The $10,000 Short Deck Champion Will Be Crowned Today
The next winner of a prestigious gold bracelet will be decided with a 36-card deck. Event #60: $10,000 Short Deck No-Limit Hold'em has reached its final day here at the World Series of Poker at Bally's and Paris Las Vegas; five players are left to battle for the $277,212 that sits waiting for first place.
Shota Nakanishi sits in prime position as the chip leader with 2,562,000 chips, nearly double the chips of his nearest contender. A short deck specialist with online experience in the game, Nakanishi demonstrated his prowess many times over the last couple of days. As one of two remaining players without a bracelet, he will look to close out the event today and take home his first piece of signature WSOP hardware. There are a few people who want to write a different story.
Final Day Seat Assignments
| Table | Seat | Player | Country | Chip Count | Antes |
| Bally's 1 | 1 | Sean Winter | United States | 553,000 | 55 |
| Bally's 1 | 2 | Stephen Chidwick | United Kingdom | 1,423,000 | 142 |
| Bally's 1 | 3 | Brian Rast | United States | 855,000 | 85 |
| Bally's 1 | 4 | Ben Lamb | United States | 1,207,000 | 120 |
| Bally's 1 | 5 | Shota Nakanishi | Japan | 2,562,000 | 256 |
Stephen Chidwick (1,423,000) sits in second place. Chidwick ended play yesterday with a final big hand of the night when he flopped top two pair against the top pair of Scott Smile That hand finalized the final five and moved Chidwick into second place on the leaderboard. Chidwick will look to ride that momentum today.
Ben Lamb, Brian Rast, and Sean Winter round out the table. Lamb built a large stack early by making all the right moves, navigating tricky spots, and demonstrating a strong understanding of the game. Rast made a big, and correct, preflop call on Day 2 to eliminate two players and build a final table stack of his own. Winter, the other maiden-bracelet seeker and the short stack of the table, still has 55 antes to work with to take chips from those above him. Play will be deep and will likely feature very interesting play between these poker giants.
Final Table Results and Remaining Payouts
| Place | Winner | Country | Prize (in USD) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1st | $277,212 | ||
| 2nd | $171,331 | ||
| 3rd | $121,718 | ||
| 4th | $88,168 | ||
| 5th | $65,143 | ||
| 6th | Scott Smile | United States | $49,113 |
| 7th | Robert Wilke | Germany | $37,800 |
Play will begin at 1 p.m. local time inside of Bally's Event Center. The 60-minute levels will continue with 15-minute breaks after every two levels. Antes will still be paid by every player each hand with the button players paying two antes. Players will return to level 18 and antes of 10,000.
PokerNews will be covering all the way to the new short deck champion, so follow along right here for the updates.