Which Country Has the Best Professional Gamblers – Canada or the USA?
It is not uncommon for the United States of America and Canada to be pitted against one another. And that is something that is true when it comes to the gambling world, too. So, it would be quite curious to find out which nation actually has the best professional gamblers.
Of course, gambling has had a much harder time establishing itself in the United States. In fact, still many forms of gambling are illegal in certain states or have not taken hold in the way that they were expected to elsewhere. Sports betting has started gaining some traction across the country, but other options like online casinos remain restricted. That is not the case with Canada in many areas. There are various online casinos that accept Canadian players, for example.
Over the past three years though, the gambling scene has changed in the U.S., thanks to the Supreme Court overturning the PASPA law and the Wire Act remaining only attributable to sports betting. This has helped the online gambling scene to swell in more recent times as well. This has also led to professional gamblers from both countries upping their game. As a result, there now exists a group of very elite professionals across the USA and Canada. So, who are these players?
Let's Have a Look at the Names
Here are the names of the competitors for this title.
Bill Benter
Born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Bill Benter is known as both an Americana and Hong Kong professional gambler. He has quite the focus on horse racing betting, and this also led him to develop one of the most successful computer software programs for analysing that market. Through this, he has earned almost $1 billion.
However, prior to his success in the horse racing industry, Benter was quite the dab-hand at blackjack. He became so good with his ‘beat the dealer’ strategies, that he ended up being banned from more than one casino in The Keystone State. From there, he relocated to Hong Kong and its gambling scene, which is where he gained an interest in horse racing events.
As a result of his success with such, Benter now makes around $100 million every year. Even though this is the case, he is also known for his philanthropy, contributing to many charities and political groups over the years.
Evelyn Ng
Born in 1975 in Toronto, Ontario, Evelyn Ng is known as a highly successful poker player. She started out with her gaming career by playing pool for money at the age of 14. Only three years later, she had expanded her repertoire into dealing both blackjack and poker games in Toronto. It was also during this time that she dated fellow Canadian poker player Daniel Negreanu, who helped her to develop her style of play.
She achieved fame on the World Poker Tour circuit back in 2003 when she placed second to Clonie Gowen as part of the Ladies’ Night I tournament. In that event, she placed ahead of huge professionals such as Annie Duke and Kathy Liebert. By 2010, her live tournament winnings had reached around $375,000. Since her second-place finish in the 2003 WPT, Ng has gone on to have a flourishing poker career, whilst also scoring sponsorship deals with PokerStars and Bodog. She is known as one of the best female poker players in Canada.
Michael McDonald
Michael McDonald has achieved so much in his time in the gambling scene, and he’s only 31. He is the youngest player to have ever won an event on the European Poker Tour and the youngest to win an event on the Epic Poker League. The Waterloo, Ontario native has managed to acquire live tournament winnings exceeding $13,200,000 as of March 2018, and he’s still going strong. McDonald plays in a number of live tournaments that take place across Canada, with 9 money finishes in the World Series of Poker and 3 in the World Poker Tour so far.
It just goes to show that regardless of where these professional gamblers come from, the competition level is high. Which country has the best professionals? Well, it stands to reason that that is a matter of opinion. His name was also pretty popular in the casinos in Malaysia.