When Day 2 of the $1,000-entry Mystery Million event began at last summer’s World Series of Poker (WSOP) in Las Vegas, the chances of winning one of the top bounties had reduced from three in 18,409 to one in 317, with just 950 players surviving to ‘Bounty Day’, a.k.a. Day 2. With two $1 million bounties won already by DJ Buckley and Valentyn Shabelnyk, both of whom hadn’t reacted, one remained.
This is the story of who won that half a million dollars and where it all went.
Pulling the Half-Million Bounty
“I’d played the first couple of tournaments and bagged half a million.”
By the time Roberto Romanello won $500,000 by opening an envelope in the Paris cardroom in Las Vegas, both the two biggest bounties in the $1,000 buy-in Mystery Millions event had been claimed. First Valentyn Shabelnyk then DJ Buckley had won a million dollars each before reacting with all the excitement of men collecting the written arrangements for their own funerals.
Blank faces, next to no excitement, fans felt robbed. Then up stepped Roberto Romanello.
“If you win a bounty on Day 2, you go up to a side table and register your bounty,” he tells us. “It comes up on the screen automatically if it’s $1,000 to $2,500. If it is a higher value, it comes up ‘Go to the Chest’, it means you’ve qualified for the gold chest, and you go up on stage and pull it.”
Up on stage, Roberto was accompanied by Jesse Fullen for the moment and was being filmed by a friend. A five was the first digit to follow the dollar sign. Then the sweat, peeling back the slip to show a zero… and another zero before a comma. That was enough suspense, and Roberto ripped apart the paper and revealed that he had won $500,000!
Here’s the video in full as Roberto won half a million dollars in half a minute at the World Series of Poker.
“It was lovely to win it,” says Roberto. “I’d played the first couple of tournaments and bagged half a million with six weeks in front of me. It’s the best feeling ever.”
Some eight hours behind his family back in Wales, Great Britain, the Triple Crown (WSOP, WPT and EPT) winner decided to play it cool, and simply send the video back on the family WhatsApp group without any introduction. His family, sleeping because of the timezone difference, went crazy.
“They couldn’t believe it!” he laughs. “Everybody was chuffed. Back at the poker table…., I don’t know if they meant it but they were very nice. It was the last big bounty in the event, so maybe the high fives didn’t feel too real!”
Chasing Millions
With the bounty banked, Roberto knew that there was still a lot to play for and raced back to his seat.
“It was a million for first place,” he says. “I got into the top 100 and I thought, ‘I could win double the bounty’. It was still a monster tournament to keep playing.”
Playing a bounty event is a unique mix of tightening up at the right time and going on the attack when the conditions dictate it. Roberto’s experience in the format helped him a lot.
“You don’t want to make stupid mistakes; I capitalize on mistakes other players make in those tournaments.” He tells us. “People weren’t betting the right size and trying to win bounties. I’m never afraid, I wear my heart on my sleeve. If I think it’s the right move, I’ll risk my stack to try to win the pot. People were overplaying their hands, and I think that’s where I made a lot of my chips.”
With the field whittled down to a couple of hundred, Roberto’s experience of winning major titles played into his hands.
“Sometimes not forcing the situation is right; you’ve got to let the tournament take its course at certain times – it’s such a long event, especially with the big bounties gone. At that stage, we’re playing for $1 million; you’ve got to knuckle down like you’re playing the WSOP Main Event.”
As he got into the last 100 players, fewer tables stood between Roberto and glory.
“There are dynamics [to the tournament] and you’ve got to adapt to them all and switch gears. Adapting to every situation is a big part of my game,” he says. “Eventually, I got ace-queen with 11 big blinds and ran into pocket kings.”
Roberto came 77th in the event, and when he got home to Wales, had a big decision to make – what to do with the $500,000 windfall. In the end, after talking it through with his family, he made his choice.
Betting Clever
“We give a tip for every single soccer game on the planet, all free of charge.”
Roberto decided to invest it all in his odds comparison and sportsbetting tips website Betclever. He explained to me why he made that call.
“It was a pretty easy decision,” he says. “We’ve had Betclever for around 10 years and it’s been growing, it’s very exciting. When I first started Betclever, I was working out of my mother’s veranda with one of my best friends. We’d meet up every morning and we were grinding it out, similar to starting out in poker. We travelled to all the conferences in Europe, and we were enjoying it.”
Roberto has aways loved the gaming and gambling industry in general – it excites him, driving him on to further success. The investment was a vindication of that love of the industry.
“Long before the bounty win, in our fifth year we moved into an office. We’ve grown from me and a friend to six full-time staff, multiple part time staff and an office. With the growth that we’ve shown and where we’re going since the investment we’re only going to grow even more.”
Betclever started with soccer, specifically odds comparisons. Betclever have now added free tips to providing the latest statistic-driven data for their mushrooming fanbase.
“We give a tip for every single soccer game on the planet, all free of charge,” says Roberto. “Each tip is produced by algorithms with statistics. Since the big bounty win, we’ve added UK and Irish horse racing because it’s huge; that was always a market I wanted to explore and they’re live on the site.”
That’s only the beginning. The $500,000 bounty winnings have been invested to grow the site to include sports such as golf, tennis and boxing. Then, Betclever is taking on America.
“We’ll hit the five or six major sports in the U.S. all based on algorithms. There’s no download needed, no signing up, and its all free. If you’re watching the game, the algorithm will tell you the best bets on offer based on the statistics.”
Plenty of odds comparison sites exist but as we know it, none that have Betclever’s scope, statistical algorithm and free to access tips. Betting companies advertise on the site and bookmakers are keen to use Betclever to drive traffic to their own sites. The interest has been phenomenal.
The Dream Team
Betclever now have a product that gives people a reason to come back every day. As Roberto told us, he’s determined to help the average bettor, not just those who have hours on hand to scout for the edge.
“It’s enjoyable for the recreational punter, where the hit rate will be higher for them. Winning more at betting is hard in general, so giving the casual bettor an edge is great. That’s what is exciting for us. We have a huge amount of information coming in and it is all statistic-based too, which is brilliant.
Knowing each member of the Betclever team so well makes the company itself its own greatest assest in Roberto’s opinion.
“When I started BetClever it was something I wanted to do because I loved the industry. It was fantastic to see my friend work that extra mile and that’s continued as we’ve grown. I’ve given people on board shares, with my brothers working full-time on there. It’s a dream office to go into, my best friends are there, and they’ve got a piece of the company. When the office door shuts, I can still see the work group pinging on my phone. Everybody on board has a reason to push it that extra mile. That’s a big part of how we’ve grown – everyone’s got the same goal.
For Roberto Romanello, there isn’t much left to conquer in poker – he’s achieved so much. The exploration of America for Betclever excites him.
“American bookmakers aren’t like the UK, every state needs a licence. In the UK, that’s not the case, but in the U.S. even being an affiliate you need a licence and we’ve got a bunch of those already. We’ve just got to keep building and driving forward.”
With a lifetime’s experience of adapting to different situations, judging the chances of profiting on the turn of every card, Betclever owner and WSOP bracelet winner Roberto Romanello is prepared for whatever comes his way.
The future is looking very clever indeed.