Eric Morris's Bluff Media scored a honey of a deal this week with
the announcement that it is to provide a wide range of poker content
and information to the ESPN Poker Club section of this leading sports
site that boasts tens of thousands of unique visitors daily.
The combined collection of content will join with ESPN.com’s
free online poker game to offer poker fans a complete online destination.
"This agreement will allow ESPN.com to build on the hugely
successful launch of ESPN Poker Club this past February and offer
poker fans a full array of top-quality editorial content from two
trusted sources," said John Kosner, senior vice president
and general manager, ESPN New Media.
Added Bluff publisher Eric Morris, “Collaborating with
ESPN.com allows Bluff to extend its great content to a new audience
of recreational poker players, and create still more awareness for
our magazine. We are thrilled to be a significant part of developing
this growing, dynamic poker hub."
Bluff, with 250,000 copies distributed nationwide, will provide columns,
tips, feature and lifestyle stories, as well as power rankings for
top poker professionals, live poker tournament updates and poker pro
information and profiles. Additionally, there will be a live, weekly
Bluff Magazine chat in SportsNation – the site’s live
interactive hub. ESPN.com and Bluff will also collaborate on a poker
fantasy game in which ESPN users will select favorite professional
poker players and earn points based on those players’ performance
in tournaments.
Bluff material will combine with ESPN’s existing content to
bring fans a complete collection of poker-related news, insights and
information from notable poker experts including Steve Rosenbloom,
Phil Gordon, Jennifer
Tilly, Marcel Luske,
Josh Arieh, Annie Duke,
Antonio Esfandiari,
Clonie Gowen, Phil
Laak, Michael Mizrachi and more.
The ESPN Poker Club section of ESPN.com also features a free online
poker game for users over the age of 21. Launched in February, already
hundreds of thousands of poker aficionados of every skill level play
for fun, practice and prizes on ESPN.com. Players can play head-to-head,
or in single- and multi-table tournaments, and choose from six different
games: Texas Hold’Em, 7 Card Stud, 7 Card Hi/Lo, Omaha, Omaha
Hi/Lo and 5 Card Stud.