the cash game format.
The hand - Antonius vs Persson
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With blinds at $1000/$2000 and a $2000 big blind ante, Persson opened the action with a $7,000 raise - holding queen-nine of hearts (Q9hh).
Rob Yong called on the button with ace-two of clubs (A2cc), before Antonius squeezed to $30,000 with ace-king of hearts (AKhh) in the small blind.
Both Persson and Yong made the call.
With $94,000 in the pot, the flop came eight of hearts, three of hearts, three of clubs (8h3h3c) - an action flop with both Antonius and Persson holding hearts.
Antonius continuation bets for $40,000 and Persson snap raises to $140,000, with Yong folding.
Persson is banking on the fact Antonius can only have three hands with a better draw than his heart draw in this situation that would squeeze preflop - AKhh, AJhh and AThh.
With Antonius having one of those hands, the Finn re-raises Persson's flop raise to $250,000 - and gets a call making the pot $594,000.
The turn brings the ace of spades (8h3h3cAs), which now has Persson drawing dead against Antonius, with his queen and nine no longer live outs to a pair and his flush draw beat.
Antonius leads the river with a small $150,000 bet and Persson snap jams his remaining $692,000 despite having no chance of winning if the Finn calls.
Antonius knows he is only behind a minimal combination of hands - one combo of pocket threes and two combos of pocket eights, with Persson extremely unlikely to play pocket aces this way.
The Finn calls and has a shattered Persson drawing dead - scooping in the $1.978m pot.
It surpassed the previous record on a U.S. live stream of $1.158m on Hustler Casino Live.
The cash game - No Gamble, No Future
The Antonius-Persson hand occurred at No Gamble, No Future's 'Clash of the Titans' cash game, which was streamed live on PokerGO.
It involved six players - Patrik Antonius, Eric Persson, Rob Yong, Andrew Robl, Markus Gonsalves, and Matthew "MJ" Gonzales - with a $1m buy-in and $100,000 posted on the side.
Players had the choice to spread their buy-in into two $500,000 bullets or just put the $1m on the table straight away.
Blinds started at $500/$500 but gradually rose over the three days to $1000/$2000 with a $2000 big blind ante - which was the status during Antonius and Persson's famous battle.
The $100,000 posted on the side by the six players created a $600,000 jackpot that was awarded to the biggest winner in the game at its conclusion.