{"id":195065,"date":"2026-03-17T15:53:39","date_gmt":"2026-03-17T15:53:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/195065\/"},"modified":"2026-03-17T15:53:39","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T15:53:39","slug":"tampa-poker-community-mourns-passing-of-local-legend-tom-mcdonald","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/195065\/","title":{"rendered":"Tampa Poker Community Mourns Passing of Local Legend Tom McDonald"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Zw.webp.webp\" alt=\"Tom McDonald\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Players at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shrtpoker.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">2026 Tampa Poker Classic<\/a> learned sad news over the weekend as reporter Al \u201cALCANTHANG\u201d Rash shared that Tom McDonald, a long-time regular at the Seminole Hard Rock Tampa, passed away on March 13.<\/p>\n<p>McDonald had $502,472 in lifetime tournament earnings dating back to 2012, <a href=\"https:\/\/pokerdb.thehendonmob.com\/player.php?a=r&amp;n=240576&amp;sort=date&amp;dir=desc\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">according to The Hendon Mob<\/a>. That included a career-best $97,475 for finishing third in the 2022 Tampa Poker Classic $2,500 Championship Event. That came a week after he finished second in Event #2: $400 NLH for $47,072.<\/p>\n<p>That same year, he made a deep run in the 2022 World Series of Poker (WSOP) $1,000 Super Seniors, finishing 14th out of a field of 2,669 runners for $15,300. <\/p>\n<p>        <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/1773762818_492_Zw.webp.webp\" alt=\"Tom Mcdonald\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><\/p>\n<p>    Tom McDonald competing at the World Series of Poker!<\/p>\n<p>More recently, he won $66,930 for finishing second to Paul Snead in the 2024 Tampa Poker Classic $1,700 Championship. As <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shrtpoker.com\/championship-day-1c-remembering-tom\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Rash pointed out<\/a>, when McDonald finished third for his career-high score, Snead also won that tournament!<\/p>\n<p>According to Rash, McDonald would often enter the tournament and ask, \u201cHave you seen Paul Snead? I can\u2019t beat him.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Over the past year, McDonald has cashed in tournaments in Tampa, Biloxi, Maryland, Las Vegas, and Seminole Hard Rock Hollywood.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe lost one of the nicest guys in the game,\u201d Rash wrote. \u201cRest in peace to a truly kind gentleman and friend to so many in the Poker Room. Our condolences to his friends and family. He will be missed.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>        <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/1773762818_76_Zw.webp.webp\" alt=\"Tom McDonald\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><\/p>\n<p>    Tom McDonald<\/p>\n<p>*Image courtesy of Seminole Hard Rock Tampa.<\/p>\n<p>                <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/ZjllODZhY2MucG5n.webp.webp\"  alt=\"Chad Holloway\" width=\"40\" height=\"40\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><\/p>\n<p>                        <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pokernews.com\/editors\/chad-holloway\/\" rel=\"author nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Chad Holloway<\/a><\/p>\n<p>                    PR &amp; Media Manager<\/p>\n<p class=\"ds-author__bio\">PR &amp; Media Manager for PokerNews, host of both the PokerNews Podcast &amp; MPST Podcast Presented By PokerNews, and 2013 WSOP Bracelet Winner.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Players at the 2026 Tampa Poker Classic learned sad news over the weekend as reporter Al \u201cALCANTHANG\u201d Rash&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":195066,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[135,137,136],"class_list":["post-195065","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/195065","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=195065"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/195065\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/195066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=195065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=195065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=195065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}