WSOP Event #36: Dealers Choice 6-Handed Championship

Event #36 of the 2021 WSOP is the $10,000 Dealers Choice 6-Handed Championship tournament. This three-day event started on October 18, and allowed each player at the table to choose the game played for that orbit from a pre-approved list of 20 poker variants. Players faced 60-minute blind levels on Day 1 and then 90-minute blind levels on Day 2 and Day 3.

Phil Hellmuth landed his record-breaking 16th WSOP bracelet in this one, cementing his status as the WSOP GOAT. Astoundingly, only three nights later, he was back in position to make history again. That's when he sat heads up against Adam Friedman in the 2021 WSOP Event #36 $10,000 Dealer’s Choice event. He didn't score bracelet number 17 though, since Friedman won an exciting heads-up match, sealing his third straight win in the Dealer’s Choice Championship.

You'd be forgiven for thinking Hellmuth’s wow-getting 16 bracelet wins are mostly due to amazing luck heads up. No other poker player in history has ever earned more than 10 career bracelets. Three pros are tied with that many: Johnny Chan, Doyle Brunson, and Phil Ivey. It's easy to conclude that Hellmuth’s bracelet powers come from a shockingly high win-rate in  heads-up play during bracelet events. But the data don't support that.

The $10,000 Dealers Choice event in 2019 had 122 entries and a total prize pool of $1,146,800. Adam Friedman won $312,417 and his third career WSOP gold bracelet by winning this tournament for the second straight year.

Read about the 2021 WSOP Event #36 winner here.