National Heads-Up Poker Championship Implements Auto-Bids

The organizers of NBC’s National Heads-Up Poker Championship announced Tuesday that they have established criteria for automatic bids into the competition.  For the first four Championships, all of the competitors (minus the Caesar’s and online qualifiers) were individually chosen and invited.  Now, with “automatic bids,” some objectivity is entered into the selection process so that those who are truly deserving of an invite get one, even if they aren’t a “famous” poker celebrity. 

The list of those who will automatically receive an invitation are listed below.  If nobody qualifies under more than one criteria, this list will cover 27 players for 2009. 

• Previous 5 National Heads-Up Poker Champions (obviously, for 2009, there are only 4 previous champs, but starting in 2010, there will always be at least 5)
• Previous 2 National Heads-Up runners-up
•  Defending National Heads-Up semifinalists
•  Any player who cashes in the past 4 consecutive years of the National Heads-Up Poker Championship
•  Previous 3 World Series of Poker Main Event Champions
•  Defending World Series of Poker Main Event runner-up
•  Beginning with the 2008 WSOP, multiple bracelet winners in the same year will receive an automatic invitation to the next Heads-Up Championship
•  Defending World Series of Poker Player of the Year
•  Defending World Series of Poker Heads-Up Champion
•  Defending World Series of Poker Europe Main Event Champion (must be 21 or older)
• Reigning World Poker Tour Player of the Year
• Reigning Monte Carlo European Poker Tour Grand Final Champion (must be 21 or older)
• Reigning Card Player magazine Player of the Year
• Reigning Bluff magazine Player of the Year
• Reigning ALL IN magazine Player of the Year
• Online and NBC qualifiers (1-3) (must be 21 or older)
• Host venue qualifiers (2)