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WSOP Releases Top Nominations for Poker Hall of Fame

The World Series of Poker has released the list of the top 10 nominees from the public for the 2010 class of the Poker Hall of Fame.

The nominees were taken at WSOP.com over the last two months, and the WSOP decided to publicize the names of the people who were nominated the most by the public. Here is the list, in alphabetical order:

Chris Ferguson: Five-time WSOP winner, including the 2000 main event.
Barry Greenstein: Three-time WSOP winner, two-time World Poker Tour winner.
Jennifer Harman-Traniello: Two-time WSOP winner, the only woman to hold two bracelets in open events.
Dan Harrington: Two-time WSOP winner, including the 1995 main event, and back to back ME final tables in 2003-2004.
Phil Ivey: Eight-time WSOP winner, and one of the top online cash-game players in the world.
Linda Johnson: Known as “The First Lady of Poker,” helped set up standard tournament rules, and is a WPT personality.
Tom McEvoy: Four-time WSOP winner, including the 1983 main event.
Daniel Negreanu: Four-time WSOP winner, two-time WPT winner.
Scotty Nguyen: Five-time WSOP winner, including the 1998 main event and the 2008 HORSE $50K.
Erik Seidel: Eight-time WSOP winner, one WPT victory.

These players and the others nominated will be whittled down by the Poker Hall of Fame Governing Council, which consists of 16 living Hall of Fame members and 17 members of the media. The council will create a final list of possible inductees before making its selections:

Here are the criteria for induction, according to WSOP.com:

A player must have played poker against acknowledged top competition
Played for high stakes
Played consistently well, gaining the respect of peers
Stood the test of time
Or, for non-players, contributed to the overall growth and success of the game of poker, with indelible positive and lasting results.

By those criteria, it seems any of those 10 nominees could be inducted. But historically, the Hall of Fame only inducts one or two members a year. And usually the selections skew toward older players who have paid their dues and had an impact on poker over a period of many years. Last year, WPT announcer and “poker ambassador” Mike Sexton was the only inductee. Phil Hellmuth is the only “younger” player to have gotten in in recent years, in 2007. Seeing as he has more WSOP bracelets than anyone in history (11), the Poker Brat getting into the HoF at some point was a foregone conclusion.

Based on past precedent, McEvoy, Harrington, and Johnson would seem to be the most likely inductees. However, it’s going to be increasingly difficult to keep Ivey out, as he’s generally considered the best all-around player in the world, and has been considered such for some time.

A total of 102 different people were nominated. Forty-four of them received multiple nominations.

The 2010 class will be inducted as part of the festivities surrounding the final table of the WSOP main event in November in Las Vegas.

The Poker Hall of Fame was started in 1979 and is now owned and overseen by Harrah’s Entertainment. There are 38 members in the Hall of Fame.

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