The 2020 WSOP Online Bracelet Series on GGPoker is nearing its close. But there are still a handful of events remaining and some bracelets to be handed out. On Thursday, two more players — Jeffrey Dobrin and Nicolo Molinelli — became World Series of Poker champions.
Dobrin was the first to ship a bracelet, having won the 80th event of the series, a $600 Six-Handed No-Limit Hold'em tournament. He earned $189,666 for his performance, along with his first WSOP bracelet. The game chosen in this event was voted on by a group of pros. Dobrin certainly enjoyed the selection.
He earned that victory by playing solid poker, but also for grinding it out throughout the series. The American poker pro now has 15 cashes during the WSOP Online Bracelet Series. All that hard work and dedication ended up paying off for him.
Dobrin won the bracelet after defeating Idris Ambraisse, a Frenchman, heads-up. The runner-up took home $144,998.
Never easy winning a WSOP bracelet
Dobrin defeated a difficult final table that included Chris "Jesus" Ferguson, a six-time WSOP bracelet winner and 2017 WSOP Player of the Year. Ferguson reached the final table with an above average chip stack. But he was the first to bust, going out in 9th place for $14,404. He now has 153 cashes in bracelet events, second only to Phil Hellmuth.
Despite being one of the greatest tournament pros ever, and the 2000 WSOP Main Event champion, Ferguson is unlikely to ever reach the Poker Hall of Fame. That's due to his connection to the Black Friday scandal at Full Tilt Poker in 2011. He received an eight-figure payout as a bonus from FTP days before the US Department of Justice shut down the site. It took more than three years before regular players were paid, but he still accepted and kept the bonus money.
Marc McDonnell, who hails from Ireland, also reached the final table. He has 32 WSOP cashes and finished 5th in the People's Choice tournament, good for $53,897.
In Event #81, $1,050 Six-Handed No-Limit Hold'em Bounty, Italy's Nicolo Molinelli took down the bracelet, and the $144,419 for 1st place. He also received an additional $99,216 worth of bounties he collected throughout the tournament.
Molinelli didn't just earn his largest poker score ever — he picked up his first ever big score. In fact, his previous live tournament cashes were only $3,164, according to the Hendon Mob database.
Kyle Menard from Canada took 2nd place, which paid $104,644. Unlike Molinelli, Menard didn't rack up a ton of bounties along the way. He earned just an additional $23,773 in bounties.
The $1,050 buy-in People's Choice tournament that was chosen via a wheel spin, attracted 1,925 entries. Daniel Negreanu was among those who gave it a shot, and he earned some money, but fell short of reaching his first final table of the summer. "Kid Poker" is still chasing his first bracelet since 2013, something he needs to do before the series concludes or he won't win his $1 million side bet.
