Chris Moneymaker and Lucas Jumalon obviously have a few things in common.
Both of them reached the final table of the World Series of Poker Main Event with a huge chip lead. Both did it in their 20s and became millionaires (every player at this year’s final table will win at least $1M), and neither had experienced major poker success before their breakthrough WSOP.
But there are differences, too. Moneymaker’s WSOP moment came 23 years ago, before 22-year-old Lucas Jumalon was born. The 2003 champ knows what the future holds for a poker world champion; Jumalon can only imagine (and still has plenty of work to do to get there).
And while Jumalon knows all about Moneymaker and his famous story, Chris hadn’t heard of Jumalon — he says he never watches poker — until PokerOrg brought the two players together.
But after a one-to-one chat in which Moneymaker offers Jumalon some hard-won advice, that’s all changed.
Watch their conversation above, and read on for some of Moneymaker’s words of wisdom to the young pretender ahead of next week’s final table.
Moneymaker touches on various aspects of life as a world champion in his exclusive chat with Jumalon, including...
Separate friendship from money
“The most important thing that you'll learn is the word ‘no’, because you're going to have everybody in the world asking you for money. It's tough, especially with friends, to tell them no. But if you don't learn how to, you're going to be broke.
“You have poker friends and those poker friends are going to want to live the same life that you live, and they can't.
“And if you try to support them, then you're going to be one of the statistics that's broke. You’ve just got to separate things: they can still be your friends, but it can't be about money.”
Protect yourself in future games
“You're going to get a ton of private game invites and invitations to different home games. There'll be a lot of different, random opportunities. And I would say in the very beginning, put your money back and just play the normal games that you've been playing.
“Don't change your life. Get used to it. Most of the invites you get, especially to private home games, there's going to be bad actors in those games a lot of times, and you need to protect yourself.
“There's a lot of cheating that goes on in a lot of these private games now. So, just be aware of that kind of stuff.”
Don’t spend it all
“You're 22 years old. Everybody thought it was crazy, but [after I won the Main Event] I went back to work. I was back at work Monday morning.
“You’ve got your whole life in front of you and $10 million is a lot of money, but I can tell you from experience, $10 million can go pretty fast.
“Be smart, buy a reasonable house and put [your money] to work. Don't go play Tritons.”
Recognize your value
“Everything that I ever play, I'm sponsored to play. I don't ever put my own money up into anything really at all. And I did that for 20 years.
“I protected my investment, and if you win, you'll have those opportunities. People will put you into things. Don't show up for free. Value your time. If someone wants you to come play in their event, well, are you going to pay for my airfare, my travel, my appearance fee?
“You're going to bring people to these venues, so if you do win, make sure that you get paid when you show up.”
The 2026 WSOP Main Event final table runs Monday-Wednesday next week.
Stick with PokerOrg for all the biggest hands and moments from poker’s biggest showcase and beyond.
