After all the confusion that followed yesterday’s announcement of Peter Eastgate being in the NBC National Heads Up Championship, we finally get to have an explanation of what’s really happening and why. As it turns out, this wasn’t just one last Hoorah for Peter; he really is coming back, for good.
Surprise, he’s back
The whole industry was very shocked when Peter Eastgate announced his retirement from the game. He was only 24 and he had his whole life ahead of him. With his win from the 2008 WSOP Poker Main Event securing his financial stability, he’s pretty much free to pursue any other career he likes. It was a move that befuddled many, since it seemed like such a huge waste to throw such a great career away. Then again, it also caused a lot of people to admire him for wanting to pursue other ventures, for seeing that there’s more to life than poker. Eastgate even made the grand gesture of selling of his WSOP Main Event bracelet in order to help UNICEF. It seemed like the ultimate symbol of a clean break from the game – but now, well, now Eastgate’s back.
He didn’t even last for a single year outside of the industry. His retirement only spanned eight months; that means he hasn’t even missed a single WSOP. He sure didn’t waste a lot of time in changing his mind about that retirement – turns out ‘24’ is still a volatile age, after all.
PokerStars turns out to be Supportive
Apparently, Eastgate just needed a break from it all to get his game face back. He says that he lost sight of who he really was and what he wanted to do with his life. So, he took a break from poker to find out. What he ‘found out’ was that what he actually wants is to play poker! Eastgate feels that he has ‘figured out’ how to balance his life as a poker pro and his life outside the game. Does anybody else feel like we’re running around in circles? Does he feel even a little bit silly that he called it a ‘retirement’ instead of a ‘hiatus’? He even mentioned that there was a good chance he was going back to being a pro – which is funny because the vibes we were getting last year certainly felt like the opposite. Either way, Eastgate’s lucky that PokerStars is ‘very supportive’. He’s also lucky that he’s such a big shot pro because the site pretty much welcomed him back with open arms.
As such, he’s going to play as a PokerStars pro at the EPT Copenhagen and also at the NBC Heads up Championship. Some people are annoyed that PokerStars would go to such great lengths for an “inactive” pro but was entirely unwilling to keep Raymer under their wing. For the rest of us, however, all we get is a talented pro who’s back in the game, and that’s always something to be thankful for, right?
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