He’s finished in 9th place, 8th, 7th and as the runner-up in WSOP bracelet events this year already, and Daniel Negreanu is back at the business end of yet another one.
Another Day 2, another end-of-play surge for the top of Canada’s all-time money list, who bagged up just behind leader Aaron Kupin and will make his latest run at an eighth bracelet on Tuesday, this time in the ever-changing dance that is the $2,500 Mixed Big Bet.
Gliding through the 458-strong field with him are the likes of Jeff Madsen, Christopher Vitch, Steve Billirakis and Marco Johnson. Johnson has only a small blind’s worth of chips separating his stack from Negreanu’s, but the top three are comfortably detached from the rest of the pack in the counts. Top prize of $206,982 awaits the winner, but seeing as ‘Kid Poker’ has already racked up around a million dollars in prize money this summer, it’s the elusive 2025 hardware that will be the goal.
Among those eliminated deep on Day 2 were James Obst, Ali Eslami, Brian Rast, Barry Greenstein, Chad Eveslage and Shaun Deeb. The latter wasted little time entering the payouts/registration revolving door for the $10K stud hi-lo Championship – and built another towering stack (see below).
Deeb runs: Mixed Big Bet cash for the main course, $10K stud hi-lo chips for dessert
Shaun Deeb has finished Day 1 of the $10K Seven Card Stud Hi-Lo 8 or Better Championship lying in second place behind Walter Chambers, after performing a swift about turn from mixed games to focus on a single split-pot one.
This display of chip-amassing stamina leaves him in good shape for Day 2, which sees 78 players return to join an undoubtedly sizeable number of last-minute entrants. Last year saw 167 entries into this elite Championship; with 160 already in the mix, the prize pool is set to sail past $1.5 million.
Between Deeb and a seventh bracelet lies some extremely tough opposition. Large stacks have been carried through by Player of the Year challenger Scott Bohlman (top of the rankings Benny Glaser’s also through, with a more modest bag), Anthony Zinno, Brian Hastings and Felipe Ramos. Esther Taylor is back in action, too, after finishing third in the Poker Players Championship for $595,136. The late registration queue on Day 2 is unlikely to be filled with players who have fallen into this event by accident; it’s going to be one to rail.
$10K PLO Championship final features Foxen
Alex Foxen has scored one for the live multi-tablers with his performance in the 874-entry $10K PLO Championship, finishing Day 3 short-stacked but still very much in the running (with seven players remaining) after juggling both this event and the Wynn’s $10,000 Summer Championship at the same time.
Until teleportation becomes widespread, this sort of behaviour is unlikely to become commonplace; blinding out of one elite tournament to focus on another can’t be a comfortable situation.
Foxen’s opposition for the final day, in chip count order: Quan Zhou, Sean Rafael, two-time bracelet winner Michael Wang, Javier Francort, Michael Zulker and Melad Marji. One of these players will take home the bracelet and $1,394,579 top prize; all are guaranteed at least $182,983.
In mega-field tournament news:
Ian Pelz was the last man standing out of 24,629 entrants in the $300 Gladiators of Poker, making him the winner of the second-largest live poker tournament ever held. His $420,680 top prize would look like an extra-zero typo to most players at the $300 buy-in level, but this is the sort of return on investment an absolute monster of an event like this one guarantees its winner. Read more from a delighted Pelz, who simply ‘hopped in’ and gave it his best shot, here.
Meanwhile, the $1,000 Mini Main Event’s entries broke five figures, bringing a total of 10,794 players to the felt. This is double last year’s 5,257, but bear in mind that in 2024 this event was a freezeout, like its $10K big brother, and had only one starting day. Players had the option to enter once per starting flight this time round.
Day 2 is scheduled to play down to five players, by which time a good chunk of the $9,887,304 prize pool will have been awarded. It would be interesting to know the stats on how many Mini Main deep runners decide to flick it in for the Maxi Main after such a promising warm-up.
