Prendergast Joins Lazrus and Leng as Day 14 WSOP Winners
It was a regular Wednesday for many people but not for poker players at the World Series of Poker.
Three players won gold bracelets – one of them grabbed his first career bracelet, another his second, and one earned his third. Five women made the final day of the Ladies Championship, which will play out live on PokerGO later today. An impressive group of players bagged chips for the final day of the $5K NLHE 6-Handed tournament today, while another did so in the $1K Freezeout. And nearly 100 HORSE players bagged and tagged in the hopes of making the money today.
During the 2021 WSOP, there is no regular Wednesday…or Thursday. It’s day after day of A-game poker and pursuing dreams.
Let’s see what happened on Day 14 of this series. And scroll down to see an important message from Phil Galfond.
Event 17: $1,500 NLHE Millionaire Maker
Five players returned for one more day of the Millionaire Maker, all seeking that $1M first-place prize. Michael Gathy entered his second final table of this year in search of his fifth bracelet and even more of a place in poker history. He came close but didn’t achieve that goal…yet. Ultimately, it was Daniel Lazrus, who won a WSOP Online event earlier this year, taking this one down for the biggest score of his career and a second piece of gold. In comments to PokerNews, he said:
“This one feels much more special. It feels more legitimized than online did, just because it was a different atmosphere. This makes me happy with the decision I’m making of putting a lot of time into poker. The first was an achievement; this feels like THE achievement. I didn’t realize it yet, but this is a much greater feeling. I can’t even begin to describe it.”
| Event 17: Day 5 of 5 | $1,500 buy-in | NLHE Millionaire Maker (1RE/flight) |
| Total entries: | 5,326 | |
| Total prize pool: | $6,990,060 | |
| Players paid: | 799 | |
| Minimum payout: | $2,400 | |
| Final table results: | 1st place: | Daniel Lazrus (USA) $1,000,000 |
| 2nd place: | Darryl Ronconi (USA) $500,125 | |
| 3rd place: | Jeffrey Gencarelli (USA) $377,125 | |
| 4th place: | Michael Gathy (Belgium) $288,715 | |
| 5th place: | Ignacio Moron (Spain) $222,430 | |
| 6th place: | Kevin Palmer (USA) $172,455 | |
| 7th place: | Todd Saffron (USA) $124,570 | |
| 8th place: | Adam Sherman (USA) $105,690 | |
| 9th place: | Sertac Turker (Turkey) $83,545 |
Event 22: $1K/$10K NLHE Ladies Championship
What was supposed to be the final day of the Ladies Championship started with 17 players but stopped at five. This is for PokerGO to livestream the end of the tournament today. The eliminated players on Day 3 included Amanda Baker in 15th place for $4,670, Thi Nguyen in tenth place for $7,023, Cherish Andrews in eighth place for $11,341, and Marle Cordeiro in seventh place for $14,791. The sixth-place exit of Qing Lu for $19,619 ended play for the day.
| Event 22: Day 3 of 4 | $1K buy-in | NLHE Ladies Championship (1RE) |
| Total entries: | 644 | |
| Registration still open? | no | |
| Total prize pool: | $582,180 | |
| Players paid: | 97 | |
| Minimum payout: | $1,633 | |
| Winner payout: | $115,694 | |
| Chip leader: | Mikiyo Aoki | Mikiyo Aoki = 4.88M chips |
| Players remaining: | 5 | Debora Brooke = 4.28M chips |
| Restart: | 4pm Thursday | Diane Cooley = 1.265M chips |
| JJ Liu = 1.25M chips | ||
| Lara Eisenberg = 1.2M chips |
Event 23: $1,500 Eight-Game Mix 6-Handed
Ryan Leng had two bracelets heading into the final day of this event, but Connor Drinan just won his second bracelet last week and had momentum. Two other players of the five at the final table also had won WSOP gold before, too. In the end, Leng and Drinan battled for nearly two hours before Leng pulled out the win. He had a lot to say to PokerNews afterward:
“I’ve been studying mixed games lately. I definitely think the final table, the final two tables, I was certainly nowhere near the best player left in the field. I ran really hot. … My rail is amazing. They all have success in their own right. I love seeing them have success. We love seeing each other have success. We push each other. We study together. … My biggest long-term goal is to win Player of the Year at the World Series. I’ve got a lot of work to do the rest of the series to make that happen. But I’m going to try to make that happen.”
| Event 23: Day 3 of 3 | $1,500 buy-in | Eight-Game Mix 6-Handed (1RE) |
| Total entries: | 484 | |
| Total prize pool: | $646,140 | |
| Players paid: | 73 | |
| Minimum payout: | $2,415 | |
| Final table results: | 1st place: | Ryan Leng (USA) $137,969 |
| 2nd place: | Connor Drinan (USA) $85,273 | |
| 3rd place: | Brett Shaffer (USA) $56,839 | |
| 4th place: | Daniel Zack (USA) $38,752 | |
| 5th place: | Schuyler Thornton (USA) $27,038 | |
| 6th place: | Ryan Hughes (USA) $19,317 |
Ryan Leng now has three World Series of Poker bracelets after winning the Event #23: $1,500 Eight-Game Mix at the 2021 @WSOP. https://t.co/ylmeMYzdlt
— PokerNews (@PokerNews) October 14, 2021
Event 24: $600 PLO Deepstack
Michael Prendergast may not be a household name for poker fans. He only plays tournaments occasionally because his work and family take up most of his time. But he defeated some very skilled players at the PLO final table, coming back from a short stack at the beginning of the final table and then again at the start of heads-up play. He told PokerNews that it felt…
“…absolutely wonderful. I don’t play a lot of tournaments. I’ve got a wife and kids. … I decided to just do what I did the entire tournament and wait for a hand that I could hit the nuts with (and) got the luck that I needed to win a tournament.”
| Event 24: Day 2 of 2 | $600 buy-in | PLO Deepstack (1RE) |
| Total entries: | 1,572 | |
| Total prize pool: | $801,720 | |
| Players paid: | 236 | |
| Minimum payout: | $963 | |
| Final table results: | 1st place: | Michael Prendergast (USA) $127,428 |
| 2nd place: | Jeffrey Barnes (USA) $78,755 | |
| 3rd place: | Jungwoong Park (Hong Kong) $57,386 | |
| 4th place: | Joao Simao (Brazil) $42,272 | |
| 5th place: | Daniel Wasserberg (USA) $31,485 | |
| 6th place: | Donnie Phan (USA) $23,713 | |
| 7th place: | Eric Polirer (USA) $18,062 | |
| 8th place: | John Bunch (USA) $13,915 | |
| 9th place: | Joseph Sanders (USA) $10,845 |
Michael Prendergast tops 1,572 entrants in Event #24: $600 Pot-Limit Omaha Deepstack to win $127,348 and his first gold bracelet.
📸 @timeweavers https://t.co/wtTYmQtuGc pic.twitter.com/LLRDeZcQZV— WSOP – World Series of Poker (@WSOP) October 14, 2021
Event 25: $5K NLHE 6-Handed
Only a few players remain in this event, and there are some big names among them. John Racener makes his second final table with the chip lead in this series alone, and Scott Ball and Jonathan Jaffe follow him on the leaderboard. Yuri Dzivielevski and Vanessa Kade remain in contention, as does Daniel Negreanu and Nick Petrangelo.
| Event 25: Day 2 of 3 | $5K buy-in | NLHE 6-Handed (1RE) |
| Total entries: | 578 | |
| Registration still open? | no | |
| Total prize pool: | $2,785,950 | |
| Players paid: | 91 | |
| Minimum payout: | $8,040 | |
| Winner payout: | $562,667 | |
| Chip leader: | John Racener | |
| Players remaining: | 31 | |
| Restart: | 2pm Thursday |
Event 26: $1K NLHE Freezeout
The lack of reentries pushes a tournament to play down faster. The first day of this freezeout ended with just 38 players, and Pete Chen and Maurice Hawkins are among them.
| Event 26: Day 1 of 2 | $1K buy-in | NLHE Freezeout |
| Total entries: | 1358 | |
| Registration still open? | no | |
| Total prize pool: | $1,208,620 | |
| Players paid: | 204 | |
| Minimum payout: | $1,605 | |
| Winner payout: | $199,227 | |
| Chip leader: | Levi Klump | |
| Players remaining: | 38 | |
| Restart: | 12pm Thursday |
Event 27: $1,500 HORSE
Before the WSOP started including eight-game mixes and dealer’s choice events with 20 games, HORSE was the mixed game of choice. Hundreds of people still enjoyed it enough to play for a bracelet in it. The field remains big with 200 players still in it, but only 90 of them will finish in the money. That playdown happens today.
| Event 27: Day 1 of 3 | $1,500 buy-in | HORSE |
| Total entries: | 594 | |
| Registration still open? | no | |
| Total prize pool: | $792,990 | |
| Players paid: | 90 | |
| Minimum payout: | $2,400 | |
| Winner payout: | $160,636 | |
| Chip leader: | Mark Dickstein | |
| Players remaining: | 207 | |
| Restart: | 2pm Thursday |
Highlight of the Day
It goes without saying – I hope – that Phil Galfond is one of poker’s good guys. He recently launched a YouTube channel, and within just a couple of weeks, nearly 3,900 people have subscribed.
His latest video is a timely and important one. With so many poker players in Las Vegas playing tournaments and cash games – not to mention people around the world returning to poker tables post-pandemic – Galfond felt it was time to talk about how to treat poker dealers. He gives a simple yet important message about how to treat dealers, as well as how to handle a situation in which someone else is being abusive at a poker table.
