PokerStars and Isildur1 Part Ways

PokerStars will not renew Viktor ’Isildur1’ Blom’s professional contract: they part ways on a mutual agreement.

PokerStars head of corporate communications, Eric Hollreiser announced that Viktor ‘Isildur1’ Blom and the room will not continue to work together: on a mutual agreement, the professional contract of the young poker star has not been prolonged.

"In his short time as a poker player, Viktor has played against the biggest names in poker at the highest stakes in the toughest games. It’s hard to recall a player who has kept the poker world so riveted at such an early stage of his career. We’ll be watching with great interest and we wish him nothing but success," Hollreiser said.

‘Isildur1’ entered the online poker world with a great blast, turning the high stakes field upside down in late 2009: completely unknown before, he played the highest stakes against the greatest names, not ineffectively. By November, 2009, he had a profit of $5.5 million; not even the best players could counter his hyper-aggressive style. Eventually, he would also loose: Brian Hastings finished his bankroll, winning $4,206,960 from Blom in a single session.

The Swede rebuilt his bankroll and returned to the high stakes tables but could not repeat his greatest success. Still, he made it a PokerStars Team Pro member in December, 2010.

Even though ‘Isildur1’ failed to show off the achievements of his earlier self again, which may have something to do with the fact that he started to move to PLO from NLHE, his cooperation with PokerStars proved to be mutually beneficial. In addition to his probably well paying contract, ‘Isildur1’ was allowed to learn PLO from the biggest pros and he continued to be a driving force of the high stakes games, bringing a lot of action to the room. On top of that all, he also performed greatly in the SuperStar Showdown promotion.

Considering all this, the recent decision to let him go is surprising, as Blom is one of the most valuable players around. Many believe it is the restart of Full Tilt Poker that justifies the move, where ‘Isildur1’ would continue his career, returning to the scene of his greatest successes as a pro. Others argue that rooms try to retire their gambler type players who have a soft spot for breaking some rules (no cheating by any means, rather Blom’s reputation for playing real money poker well under age), prior to moving in to the US market.

‘Isildur1’ closed his pro career at PokerStars with a breakeven performance in cash games but did well in MTTs, including two SCOOP championship titles.