The Call That Made the Poker World Cringe
Let’s set the stage. $10,000,000 for first, $6,000,000 for second. Heads-up play.
Lauri Saaskilahti has battled his way from having the third-lowest chip stack when the final table began, to nearly being even in chips with Lucas Jumalon. It’s a fantastic result, and he’s gone from an unknown to gaining the poker world’s respect.
But his reputation is about to take a big hit.
The hand starts with 266 million chips for Saaskilahti, and 287 million chips for Jumalon (only a 4BB difference). As we said, neck and neck. It’s the closest Lucas has come to having his chip lead threatened.
The 22-year-old limps in with . Saaskilahti checks his option with .
🔸 Flop:
Lucas bets 4,000,000 into 12,000,000. When Lauri calls, the pot is 20,000,000.
🔸 Turn:
Lucas overbets 40,000,000, and Lauri calls. There is 100,000,000 in the pot.
🔸 River:
Lucas makes the nut flush and bets 180,000,000. Saaskilahti calls with a pair of Jacks and is left with only 34,000,000.
Saaskilahti wins a small pot in the next hand with , but loses a preflop all-in immediately after that, giving the Main Event victory to Lucas Jumalon.
Even after his catastrophic call, Saaskilahti still had a shot, but you can see the exact moment on Polymarket. The Finnish player went from 40% Yes to just 4%.
The Big Issue with This Call: Getting Attached to a Read
It was very painful watching the stream. The world must have been telepathically willing and begging him to fold, but Saaskilahti started talking about calling. And he did.
The flop call was the beginning of it all. With nothing more than Jack high and a backdoor straight draw, Lauri called. One of the only conceivable lines here is floating to steal the pot later, which is reasonable.
But the basis for this float, and the prediction that Jumalon was bluffing, was never reevaluated. At least, that’s how it looks.
Saaskilahti calls the turn overbet with third pair, thinking he’s likely ahead.
When Lucas bombs the river, nearly putting him all-in, Saaskilahti hangs on to his flop read. In his eyes, Lucas is still bluffing.
Saaskilahti was attached to his early read and couldn’t shake it off.
There are questions that even less experienced players can ask here, and each shows why this call is so bad.
❓ #1. Why would Jumalon bluff the river?
If Jumalon is bluffing, and Saaskilahti calls a 2x overbet on the turn, why is he betting 180,000,000 on the river? It looks like a terrible time to bluff, since Saaskilahti is showing he’s likely to continue. A bad bluff at this stage of the Main Event could mean a $4,000,000 lower payday. It’s probably not happening.
❓ #2. What hands is Jumalon bluffing with on the river?
Ignoring complete airball bluffs (which aren’t likely this close to the Main Event end), Jumalon is probably betting the flop with two main types of semi-bluffs. The first obvious one would be a flopped flush draw. The second would be straight draw hands, like or . On the river, both of these semi-bluff beat Saaskilahti’s pair of Jacks.
❓ #3. Is Jumalon ever betting worse than a pair of jacks on the river?
Jumalon might be betting worse than Jacks on the river, for example, pocket Tens with a Ts blocker, but it’s extremely unlikely. We’re talking about a player who’s been chip leader for a long, long time, someone who is close to a $10,000,000 score. Considering all of the draws that got there, he’s probably just trying to showdown with a lot of his pairs, not going for a suicidal bluff.
To make a long story short, this call doesn’t make sense. The chance that Jumalon loses to a pair of Jacks is close to zero.
Lucas Jumalon Explains the Hand
Luckily, it’s the age of Twitter, and Lucas was gracious enough to explain his thought process behind this key hand against Saaskilahti.
So, for you guys to truly understand my reasoning throughout the hand and the reason I 2x potted turn, it comes down to what I think he perceives me as. Because of this, I knew, although in theory not often supposed to take turn sizing, I felt it was good vs him as far as river because I had set this image up of me being capable in every spot and a little blasty in others, combined with some other factors that I would feel uncomfortable sharing, I would’ve snap given up river vs him not vs population. All respect to Lauri. Great player/person.
There you have it. On a brick, he’s not running a bluff, especially after getting a 2x turn bet called.
The Community Responds – Nearly Unanimously
We’d like to say that someone, somewhere found a logical reason for Saaskilahti’s call, but that’s not what we’ve seen.
Doug Polk immediately released a video about the hand. He said that preflop was the only street that Lauri plays that he was a fan of, and called the flop an “easy fold.”
As for the turn call, Doug called it “not even a particularly close one” and even noted that Aces could comfortably be folded against a 2x pot sized bet. On the river, he said “it’s just wild to imagine a scenario where you’re good here,” referring to Lauri’s call.
Jonathan Little published a video a few days later, titled “The BIGGEST Punt in Poker History.” Not even in Main Event history; in Poker History. Ouch.
He noted that even though a flop call may make sense considering Lucas’s wide betting range, progressing through to the river successfully is dicey. As for the river call, Little said, “you basically never should” and pointed out the obvious: plenty of Jumalon’s bluffs beat a pair of Jacks.
Twitter was equally unkind to Saaskilahti.
A poll was taken to judge just how bad this call was, and the results are in.
When the WSOP posted the clip to their Twitter, over 200 comments built up. Most hate the call, and plenty hate the volume from Lucas’s rail.
THE DEFINING MOMENT.
— WSOP – World Series of Poker (@WSOP) August 6, 2026
The entire 2026 World Series of Poker Main Event comes down to this hand. pic.twitter.com/HQLnuTTpPM
Bencb mused over what could have been:
For us online grinders it would have been better if SAASKILAHTI was right.
Not a single bluff would have worked on monoton boards for months 😭😭😭
Lucas, Congrats Champ!
Sick sick river over value bet.
Some high-level exploitative shit.
People also pointed out that another river card could have given Saaskilahti the win. Maybe Lucas would have still bet big, with a different outcome.
Scott Seiver echoed this and later said there was a “10000000%” chance Lucas still bluffs river on a blank (although Lucas denied this):
I will just say about that final hand, if the river isn't another spade, there's probably a different Main Event champion and people call it the best call in Main Event history. Funny how poker can work like that, so let's just all remember that in this moment.
Everyone saying you’d have auto bet a blank completely missing forest from trees.
Fact you overbet on this card with the nuts to get paid as an exploit gives more credence to shutting down if blank comes cause pretty much zero chance he’s folding on blank if he didn’t fold on spade.
The 2026 WSOP is now over, and all that's left is the community dissecting the plays and celebrating the winners.
But online, the tournament series never stop, and you could be celebrating your own major score soon.
Some of the largest poker sites like PokerStars, CoinPoker, GGPoker, and WPT Global are running massive festivals now.
We can lock in huge welcome bonuses for you, and help with any sign up issues, or name the best alternatives.
Get in, take your bonus and tournament seat, and make your next deep run.
