As the field whittled down over eight fierce days of poker play from 6,650 unique entrants to the final table of nine, there were some big names eliminated in that last few tables, the biggest name amongst which must have been Chance Kornuth, an awesome ambassador for the game who went out in 16th.
Now let’s look over that final table line-up, and find out a little about each player. Guaranteed at least a million USD each, they are set to battle it out restarting tomorrow for a chance at the first place prize of $8 million USD.
The Final Nine –
Jareth East
Representing the UK, East is a cryptocurrency enthusiast and poker player whose biggest live score prior to this final table was $34k, but he did take down the Partypoker Online WPT Deepstacks for a sweet $557k back in May 2020. East comes in as the shortstack to this FT playing 8.3 million in chips, or just over 10bbs.
Chase Bianchi
Hailing from Massachusetts, Bianchi has form at the WSOP, having snagged a bracelet and $316k back in 2016 in the $1k. He is married with two foster kids and a devout church-goer. He comes into this final table with 12.1 million in chips, or 15bbs.
Hye Park
Park starts this FT with a stack of 13.5 million in chips, or 22bbs. Born in South Korea, he now lives in New Jersey, and he and his wife are expecting a baby in the New Year. Park began playing poker on a US Navy vessel as part of his career as a Marine.
Ozgur Secilmis
Currently sitting in sixth in chips at 24.5 million, Secilmis will start play with just over 30bbs. Secilmis is an excitable, fun and demonstrative player from Istanbul, Turkey. One very memorable hand for Secilmis was when he beat Liu in a huge pot for quads over quads on day 3.
Jack Oliver
Another UK player and the youngest final tablist in this year’s WSOP Main Event at 26 years old, Oliver is on the run of his life (well, aren’t they all though?) after a previous best live score of just $27k. Sitting in fifth on 30.4 million chips, or 38bbs.
Joshua Remitio
Sitting in fourth place right now with a healthy stack of 40 million chips, or 50bbs, is Remitio, a player from California currently living in Vegas. Remitio is a relative newcomer to live poker, with less than $2,000 in recorded live cashes prior to being guaranteed at least a million in this event!
Alejandro Lococo
Lococo is third in chips at this WSOP ME FT with 46.8 million chips in his stack, which is 58bbs. He is a successful rapper from Brazil known as Papo MC, and he claims to have been playing poker since the tender age of 14, and his best previous live score is $36k for 5th in the PartyPoker Live Millions $1k event in Rio 2019.
George Holmes
Second in chips right now is George Holmes, on a whopping 83.7 million in chips, coming in at just over 104bbs. Holmes is a 49-year old from New Jersey currently living in Georgia, and working in payment processing. He has just one cash on record at live poker, but it’s a good one, $50k for a deep run in 2019’s WSOP Main!
Koray Aldemir
We come at last to the man currently leading the way in this legendary event, Aldemir, sitting on a stack of 140 million chips, or 175bbs. This equates to over a third of the total chips in play. Aldemir is a German living in Austria. Entering this final table with over $12 million in career earnings, he’s not only the favourite to win this thing based on his stack size, but also based on serious prior form.
It will be a fascinating final table with unbeatable commentary, and we can’t wait to see which player will prevail to ship this most prestigious of tournaments this year!
Image courtesy of PokerGO.com
