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Negreanu Wins Big But Then Stalls Big in Grudge Match

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Doug Polk Low Stakes

Just when I said that Daniel Negreanu had no shot to make a comeback against Doug Polk, he pulls off the biggest win of the session. Last weekend, Negreanu managed to win almost $400,000 against Doug Polk in the largest single win by either player.

Following that win, Negreanu eeked out another profit and was looking to maybe make a comeback. However, two winning sessions from Polk put him somewhat back into control. However, during one of those sessions, it appeared that Negreanu was clearly stalling.

Negreanu Comes Back from the Dead With $390k Win

I said it was all over but the crying last week, but Negreanu had other plans. Last Saturday, Negreanu changed things up and went hyper-aggressive against Polk. This resulted in a monster session that saw the six-time WSOP bracelet winner pull down a $390,000 win.

Negreanu admitted that he was “pretty dead without a huge win” and he pulled that off over the course of 1,046 hands. His win knocked Polk down to a total win of $612,563.48 and gave Negreanu some new life.

The grudge match continued on Tuesday with Negreanu booking another win. This time around, the session only lasted 438 hands with Negreanu winning $46.854.50. This reduced Polk’s lead to $565,708.96 after 19,362 hands.

Polk changed up his strategy for the session and started limping in a lot more. Apparently, this did not sit well with Negreanu as was evidenced by the next session.

Polk Bounces Back Despite Negreanu Tankfest

The next session between the two went down on Wednesday with Polk this time pulling out a $136,239.17 win over 560 hands of NL Hold’em. This pulled him back up to a lead of $701,948.13 after almost 20,000 hands.

However, the session was plagued by Negreanu constantly tanking. He was taking 20 seconds per decision in many hands, clearly trying to slow down the game to a crawl. After a while, Polk sat out for over half an hour and then called in Phil Galfond to arbitrate the matter. All that resulted was a suggestion that Negreanu speed things up. By this point, many came out to roast Negreanu for his bad form.

Polk called Negreanu’s stalling a shit move and went off on an epic rant after the session. However, the most important thing was that he was able to get back on the winning side of things

Polk Takes Latest Session – Says He Will Not Do a Rematch

The two got together again on Saturday to battle things out and this time put in a session of 1,384 hands. Polk won yet again, pulling down $34,855.96. This brings him to a total of $736,804.09 over 21,306 hands played.

After the session, Polk took to Twitter to discuss a few things. First, he is not interested in playing a rematch or taking on other challenges. He is once again burnt out from poker and has little desire to play. This may seem a bit odd for someone up over $700,000, but Polk left the game a couple of years ago for this very reason.

Next, Polk does plan to use some of the material from his challenge for his Upswing Poker lab. The only way that he might consider some type of rematch would be as a coach. He said that he would help coach someone that wanted to play Negreanu, but that is about it.

Finally, Polk says that he thinks that the challenge should be wrapped up in 1 to 2 weeks. If the pair could play sessions as long as they did on Saturday, they could finish up by the end of the week. Regardless, it seems unlikely that Negreanu will be able to make a comeback at this point. The question now is whether he will give up more to Polk or if he can reduce his deficit before the end of the challenge.

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