The 2017 World Series of Poker Main Event is down to just 27 players from its original 7,221 as the action heads into the last day before the always anticipated final table. Christian Pham, who earned his seat in the Main Event via a $575 satellite, leads the field with 31.440 million chips.
As we all know, making a deep run in a tournament like this requires plenty of skill, but also one’s fair share of luck. Pham has clearly done something right in his life as the poker gods blessed him on Saturday’s Day 5 to keep him in the tournament and allow him to sit on his perch going into Monday. He was all-in on the turn with 5-3 suited and the board reading 9-7-5-8. Josh Tieman, though, had pocket 8’s, good for a set. Pham was drawing to only a 6 to chop the pot with a straight on the board. He got that lucky card, survived the bluff, and obviously continued on to the chip lead the next day.
Pham has one WSOP bracelet to his credit and that one involved a different sort of luck. According to Pham, he had intended to register for a $1,500 No-Limit Hold’em event in 2015 but accidentally signed up for the much different $1,500 2-7 Single Draw event. No problem – he just went ahead and won the whole thing.
That bracelet earned him $214,332, making up the bulk of his $563,439 in live tournament earnings. This Main Event already qualifies as his largest cash, as Pham is guaranteed at least $263,532 at this point.
One of the more interesting things about the remaining field is that there are a number of players who have made a WSOP Main Event final table before. Ben Lamb (4th – 25.685 million chips) finished third in the 2011 Main Event, Antoine Saout (15th – 9.945 million) finished third in 2009, Michael Ruane (16th – 9.340 million) is gunning for back-to-back final tables after finishing fourth last year), and Marcel Luske (26th – 2.990 million) finished tenth at the 2004 WSOP Main Event, which isn’t technically the official final table, but we’ll give it to him.
Saout also finished 25th last year, so he has quite a knack for the Main Event. Benjamin Pollack (17th – 8.870 million) finished 27th in 2013.
Day 7 will begin at 11:00am Las Vegas time and will continue (with breaks, of course) until the nine-handed final table is determined. Remember, there is no “November Nine” this year; the tournament will pause for two days and then resume on Thursday for the three-day final table.
2017 World Series of Poker Main Event – End of Day 6 Chip Counts
1. Christian Pham – 31,440,000
2. Valentin Messina – 28,590,000
3. Jack Sinclair – 27,535,000
4. Ben Lamb – 25,685,000
5. Pedro Oliveira – 22,540,000
6. John Hesp – 20,880,000
7. Randy Pisane – 18,370,000
8. Scott Blumstein – 18,125,000
9. Richard Dubini – 14,975,000
10. Bryan Piccioli – 14,500,000
11. Richard Gryko – 13,760,000
12. Jonas Mackoff – 12,050,000
13. Michael Krasienko – 11,430,000
14. Robin Hegele – 11,150,000
15. Antoine Saout – 9,945,000
16. Michael Ruane – 9,340,000
17. Benjamin Pollak – 8,870,000
18. Alexandre Reard – 8,580,000
19. Karen Sarkisyan – 8,105,000
20. Dan Ott – 7,815,000
21. Damian Salas – 7,800,000
22. David Guay – 7,400,000
23. Scott Stewart – 6,230,000
24. Florian Lohnert – 5,360,000
25. Jake Bazeley – 3,915,000
26. Marcel Luske – 2,990,000
27. Michael Sklenicka – 2,230,000