The World Series of Poker is criticized every year for poor organization, terrible dealers, and many other shortcomings. Despite all the flaws, the WSOP Main Event is still the most iconic poker event of the year.

PokerNews was recently reminiscing about Main Day 1C 2019. They titled the article "The Craziest Day in WSOP Main Event History".

This year's tournament did not have such tragic incidents, but there are still enough interesting stories.

The main achievement for the organizers was a record-breaking player turnout. Registration was open for seven levels (the entire first day and the beginning of day 2), and the total number of entries was 10,043 people (the Main Event is still held in a freezeout format).

Before the start of the fifth day, in honor of the record, the organizers will raffle off a season ticket for 30 years of buy-ins to the Main Event.

The pursuit of records led the WSOP to also pay $12.1 million for first place ($100,000 more than Jamie Gold received in 2006), making the difference between the first and second prizes $5.6 million.

Final payouts:

1. $12,100,000
2. $6,500,000
3. $4,000,000
4. $3,000,000
5. $2,400,000
6. $1,850,000
7. $1,425,000
8. $1,125,000
9. $900,000

“They could have made $93 million for first place right away, and let the rest go with zero,” Kevin Martin joked.

Daniel Negreanu in his vlog said that he did not understand the general hate, since the problem would affect three people who would already be in seventh heaven.

Isaac Haxton sees the problem a little more broadly:

If there were ever a tournament to have flatter payouts, it’s gotta be the Main Event. For most of the field a few hundred thousand is life changing money and a couple million is hitting diminishing returns. Really no need to pay 13% to first and 25% to top four.

“Lol, at first I didn’t even realize that in 2006 there were exactly $12 million,” Ike added a little later. “I thought that’s how much their structure gave out.” The fact that they purposely made $12.1 million for the sake of the record and thus destroyed the entire system makes the situation much worse 🙄

Twitter quickly remembered that the WSOP payout problem is not new, and the 1992 championship will have no competition when it comes to absurd payouts.

Another record of the series was 100-year-old Eugene Kalden playing. He received a ticket to one of the Moneymaker Tour tournaments.

However, on the second day, the veteran busted out.

Some players have somewhat unjustified expectations for the Main Event. For them, the bustout becomes a real tragedy. During Day 1A, an Israeli player with the cryptic name Idan The One lost his entire stack in two hands – he was dealt KK twice against the AA of Portuguese player Ruben Correia.

After busting out, a devastated Idan simply sat on the floor.

“He sobbed for three hours against the wall next to my table,” wrote Joseph Cheong. “This gives me mixed feelings. Go to your room if you want privacy. At first, we all sympathized with him, but after three hours we could only admire the resilience of his girlfriend. That's real support.

Phil Hellmuth put on a real show for his entrance as usual. He was assisted by Daniel Cates in a lion costume and 17 girls (each personified one of Phil's bracelets).

One of the heroes of the main tournament has already become Nicholas Rigby, who finishes among the leaders every day. Thanks to his unorthodox game, he is always a welcome guest at the TV table, which is actively used by the producers of PokerGo.

“Watching Rigby play is a pleasure,” even bencb admired. – A real animal.

Rigby has already been admired by regulars in the 2021 main when he showed an inexplicable fondness for hand 32.

Then he took 52nd place. Now he has gone deep again and will start Day 5 with the 12th biggest stack.

Rigby nearly drove Phil Hellmuth crazy this year.

In the end, he knocked him out.

Despite the loud fame of Rigby, there are still rivals who believe him.

On the bubble of the tournament, the organizers again made a strange decision. With 1,507 players in the money, they decided to end the night 10 people before the money. There was hardly a player in the hall who was happy with this decision. The announcement of the stoppage was greeted with friendly booing and whistling. The details of the confusion were told by Andrey Pateychuk in his telegram channel, which he started just before the World Series.

– In general, the dealer sits down at the table and says that the floor announced to them that when 1,540 people remain, they will stop the game and there will be a hard count, and when 1520/1525 remains, hand for hand will be announced.

However, the clock was already 1,539 or less – nothing happened. The dealer asked the floor again, he said that everything is in order, they fix everything in live mode.

Ok, let's sit and play. Exactly 10 minutes remain on the clock, and then suddenly it is announced into the microphone that the last two hands are being played. And they didn't seem to even make a draw for the last hands, but they specifically announced the minimum number so as not to mess with the bubble somehow. It looks like they themselves were not sure about the exact number of people, and instead of playing to the money calmly and letting everyone go to sleep, they deliberately stopped the players ~ 15 before the money and that's it.

The audience was upset and began to “boooo”, but, of course, this did not lead to anything. We finished the last two hand and went home. For me, this is certainly good, given my stack, but the situation 🤡🤡🤡

In general, this is not the only complaint, a lot can be said about the WSOP, let's see if I can also write a post on this topic at the end of the series.

On the fifth day, Andrey moved on with a stack of 2,325,000 (93 blinds). On Day 2, he caught one out on the river to survive.

All in on the turn, the river is the saving .

Andrey recalled that he had a special relationship with this card.

In the 2011 EPT San Remo heads-up against Dimitar Danchev, he shoved the flop with only 6% to win.

Perhaps the decision to move the bubble to the next day was not so bad. At the beginning of the fourth day, they played for almost two hours to the money. On the direct bubble, three players busted out at once.

At one table Jeppe Bisgaard had shoved 30 blinds with vs. .

On the second hand, the board showed . Yuki Wang had and for some reason, she played a check-call flop and turn, bet the river, and called the raise for the whole stack. Her opponent showed four-of-a-kind sixes.

In the third hand, Eric Fields shoved for 18 blinds with AKs against and didn't improve.

All three received $10,000 (splitting two $15,000 mini-cashes) and flipped for a bubble-boy ticket to next year's main. Here Bisgaard was lucky and won with kings.

A Chinese player Xiang Chen Gao came up to the bubble in an original way. He started the day with a stack of three blinds and before the start of play, he handed out a letter to his neighbors at the table, in which he asked everyone to fold when he was in the BB.

He explained the request by saying that the min-cash would help him not only enter an American university but also have an unforgettable honeymoon. Everyone agreed, except for the player from Greece, who cynically shoved from the small blind. Gao folded, leaving himself one blind, but he still cashed in for $15,000.

Cody Daniels, who is fighting a deadly incurable disease, was very emotional after getting into the money.

He was eliminated in 635th place and earned $30,000.

Still in the game is Chris Moneymaker, who this year celebrates the 20th anniversary of his famous victory, where he turned a $39 satellite on PokerStars into $2,500,000 in 2003.

4.6
PokerStars starting out holding online poker games back in 2001 and now the company is worth over 6 billion dollars. They sponsor a slew of tournaments like the European Poker Tour, UK and Ireland Poker Tour, plus a handful of others. Over the years, PokerStars has remained on top of the online poker industry. They’ve expanded to offer fantastic online casino games and sports betting.
Overview of PokerStars Registration

Curiously, at the same time as the Main, Chris played a $1,700 buy-in tournament with a $1 million guarantee at the MGM casino. Of the 1,036 entries on the second day, 130 players made it through. Chris was one of the leaders, but he didn't dare to multi-table as the tournament started at the same time as Day 4 of the WSOP Main Event.

“Busted out of MGM in an uneventful fashion,” Chris said in the middle of the day. – Earned $5,400.

In the Main Event, Chris went into Day 5 with a stack of 435,000 (17 blinds). As the game progressed, he complained that he did better at MGM:

– Raised with AA against KK for a pot of 1.5 million. River K. Got aces two times in the Main, and doubled up opponents both times.

Alexandra Botez had good chances for a long run, but her tournament ended in 1,040th place

– Busted with KK against KJo preflop 😭 (For non-poker friends I had 89% to win preflop and 98% on the flop). I still got an incredible experience and $17,500 😊 There will be a LOT of poker in the near future.

The other day Alexandra started a new channel on youtube, dedicated exclusively to her new hobby.

In the first video, she watches popular poker videos.

Ryan Tosoc (5,120,000) will start as the chip leader on Day 5, the Russian-speaking Israeli, international chess master Gaby Livshits (3,800,000) and John Racener (3,710,000) are in the top ten. Nicholas Rigby is in 12th place (3,655,000), while Chance Kornuth is 19th (3,200,000).

Before dinner yesterday, Chance Kornuth lost a big pot and tilted hard, but not because of the outcome of the hand.

In a 3-bet pot on the board Masato Yokosawa of Japan check-raised the flop, led the turn, and bet big on the river.

While Chance was thinking, the dinner break started, but this did not stop Francisco Benitez, who played at the same table, from calling the clock on Chance.

Do you keep track of time during a big break? Kornuth was surprised. “Still mad that I fucked you in one of the last hands?”

Chance called in the last seconds, and the Japanese player showed .

– You're such a child – Kornuth said to Benitez after the hand. “I'm gonna slowroll the shit out of you."

In the hand that upset Benitez so much, Chance took an interesting line. He 4-bet preflop and cbet 50,000 into a pot of 500,000 on the flop . On the turn Kornuth made a big bet and showed when the opponent folded.

Benitez busted out in 594th place ($32,500). Whether Kornuth had anything to do with it is unknown.

In the top 50 is Michael Dweck (2,670,000), who finished 3rd in the last main event. Also in the game still is Jason Koon (530,000), who in a recent interview deceived everyone and said that he would definitely miss the main tournament.

Player Interview
Jason Koon: The Most Important Thing is to Not Lose Drive
Read

On the PokerNews podcast, the successful high roller named the world's strongest players, said he was optimistic about the future of online poker, and recalled a recent skirmish with Dan Smith.

Read