2021 WSOP: David "Global Grinch" Moses wins Crazy 8s tourney

The 2021 WSOP Event #70: $888 CRAZY EIGHTS No-Limit Hold’em 8-Handed came to a suitably zany end with a man in a Grinch hat winning the best part of a million dollars.

The Crazy Eights event grew out of the WSOP's advertising partnership with 888.com. The name is a combined reference to 888.com, the lucky number eight, and the Crazy 88 — the crew of yakuza samurai from Kill Bill vol. 1 (2003).

The premise is that the event has a buy-in of $888 and a guaranteed first prize of $888,888. The final table payouts are all jiggled so that they end with three 8s as well. Second place is $400,888, third $200,888, etc...

With 5,252 entries this event saw one of the best turnouts this year outside the Main Event. As a result, the prize pool hit $4,150,761. This is about half the 2019 numbers (10,185 entries) for the Crazy Eights tourney.

David "Global Grinch" Moses took down the bracelet, wearing a scowling green hat.

"A few years ago, I was one of like five or six people who started streaming on Global Poker," Moses explained to the press. "I had a Grinch avatar at some point. Because I streamed and ranted, I became known as 'The Global Grinch.' So I bought this hat and as a joke, I wore it to a $400 tournament in Cherokee at the circuit stop. People came up and said 'I love the hat,' [...] I liked the attention and it just became a schtick."

The promised hand

Although Moses was pleased with the jewelry he won, it was not the main draw of the tourney. Unlike most winners, he was completely honest — he was at the Rio for those bricks of bank rags.

"Everybody wants a bracelet. They asked me if I wanted a picture of it when we got heads-up and I said I'll get a picture when I win. Just being honest, the money mattered a lot more," Moses said. "It's a huge amount of money for an eight-hundred dollar tournament, it's life-changing money. I've got two amazing backers."

"The series has been kind of rough," he added." But it's definitely not rough anymore."

There were two players who already had bracelets and would have loved to have one more, but they couldn't get through the Grinch. These two players were Georgios Sotiropoulos (three bracelets) and Moses's heads-up opponent Sejin Park (one bracelet). But the event went to the perfect winner for the event.

Moses chatted his way through the final table. With his Grinch hat and a Grinch bobblehead called Leroy as a card protector, he managed to keep the game fun despite the huge amount of cash at stake.

"I have a name-game thing that I do where I get everybody's name at the table, to make the game more social," Moses said. "Since I'm getting everybody's name and repeating it over and over, one day I just said, 'And this is Leroy' out of nowhere. So he got a name, and now he's got his own little schtick."

Moses and Leroy ultimately beat Park when the latter moved all-in with K❤️8❤️ and Moses called with A♦️8♠.

The dealer was kind enough to dole out an 8♦️ to both of them on the turn. The players had to rely on their kickers though, and Moses's ace took the pot, the tourney, and — whether he wanted it or not — the bracelet.

Park won $400,888 for second place.

2021 WSOP Event #70: $888 CRAZY EIGHTS No-Limit Hold’em 8-Handed complete final table results

Featured image source: WSOP