American Poker Awards: 2017 Nominees Announced

The 3rd GPI American Poker Awards will be held in Los Angeles this year, on February 23rd. Awards will be rewarded in 18 categories, including six new ones.

Some categories have been decided already, since these were determined by points gained last year. David Peters won Player of the Year, Cate Hall the Female Player of the Year, while the WSOP Player of the Year award went for Jason Mercier. 

Veteran pro Mike Sexton leads the nominations being up for 3 awards this year: Tournament Performance of the Year, Poker Moment of the Year, Media Content of the Year.

The nominees are:

Breakout Player of the Year: Ari Engel; Maurice Hawkins; Ankush Mandavia; Sam Soverel.

Tournament Performance of the Year: Kristen Bicknell wins 2nd WSOP bracelet ($1,500 bounty); Ari Engel wins Aussie Millions, Maurice Hawkins wins WSOPC Cherokee; back-toback WSOPC;Mike Sexton WPT Montreal.

Event of the Year: Seminole Hard Rock Poker Open; Super High Roller Bowl; WSOP Main Event; WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic.

Moment of the Year: Griffin Benger's AA vs William Kassouf's KK showdown at the WSOP Main Event; Jason Mercier goes on heater: captures (2) WSOP bracelets and 2nd in a week to secure WSOP PoY; David Peters needing 3rd at EPT Prague to win GPI PoY does exactly that and takes the title from Fedor Holz; Mike Sexton mounts unbelievable comeback to win his first WPT title at WPT Montreal.

Mid-Major Circuit of the Year: Heartland Poker Tour; Mid-States Poker Tour; WPTDeepStacks, Wsop Circuit.

Media Person of the Year: Lance Bradley, Sarrah Herring, Joseph Stapleton, David Tuchman.

Industry Person of the Year: Tony Burns (Seminole Hard Rock Tournament Director); Jack Effel (WSOP VP Intl' Poekr Operations & WSOP Director); Sean McCormack (ARIA Director of Poker Operations); Matt Savage (WPT Executive D

Media Content of the Year: Bob, Charlie and a Life-Changing WSOP Main Event Journey (Lance Bradley, Pocketfives); Life's a Gamble (Mike Sexton); Stu Ungar's Last Chance Gone Wrong (Matthew Showell, PokerListing);  Twitch Coverage of the Aussie Millions (Jason Sommerville).

Podcast of the Year: Full Contact Poker (Daniel Negreanu); Poker Life Podcast (Joe Ingram); PokerNews Podcast (Herring, Parvis, Peters, Rinkema, Ryan); TwoPlusTwo Podcast (Terrence Chan, Ross Henry, Adam Schwartz).

Twitch Streamer of the Year: Kevin Martin "KevinMartin897"; Jason Sommerville "jcarvepoker"; Jamie Staples "PokerStaples"; Parker Talbot "tonkaaaP".