With the release of the roster for this years Heads-Up poker championship let’s look back at some of the past winners and deep finishes of this young tournament.  There have been a lot of dream match-ups and surprising results.  Certain players have demonstrated a consistency over time that frankly defies odds given the fast structure of the poker tournament.  This format has paired online poker pros with live poker pros and indeed introduced Tom Dwan to television poker fans after his run-in with Hellmuth and the ensuing challenge he laid down to the poker great.

We’ve seen learned that Dwan aka Durrrr likes challenges.  We also know the online poker players like to play online poker in a heads up format.  Really, the place where heads up poker has been elevated is on the virtual felt.  People who play poker online all dabble in heads up challenges and live casinos rarely offer it.  So if NBC was truly interested in proving the best heads up player it wouldn’t be so heavy with live players.

In year one, 2005, the finals matched Phil Hellmuth and Chris Ferguson.  Hellmuth had to get past Antonio Esfandiari in the semis and in a delicious matchup Ferguson kind of got a rematch with Cloutier.  In a throwback to the year Ferguson won his Main Event titlee again got the best of Cloutier.  In the NBC championship World Series of Poker Main Event champions clashed for the title and in the relatively early days of heads up poker it makes sense both players got so deep. 

Back then most of the heads up experience was when a tournament was on the line.  And nobody’s won more No Limit Texas Hold’Em poker bracelets than Hellmuth and Cloutier has won as many tournaments as anyone.  Hellmuth prevailed over Ferguson winning their final match two games to one.  This only cemented Hellmuth’s excellence in the eye of the casual poker fan.

Hellmuth’s route to the final started with him being named the number one seed and living up to it.  He beat old rival Men Nguyen (the Master) in the first round.  Internet millionaire and former poker junkie Paul Phllips fell in the second round.  Huck Seed, another former WSOP champion went down in the third to Hellmuth and  Lyle Berman was the quarter final victim.  Ferguson was the number two seed and he went through Cyndy Violette, Gus Hansen, Mimi Tran, and Mike Sexton before his semi-final clash with TJ Cloutier.

In year two, 2006, was deja vu all over again for Chris Ferguson.  Once again “Jesus” barrelled through five opponents  but couldn’t beat the sixth in the finals.  Ferguson bested Freddy Deeb in the first round, clipped the legendary Chip Reese in the second round, knocked off upstart Atlanta poker pro Josh Arieh in the third round, took out noted poker author James McManus in the quarters, and beat Huck Seed in the semis. 

Ted Forrest’s route to the finals was just as star studded.  Forrest, like Hellmuth the year before, garnered the number one seed in the field (randomly) but played like it.  He beat Erik Seidel and Chad Brown in the first two rounds.  Little known Ernie Dureck had his Cinderella story ended by Forrest in the third round.   Sam Farha went down in the quarters and Shawn Sheikhan couldn’t beat Forrest in the semi-finals. 

Ferguson again lost 2-1 in the finals.  However, his back to back finals appearances was probably the biggest achievement in the first two years of the event.  Consider Phil Hellmuth in his bid to repeat couldn’t get out of the first round falling to Chip Reese, and the previous year Forrest only made it to the third round.