Poker Superstars Looking to End Bracelet Droughts on Final Day of $10,000 Dealer's Choice Championship
Crowds were gathered around the poker tables of the Horseshoe and Paris Las Vegas until the late hours of the night on Day 2 of Event #13: $10,000 Dealer's Choice Championship (6-handed) at the 2024 World Series of Poker. The fan-favorite poker icons Daniel Negreanu and Phil Ivey were battling it out with some of poker's other most accomplished players, eventually being seated next to each other, much to the delight of the rail.
Today, the crowd will be no less as both Negreanu and Ivey made it through to the third and final day of the event. They are among the 11 players returning to the Horseshoe Event Center to crown a new Dealer's Choice champion. However, they have their work cut out for them as they find themselves near the bottom of the leaderboard when play resumes at 2 p.m.
Ivey bagged a below-average stack of 563,000 chips, while Negreanu will start Day 3 with less than half an average stack, 312,000 chips. However, with 14 and eight big bets respectively, they still have plenty of room to maneuver through the amazing structure of the tournament.
Should Ivey capture the title, he will win his first bracelet in ten years and break the infamous four-way ten-bracelet tie for second place on the all-time bracelet rankings. Negreanu, meanwhile, has been on the hunt for his seventh piece of WSOP gold since 2013 and has not won a bracelet in Las Vegas in 16 years.
The competition for the two hall-of-famers will be fierce, however, as none other than Robert Mizrachi secured the chip lead on Day 2. The four-time bracelet winner will return to the tables with 1,511,000 chips, looking to capture his first WSOP win in eight years.
Start of Day 3 Chip Counts
| Rank | Player | Country | Chip Count | Big Bets |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Robert Mizrachi | United States | 1,511,000 | 38 |
| 2 | George Alexander | United States | 1,090,000 | 27 |
| 3 | Ryutaro Suzuki | Japan | 1,053,000 | 26 |
| 4 | Venkata "Sandy" Tayi | United States | 932,000 | 23 |
| 5 | David Bach | United States | 909,000 | 23 |
| 6 | Michael Martinelli | United States | 807,000 | 20 |
| 7 | Ben Lamb | United States | 683,000 | 17 |
| 8 | Phil Ivey | United States | 563,000 | 14 |
| 9 | Richard Bai | United States | 336,000 | 8 |
| 10 | Daniel Negreanu | Canada | 312,000 | 8 |
| 11 | Max Kruse | Germany | 268,000 | 7 |
Also surviving the 141-strong field thus far are 2019 nine-game bracelet winner Ryutaro Suzuki, mixed game specialist David Bach, who is looking to add a fourth piece of WSOP hardware to his collection after last winning a bracelet seven years ago, Omaha expert and two-time bracelet winner Ben Lamb, and German retired soccer star Max Kruse, who captured his first bracelet in 2022.
Meanwhile, Venkata Tayi, George Alexander, Michael Martinelli, and Richard Bai may be lesser known to the general audience, but they each have mixed game final table experiences under their belt and will be looking to prove that they belong among the elite players in the world.
All 11 returning players have secured a minimum payout of $27,041, but their eyes will be locked on the enticing golden bracelet and the $333,045 lion's share of the $1,311,300 prize pool that comes along with it.
Remaining Payouts
| Place | Prize |
|---|---|
| 1 | $333,045 |
| 2 | $215,848 |
| 3 | $144,431 |
| 4 | $99,885 |
| 5 | $71,476 |
| 6 | $52,985 |
| 7 | $40,743 |
| 8-9 | $32,543 |
| 10-11 | $27,041 |
When the action picks back up at 2 p.m. local time, the tournament will restart in Level 18, which knows limits of 20,000/40,000 for the fixed-limit games and blinds of 5,000/10,000 for the big bet games. All levels will be 90 minutes in duration and the plan is to play down to a winner today.
Stay tuned to PokerNews to keep up with how Ivey and Negreanu fare and who of poker's elite will crown himself as the 2024 Dealer's Choice champion, adding another WSOP bracelet, or perhaps a first one, to their trophy collection.