If you have ever wanted to own a piece of poker history, now is your chance. This week, 2008 World Series of Poker (WSOP) Main Event Champion Peter Eastgate put his gold bracelet up for auction on eBay. But before you wonder if he is “busto,” it should be noted that the sale is an eBay Giving Works charitable listing and the proceeds from the auction will benefit the United States Fund for UNICEF. Buy it now.
In a translated press release, the young Dane said, “Of course, I still have great pride in my title, but I will never use the bracelet. I thought they (UNICEF) could better benefit from the bracelet. Hopefully it will do a lot of people good.”
Swiss luxury watchmaker Corum manufactured Eastgate’s bracelet. It is made from 168 grams of 18-karat white gold and set with 291 diamonds. According to pokernyhederne.com, an independent jeweler valued the bracelet at £10,000, or $15,990. As such, Eastgate set the minimum bid on eBay at $16,000. As of the time of writing, there has been one bid placed on the collectable for the minimum and the next valid bid must be $16,100 or higher. The current high bidder appears to be new to eBay, as he or she has no past bid history. The auction will end at 9:04am ET on November 25th.
While the sale of a WSOP Main Event bracelet may come as a shock to most people, it is not completely out of character for the 2008 champ. In July, Eastgate announced that he was taking an indefinite leave from live tournament poker. In a statement, he said in part, “When I started playing poker for a living, it was never my goal to spend the rest of my life as a professional poker player. My goal was to become financially independent. I achieved that by winning the WSOP Main Event in 2008.”
He continued, “In the 20 months following my WSOP win, I feel that I have lost my motivation for playing high level poker along the way and I have decided that now is the time to find out what I want to do with the rest of my life.”
Eastgate had originally planned to compete in the 2010 WSOP Main Event, but changed his mind, opting to attend the World Cup in South Africa instead. He had already made the decision to not participate in any preliminary events, as he did not care about winning another bracelet. He felt the only motivation to win more events was if he had side bets with other pros, but he opted against that because he is really only a Hold’em player, something that would put him at a disadvantage in any sort of bracelet competition.
The sale of a WSOP bracelet from any event is rare, but not unprecedented. In January, T.J. Cloutier pawned his bracelet from the 2005 $5,000 Limit Hold’em event at the Plano Pawn Shop in Texas. The store turned around and auctioned it off on eBay, with online poker room Cake Poker buying it for just over $4,000. Cake Poker eventually returned the hardware to Cloutier.
UNICEF, the organization that will receive the proceeds from Eastgate’s auction, was formed in December 1946 by the United Nations to provide aid to children in war-torn China and Europe. The organization now works to provide basic needs and protect the rights of children in developing countries around the world. CharityNavigator.org rates it as a four-star charity, which is the highest mark the site offers. According to the watchdog site, over 91% of UNICEF’s revenue goes to its aid programs.
