Daniel Negreanu’s $25K Fantasy draft has been running since 2011, with one year off in 2020 because of COVID. You might not know this, but the very first draft was conducted in Howard Lederer’s house. He wasn’t around to do the next one in 2012 (don't ask) and since then it’s been run by Negreanu, held at Aria each year, and is now streamed live on PokerGO.
The first $25K Fantasy was won by Team Jason Somerville and Jason Mercier. They walked it, scoring almost double Team Erick Lindgren in second, thanks to Ben Lamb. 15 teams entered, and Team Daniel Negreanu came 9th.
This was Somerville and Mercier’s winning side and points scored:
- Ben Lamb: 403
- ElkY: 204
- Allen Bari: 61
- Michael Binger: 58
- David ‘Bakes’ Baker: 55
- Dan Kelly: 49
- Bryn Kenney: 41
- David Oppenheim: 0
Jason Mercier won it in 2012 as well and is still the only two-time winner.
Negreanu hasn’t enjoyed much success in his own competition. He finished fourth in 2017 but only eight teams entered, and he followed this by finishing rock bottom in 2018. His best-ever finish was second in 2022, when Maria Ho won it thanks to Koray Aldemir and Marco Johnson.
Follow the draft and win for free!
PokerOrg has got a deeper interest in the $25K Fantasy draft this year — all the players drafted on May 27 will be available for you to pick in our free-to-play Fantasy Freeroll competition, where you can win a $10k main event seat of your choice. The $25K Fantasy draft will also set their salaries, which is important as you only have $200 to spend.
How are these salaries set? By how much they are drafted for in the $25K auction. This is how that works, in the words of Negreanu himself. “The way an auction draft works looks like this: each team has a $200 budget to spend on a total of 8 players. A player is nominated to be chosen and the highest bidder gets him. So for example, let’s say the highest bidder on Phil Ivey spends $105 of his budget. That means he only has $95 left to spend and has to fill 7 more spots! We keep throwing out players until each team has a complete roster of 8.”
Once all of these players have been drafted (there were 19 $25K teams last year, meaning a roster of 152 players), the PokerOrg Fantasy team selection will officially open. You’ll have a $200 budget to pick your team of eight players to play for you this summer, earning points for each WSOP event they cash in.
Who is going to be drafted this year?
We don’t know who’s going to be drafted but looking at the historical data gives us a few clues.
11 players have been drafted in all 13 years of the $25K draft and two of those are the biggest scorers in the game. Can you guess who they are?
Daniel Negreanu and Phil Hellmuth are number one and two on the overall Player Leaderboard with 2103 and 2080 points, respectively. Both are expected to play a full schedule again and both are almost guaranteed to be drafted.
Shaun Deeb is the third-highest point scorer and he’s been drafted 12 times.
Players drafted every year and their total points
- Daniel Negreanu: 2,103
- Phil Hellmuth: 2,080
- John Monnette: 1,511
- David ‘ODB’ Baker: 1,510
- Scott Seiver: 1,375
- Brian Hastings: 1,373
- Marco Johnson: 1,330
- Robert Mizrachi: 1,227
- Matt Glantz: 1,107
- Eli Elezra: 1,048
- Michael Mizrachi: 766
Players drafted 12 times and their total points
- Shaun Deeb: 1,884
- Ben Yu: 1,590
- Paul Volpe: 1518
- Nick Schulman: 1309
- Justin Bonomo: 1275
- Stephen Chidwick: 1184
- Allen Kessler: 316
Top 10 drafted players from 2024
- Jeremy Ausmus: 388
- John Racener: 336
- Scott Seiver: 334
- Calvin Anderson: 283
- John Riordan: 281
- Phil Ivey: 267
- Brian Rast: 259
- Chance Kornuth: 243
- Bryce Yockey: 240
- Chris Hunichen: 237
Get involved
Playing a Fantasy league this summer gives you the ultimate sweat, whether you're watching along at home or playing in Las Vegas.
If the $25K entry fee is out of your bankroll, you’ve got two brilliant options to get involved:
- Play the PokerOrg Fantasy Freeroll. This is completely FREE to enter, and you can win a $10K main event seat of your choice.
- Play the ODB Fantasy. It costs $500 but you can enter as a collective if you and your friends want to play together.
Both fantasy competitions play with the same rules, the same budget and the same players. You can enter the same team in each one.
PokerOrg will be running a Live story throughout the summer, keeping track of all the fantasy players that have been drafted so you can keep a close eye on your team's ups and downs.
Good luck!
