Kansas City Lowball
From LowballWiki
Kansas City Lowball (KCL) is single draw 5-card lowball with 2-7 rankings, played no-limit. In KCL, straights and flushes count against the value of your hand, making them some of the worst possible hands.
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[edit] Where to Play
PokerStars offers no-limit single draw 2-7 at a variety of blind levels from $0.25/0.50 to $10/$20. Usually only the lowest stakes run, although there are often one or two tables. In addition, there are tournaments running regularly, including a $215 on Saturday.
The World Series of Poker usually has a Kansas City Lowball tournament; in 2009 it will switch from a rebuy to a single-entry format.
"Capped NL" deuce-to-seven is mentioned as one of the games played in the "Big Game".
[edit] History
Murph Harrold is widely considered the greatest Kansas City Lowball player of all time.
[edit] Tournament History
At the first World Series of Poker, Kansas City Lowball was one of the five cash games played to determine the world champion. The following year, the main event format was changed to a freeze-out tournament, with Texas Hold 'Em and Kansas City Lowball being the finalists for the freeze-out. Texas Hold 'Em won out and has been the main event of the World Series of Poker ever since.
The World Series of Poker has included a NL2-7 $5,000 rebuy tournament since 2000, and in 2002 hosted a $1500 freezeout which attracted 111 entrants, the largest KCL field ever assembled.
Previous champions in the $5,000 rebuy include:
2000 - Jennifer Harman Traniello - $146,250
2001 - Howard Lederer - $165,870
2002 - Allen Cunningham - $160,200
2003 - O'Neil Longson - $147,680
2004 - Barry Greenstein - $296,200
2005 - David Grey - $365,135
2006 - Daniel Alaei - $430,698
2007 - Erik Seidel - $538,835
The winner of the $1500 freezeout:
2002 - Thor Hansen - $62,600
With three final tables in seven years Allen Cunningham has been the most successful KCL player in World Series History.
[edit] Articles
The original SuperSystem includes a chapter on lowball which mentioned NL2-7 but does not provide a lot of detail.
