After parting methods with ACR earlier this yr, Argentine poker professional Nacho Barbero is getting into a brand new chapter in his high-stakes poker profession as an envoy for WPT International.
The partnership with WPT International, which was not too long ago retained because the title sponsor of Triton Poker, provides Barbero a shot at redemption after a less-than-graceful exit from the unregulated poker site in April.
“I feel it is a recent begin for certain, yeah,” Barbero advised PokerNews through the Triton Tremendous Excessive Curler Collection Jeju II when requested about representing a brand new web site. “As a result of I f***ed it up with ACR. It is my fault. It is a new starting.”
Learn In regards to the Triton Poker Tremendous Excessive Curler Collection Jeju II!
“They’re Type of In every single place”
Since its launch in 2022, WPT International, which is accessible in over 100 international locations worldwide (although not america), has grown into some of the acknowledged and revered manufacturers within the on-line poker area.
“I feel they’re doing an ideal job,” stated Barbero. “They’re type of in all places. They’re placing (on) actually good money video games, actually good tournaments. I imply it is rising lots.”
Barbero added that the location affords “completely different factor(s) than what we’re used to,” together with super-deep-stacked money video games and distinctive blind constructions.
“The money video games I’ve performed in, they’re nice. They’re tremendous comfortable, and I like that they’ve like three blinds, large antes. It is a completely different format,” stated Barbero. “I feel it is fairly cool what they’re doing.”
Nacho Barbero Indicators as a WPT International Sponsored Professional
A Prime-Notch Match Tour
If distinctive and well-run poker occasions are Barbero’s factor, then it was no shock to seek out him grinding the Triton Tremendous Excessive Curler Collection in Jeju, the tour’s second cease this yr on the South Korean island after a powerful and record-breaking pageant in March.
“I’ve by no means performed higher tournaments in my life, I am not going to lie,” stated Barbero, who has three Triton titles and $14.1 million in Triton earnings. “The whole lot is so top-notch. The meals, the venue, the chairs, the remedy to the VIPs.”
“Do not get me mistaken, there are different excursions which might be superb,” stated Barbero, who had simply flown over from EPT Barcelona after a summer time on the World Collection of Poker (WSOP). “Clearly, you pay for (the posh expertise) … but it surely makes the expertise for a leisure participant so significantly better.”
Talking particularly concerning the Jeju pageant, Barbero had this to say: “It is the softest Triton cease.”
Stepping Again from Excessive-Stakes PLO
Barbero’s recent begin might also imply fewer high-stakes money video games for a participant who’s a fixture within the Legends Room (beforehand Bobby’s Room) on the Bellagio in Las Vegas through the World Collection.
“I used to play plenty of PLO high-stakes money video games,” he stated. “However I felt prefer it wasn’t the suitable match for my life, as a result of I used to be enjoying just about non-public, like consuming. They type of power you to drink, like have enjoyable and stuff.”
That stated, Barbero can nonetheless be discovered on the combined recreation tables — which he stated see him swinging $20,000 to $50,000 an evening — and stated he desires to assist “promote” combined video games and “carry folks to play combine.”
Barbero performed a full slate of occasions on the inaugural Triton ONE pageant, touchdown only one money with a Seventeenth-place end within the $10,000 Thriller Bounty value $13,700, earlier than transitioning to the higher-stakes Tremendous Excessive Curler Collection. He didn’t money within the $25,000 WPT International Slam that he was representing as an envoy, however did land a Twenty sixth-place end within the $30,000 8-Handed occasion for $53,000.
*Photographs courtesy Triton, Drew Amato, Enrique Malfavon & Spenser Sembrat
Connor Richards
Senior Editor U.S.
