A huge day of action in the World Series of Poker saw Day 2d of the Main Event welcome more late registrations as the attendance rocketed past 10,000 entries. A total of 10,043 completed the field as the World Championship went into the record books, meaning the winner will receive $12.1 million in nine days’ time. Before then, there is a lot of poker to be played, as there was on Saturday, as the Lucky 7’s reached Day 2 and the Bounty PLO event reached the business end of the tournament.

Main Event Makes History

One of the biggest days in the grand history of the World Series of Poker took place on Saturday as Day 2d saw entries reach 10,043 as the record attendance went into the books. After five more two-hour levels, Maurice Hawkins (941,000) bagged the chip lead, with Nicholas Rigby a three-bet behind on 921,500.

There was a big exit early as the 17-time WSOP bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth lost out to Rigby, the Poker Brat’s two-pair beaten by Rigby’s top two pair.

AND DOWN GOES HELLMUTH! @GTO_Diaper lands the knockout blow on @phil_hellmuth in the 3rd Round, eliminating the Poker Brat from the 2023 @WSOP Main Event!!! pic.twitter.com/aYO58aBENz

— PokerGO (@PokerGO) July 9, 2023

Possibly the most painful bust-out of the day happened at the feature table later on. Flopping an aces over nines full house is great…unless you run into quads!

Imagine busting out of the Main Event like this… pic.twitter.com/zgMrRZbvU6

— PokerGO (@PokerGO) July 9, 2023

Reaction after the event was fairly standard.

Was incidentally in Vegas during the Main Event and decided to dust the cobwebs off and get in there.

Was briefly on the TV table before getting dealt AA and losing to 99 on A99 🫠

I don’t miss this life lol

— Kory Kilpatrick (@kory_kilpatrick) July 9, 2023

The WSOP dipped their toes in extremely hot water when they revealed the prizes on offer this year. A record prize of $12.1 million up top but not even a million for reaching the final table? You could say Poker Twitter blew up.

MAIN EVENT PAYOUTS:

Players: 10,043 (New WSOP Main Event Record!)
Prize pool: $93,399,900
Places paid: 1,507

1st: $12,100,000
2nd: $6,500,000
3rd: $4,000,000
4th: $3,000,000
5th: $2,400,000
6th: $1,850,000
7th: $1,425,000
8th: $1,125,000
9th: $900,000

— WSOP – World Series of Poker (@WSOP) July 9, 2023

Across a dramatic day at the felt, plenty of other big names made the Day 3 cut, with Jeff Shapiro (832,000), Jacob Mitch (660,000) and Liran Betito (604,000) completing the top five and stars such as bracelet winner James Obst (593,000) and WPT champion Steve Watts (555,000) both storming into the top 10.

A little further back, legends of the game such as Kathy Liebert (477,000), Chance Kornuth (449,500), Tom Dwan (426,500), and Victor Ramdin (397,500) all made the top 50 with ease.

Along with the survivors from Day 2abc yesterday, an approximate count of 3,573 players will return to play on tomorrow’s Day 3, with everyone remaining now in the same room at last. There is still a very long way to go until the 1,507 money places, with a record prizepool of $93,399,900 meaning the minimum cash is $15,000.

Lucky 7’s Concludes Mammoth Day 1b

There were an incredible 2,380 entries on Day 1b of the $777-entry Lucky 7’s event, with 100 players surviving to Day 2 of the tournament. Chip leader Stepan Vinokurov (3,315,000) leads the way from some legends of the game, with David Peters (2,775,000) his closest challenger and Alex Livingston (2,200,000) making the top five.

Others to make Day 2 of this tournament included Aaron Mermelstein (1,660,000), WPT winner Eric Afriat (1,475,000), Renan Bruschi (1,425,000), Chad Eveslage (1,205,000), and Patrick Leonard (800,000).

Al-Sadoun Leads Bounty PLO Event

Just 15 players will fight for the title on the final day of three in the $1,500-entry Bounty PLO Event #78 in Las Vegas tomorrow. With 140 players kicking off the action at the start of the penultimate day in this event, players such as Daniel ‘Kid Poker’ Negreanu and David ‘ODB’ Baker both slid out of contention as they failed to make the final day.

Chip leader after a packed day of action in this tournament where everyone started with a $500 bounty on their heads, was American player Satar Al-Sadoun (4.8 million) who led the way to the final day ahead of his compatriot Thomas Skaggs (3.53 million). On a day where Ryan Coon (2m), Noah Schwartz (1.1m) and Jeff Madsen (945,000) all made Day 3 too, the action was such that tomorrow’s finale guarantees fireworks… and a bracelet winner.

Mike Matusow disagrees with the fact that players can register of Day 2 of the Main Event.

Just fact you can still reg main event with 6k of 10k people out is total embarrassment to poker just to get an extra 1500 players who would reg anyways if their was no day 2 reg. Congrats @wsop you've finally completed destroying what main event actually means! #pathetic

— Mike Matusow (@themouthmatusow) July 8, 2023

PokerStars broadcasting legend and Global Poker Award winner James Hartigan was running well on Day 2, until he ran into the ultimate cooler.

It’s over.

Jammed 45bbs with KK. Ran into AA. It happens.

Had an absolute blast. Loved the experience.

Thanks for all the support. Apologies to my investors.#WSOPMainEvent

— James Hartigan (@J_Hartigan) July 9, 2023

TV writer and former WPT Player of the Year Matt Salsberg provided the best evidence yet that the simulation might have a glitch.

In the solver era, Maurice and Rigby have over 900k @2k bb playing street poker. Gotta love the main.

— Salty (@msalsberg) July 9, 2023

Finally, Survivor legend Ronnie Bardah highlighted the fact… cough, cough.. that this year’s attendance record may never be broken … cough, choke… for a very specific .. *clears throat* reason.

This will be the largest wsop main event field of all time, cause most of us will all be dead of 2nd hand smoke soon enough

— Ronnie Bardah (@RonnieBardah) July 8, 2023

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