Another action-filled day at the Horseshoe and Paris Las Vegas saw two 2023 World Series of Poker bracelets awarded, and Dan Cates‘ quest for a three-peat in the $50,000 Poker Players Championship ended abruptly.

The first bracelet of the day came in Event #41: $1,500 Big O, a brand-new tournament for the 2023 WSOP. A field of 1,458 players started the event with high hopes, but only one of them walked away as a WSOP champion. Scott Abrams is that champion after they defeated Robert Williamson III heads-up to secure the event’s bracelet and $315,203 top prize.

Some 3,778 players may have bought into Event #42: $800 No-Limit Hold’em Deepstack (8-Handed) but it only took two days of poker action to find the tournament’s champion Qiang Xu is that player. Xu got their hands on a $339,033 payout plus their first gold bracelet.

James Obst Leads the Way in the $50,000 Poker Players Championship

Event #43: $50,000 Poker Players Championship saw 26 late entrants, taking the total attendance to 99, but only 32 players had chips requiring bagging and tagging when the curtain came down on the day’s action.

Dan Cates was one of the players who busted on Day 2. Cates, who had won this event in 2021 and again in 2022, played throughout the tournament dressed as The Terminator, as you do. All eyes were on Cates terminating the opposition, but it was he that was dismantled when Daniel Alaei made a wheel against him during a Limit 2-7 Triple Draw round in Level 10.

Cates announced, “I’ll be back,” but unless he can travel back in time like the real Terminator, Cates must be referring to the 2024 edition of this event.

Australia’s James Obst (2,972,000) leads a ridiculously stacked field into Day 2 of this event. Obst and the aforementioned Alaei (2,064,000) are the only two players armed with at least two million chips.

Phil Ivey (1,655,000), Talal Shakerchi (1,598,000), and Johannes Becker (1,387,00) round out the top five chip counts.

Day 3 commences at 1:00 p.m. local time on June 20, with PokerNews bringing you all of the action for another six levels.

Event #43: $50,000 Poker Players Championship Top 10 Chip Counts

Monster Stack Field Cut Down to 42

China’s Xuming Qi sat down on Day 3 of Event #39: $1,500 Monster Stack as one of the shortest stacks yet he heads into the fourth and final day armed with 24,300,000 chips, which are enough for the chip lead.

Marcos Exterkotter (23,575,000) and Steven Snyder (21,275,000) also bagged stack of more than 20 million.

Three bracelet winners remain in contention to add to their collections. Joe Cada (8,950,000), the 2009 WSOP Main Event champion, is lurking outside the top 20. Arash Ghaneian (6,575,000) is slightly shorter, while Jesse Rockowitz (2,250,000) is the second shortest stack.

Day 4 shuffles up and deals at 12:00 p.m. local time on June 20, and continues until one player has all of the chips in play in front of them. PokerNews is the place to discover who that champion is.

Event #39: $1,500 Monster Stack Top 10 Chip Counts

Petrone Bags Big on Day 1 of the $3K No-Limit Hold’em

Ramiro Petrone bagged up the biggest stack after Day 1 of Event #44: $3,000 No-Limit Hold’em. Petrone’s 367,000 chips place him narrowly ahead of Luis Pinho (360,500) in second, and Jiacong Zhang (348,000) in third.

Some 1,511 players bought into the tournament, and 596 of those progressed to Day 2. Among those survivors are the likes of David Miscikowski (244,500), Michael Gathy (240,000), Grant Hinkle (235,000), Joseph Cheong (228,000), Ryan Leng (200,000), Brian Yoon (193,000), John Hennigan (162,000), Kristen Foxen (98,000), Maria Ho (97,500), and Daniel Negreanu (72,000).

Play resumes at 10:00 a.m. local time on June 20 with PokerNews being the only place to follow the action.

Event #44: $3,000 No-Limit Hold’em Top 10 Chip Counts

Mixed Omaha Event attracts 1,091 Players on Day 1

Scott Clements (274,000) bagged up one of the biggest stack in Event #45: $1,500 Mixed Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better as he hunts for the fourth WSOP bracelet of his long and illustrious career.

This event drew in 1,091 entrants, smashing last year’s 771 attendance by some margin, and continuing the theme of a record-breaking WSOP. Only 316 of those starters punched their Day 2 tickets, including Joey Couden (234,500), Allan Le (220,000), James Woods (212,000), Men “The Master” Nguyen (149,000), recent addition to the two bracelet club Ben Lamb (146,000), Omaha specialist Mike Matusow (116,000), and Sammy Farha (51,500).

Cards are back in the air from 1:00 p.m. local time, with ten 60-minute levels scheduled. Of course, PokerNews will be providing live updates every step of the way.

Event #45: $1,500 Mixed Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better Top 10 Chip Counts

What to Expect on Day 22 of the 2023 WSOP

Three new events, including an online affair, enter the mix on Day 22 of the 2023 WSOP. Event #46: $500 Freezeout No-Limit Hold’em should attract a monster-sized field, while Event #47: $1,500 H.O.R.S.E. will be packed with lovers of mixed games.

Online poker specialists will turn out in force for Online Event #8: $3,200 No-Limit Hold’em High Roller. Last year’s equivalent tournament awarded champion Julien Perouse a cool $324,767.

Day 21 also sees Event #39: $1,500 Monster Stack award its bracelet, Event #43: $50,000 Poker Players Championship inch towards crowning its champion, Event #44: $3,000 No-Limit Hold’em play its Day 2, and Event #45: $1,500 Mixed Omaha Hi-Low 8 or Better make strides towards its final table.

For anyone who started playing poker after 2003, there was only one variant of poker that everyone learned first. It was no-limit Texas hold’em, the game that earned Chris Moneymaker a million bucks. However, no-limit hold’em is not the only game in town and if you want to get to grips with poker, you’ll need to learn a few key variants.

So, maybe you’re looking to spice up your home game, learn some new poker skills, or accommodate that one friend who is super into pot-limit razz. Whatever your reasons for wanting to expand your poker horizons, the team at WPT Global has put together a list of must-know poker variants to take you out of your comfort zone and to the next level.

Five Card Draw

Older players will remember a time when Five Card Draw was the default form of poker instead of hold’em. It was the game you’d see in sitcoms and play with matchstick at a family game night. Each player receives five cards, there is a round of betting, then players can “draw” (discard cards from their hands and receive new cards from the deck). There can be up to three rounds of drawing, though one or two is more typical.

There are no community cards in this game, just the five in your hand after the last draw.

Nowadays, the most common draw games are played as lowball variants (lowest hand wins) as either no-limit single draw or limit triple draw. In fact, they’re so popular we’ll come back to them in detail at the end of this article.

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Texas Hold’em

There’s no escaping Texas hold’em. Since the poker boom, Texas hold’em has replaced five card draw as the default poker game in the popular imagination. As a result, this is by far the single most useful poker variant to know and master.

Two hole cards, four betting rounds, and five community cards. Hand rankings and action are the same as five-card draw games, with players using any five cards from their hole and the community cards to make the best hand. Action is prompted by a pair of forced bets (called “the blinds”) before the deal, with play then going clockwise from the dealer.

You can spice your hold’em game up with a few variants like Chicago (the highest spade in the hole wins half the pot) and pineapple (three hole cards with one discarded before the flop is dealt).

Omaha

Omaha hold’em is a variation on Texas hold’em where players receive four hole cards. The only other main difference is that each player must use exactly two hole and three community cards for their five-card poker hand (in Texas hold’em you can use any combination of hole and/or community cards).

Other than this the action is exactly the same as Texas hold’em.

Like most poker variants, Omaha can be played in limit, no-limit, or pot-limit variants. Pot-limit Omaha is by far the most popular, though high-low variants are often also played as limit games. No-limit Omaha is rare due to the high-variance nature of the game.

Omaha high-low is a fun and popular Omaha variant to have up your sleeve. In high-low games, half the pot goes to the best poker hand, and half to the worst.

There are usually two refinements to determining the low hand. The first of these is that straights or flushes do not count for the low hand (e.g. A♠2♠3♠4♠5♠ is a straight flush for the high-hand but is a 5-high for the low hand). The second adjustment is that low hands can only include cards ranked eight or lower (this is the “eights-or-better” rule).

Read More: Exciting Changes Hit WPT Global; PLO Cash Leaderboards Launched & More Multi-tabling

Seven-Card Stud

After the hold’em variants, seven card stud is probably the next most popular form of modern poker. Before the poker boom, this could be found in just about every US poker room and served as the main game that draw players would graduate to as they left their matchsticks behind for proper chips.

The hand starts with every player receiving three cards — two face-down and one face-up. The player with the lowest cards in their exposed hand starts the action each round. In the first round, this player makes a forced bet called the “bring in,” usually between half and a quarter of a small bet (they also have the option to “complete,” betting the full amount of one small bet). Another face up card is dealt to each player and betting round follows. This continues until all remaining players have seven cards with the last card being dealt face down and followed by a final betting round.

Note that there are no community cards in stud.

Stud is also played as a lowball game (called “razz”) and as a high-low game with or without an eights-or-better rule.

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2-7 Triple Draw

The deuce-to-seven triple draw variant brings us back to the world of five-card draw games. The 2-7 in the name indicates the best possible hand in this variant. In 2-7 lowball, aces are high and both flushes and straights count against your hand. As a result, the best possible hand is 2x3x4x5x7x in at least two suits.

A royal flush is now the worst possible hand.

Play runs from the left of the dealer, with blinds (like in hold’em) to start the action. Each player gets five cards, then there is a betting round. After that players alternate drawing rounds and betting rounds three more times before the showdown.

A no-limit version with a single draw is also very popular. Both variants appear at the WSOP and one or both are part of most versions of the eight-game and fourteen-game mix.

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If you want to get some practice in on these variants of poker, you can play most of them on WPT Global.

The launch of WPT Global means that poker players around the world now have the chance to win their way to WPT events, win prizes and enjoy exciting games such as Poker Flips. As one of the world’s largest cash game poker networks, WPT Global is available in over 50 countries and territories around the world.

WPT Global offers a large deposit match bonus: 100% on deposits up to $1,200 (using any payment method). New players depositing a minimum of $20 automatically receive this match bonus which is unlocked in $2.50 increments (credited straight to the cashier) for every $10 of rake contribution.

Both tournaments and cash games count towards bonus unlocking and new players have 90 days from the date of the first deposit to unlock and claim their full bonus amount.

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It took only two days to crown Chinese player Qiang Xu in Event #42: $800 No-Limit Hold’em Deepstack, despite 3,773 entrants being a new record for this tournament. Xu took home his first WSOP bracelet and a cash prize of $339,033.

“It’s a dream coming true,” said Xu a few minutes after his victory. “My goal coming from China was to win a bracelet, and now, I’ve got it!”

The event gathered 3,773 entrants, breaking last year’s record of 2,812 runners. Some 566 players cashed in this year’s event for a $1,282 min-cash.

Event #42: $800 No-Limit Hold’em Deepstack Final Table Results

Xu was in action early on Day 2 and stayed near the top of the chip counts for a long time. “I ran very good from start to finish,” recognized Xu, who had a massive chip lead at three tables left and two tables left.

“I tried to use my stack to pressure at this point,” he explained. “Then I changed my strategy a bit to be more stable. That’s what I did at the final table when my stack decreased. Afterward, I tried not to hurry up and to find the right moment to catch up.”

He managed to win a crucial flip in the four-handed play to stay alive. In the heads-up, Xu defeated American player Jason Johnson after a few hands to be crowned as a WSOP champion.

Among the 566 players who took home some money, 238 came back on June 19 for the final day. The action was fast, as were the eliminations, which didn’t slow down until the final table early in the evening.

The 2021 WSOP Main Event champion Koray Aldemir fell in 12th place for $21,052, narrowly missing out on another WSOP final table. Donna Stutts joined the rail before the dinner break, busting in ninth place and leaving only eight players in contention for the title.

Final Table Action

Short stacks Oren Rosen and Dorian Melchers were the first to fall. Charles Johnson lost his chips to his namesake Jason Johnson with ace-five suited against pocket sevens. Jason Johnson took the lead and five-handed play lasted for a while.

Eventually, Richard Smith was the next to exit the tournament with queen-nine off against pocket kings held by Jason Johnson.

Xu and Christian Cheng played a huge pot before Cheng lost a flip and finished fourth some hands later. John Ciccarelli was next to end his deep run, with an impressive third place worth $157,776.

The heads-up battle between Xu and Johnson was quite fast as Xu doubled immediately to take the lead. Xu and Johnson played a huge flip with pocket sixes against ace-king suited. Xu made a straight with his pocket pair to eliminate Johnson and secure the victory.

Be sure to keep it with the PokerNews live reporting team for live updates from the floor throughout the rest of the 2023 World Series Of Poker at Horseshoe and Paris Las Vegas.

The first-ever Big O tournament at the WSOP has come to a close. Event #41: $1,500 Big O was a resounding success as a total of 1,458 players came out to play, creating a massive prize pool of $1,946,430, which was divided between the final 219 players.

At the end of it all it was Scott Abrams who stood atop of the field, beating Robert Williamson III for his first WSOP bracelet and $315,203.

$1,500 Big O Final Table Results

Winner’s Reaction

“If it’s Omaha Hi/Lo, I can do it,” the newly crowned champion said in regard to his good finishes in previous WSOP’s. In 2022, Abrams got heads-up in the $1,500 Mixed PLO, and in 2021 he finished third in the same event. “This is a really complex game, with so many draws with so many cards; it’s one of the most complex forms of poker that I play, which I think is good for me.”

“I’ve done a lot of work in Limit O/E,” he said in reference to his preparation for the game. “Big O is that but extrapolating strong hands on both sides. If I see a good O8 hand, but my opponent wants to bet a lot, I lean towards fold most of the time, and I’ll just make nut-nut the next hand.”

Abrams was surrounded by a supportive rail that the champion exclaimed was a big shock for him. “I think maybe because it is my first bracelet, everyone wanted to support me; I am really thankful for them. At the WSOP, there are so many different events to play, and they came on this day to watch me in a game where they don’t see what I have ninety percent of the time, so I’m really thankful.”

My wife will confirm that, basically since the week we got married, I have been on the biggest heater of my life. I’m pretty sure she did it.

Recently coming off of a win at the PokerGO Tour Mixed Games series in Event #6: $10,000 Dealers Choice for $179,300, Abrams was asked whether he believes it’s his year.

“I feel like I have been at the top end of variance for the last year and a half more than I have in my entire life. My wife will confirm that basically since the week we got married I have been on the biggest heater of my life. I’m pretty sure she did it.”

The champion left the tournament area with his wife and rail, all donning shirts decorated with his face.

Day 3 Action

The 10-time WSOP Bracelet winner Johnny Chan (14th – $13,982) found a good start to the day with an early double, but after the final two tables were set, the two-time WSOP Main Event champion would exit the tournament, seeing his deepest WSOP event run in over 10 years. The remaining players clapped the exit of the WSOP legend as he hung around a little longer to watch the event progress on the rail.

Others were unable to catch the needed momentum to make the final table, as Austin Marks (16th – $11,434), Adam Owen (15th – $13,982), and Jon Shoreman (13th – $17,298) were unable to survive on their way to the final table. Start of day chip leader Gary Gwinn got in his final chips in against Victor Ramdin just before the final table, but a rivered full house would send the chips over to Ramdin and Gwinn would take his exit in ninth place for $27,411.

Final Table Action

It did not take long for the final table to lose its first player. Frenchman Patrice Biton had called a raise from Robert Williamson III on the button and flopped three nines against Williamson’s kings. Players got their money in on the flop, and after another player said that they had folded two kings, all seemed lost for Williamson. The turn and river brought help to give Williamson a seven-six low and a straight to scoop the pot leaving Biton on the bad end of a cooler, and he exited the tournament in eighth place for $35,098.

William Haffner started the final table as one of the larger stacks, but a costly confrontation with David Mize had sent him tumbling down the chip counts after. He got in his final chips with ace, king, ten, six, three against Williamson’s ace, ace, king, jack, five. The turn brought a flush to Williamson, and Haffner was left drawing to a full house, which did not materialize on the river. Haffner wished his tablemates luck as he exited the tournament in seventh place, collecting $45,447 for his efforts.

WSOP bracelet winner Owais Ahmed was unable to gain much momentum at this final table, his second WSOP final table in two weeks. Time after time he seemed to get quartered by his tablemates until he was the shortest stack left. He got in his final chips in against Abrams on a ten-high board against Abrams’ aces, and his runout was unfavorable to his hand, leaving Ahmed to collect $59,501 for his second sixth-place finish in an inaugural event this year.

Following him out the door next was David Mize, whose run came to an end in fifth place. Mize was able to gain some early momentum early at the final table, but he busted when he got in his set of twos in against Abrams aces and a flush draw. The flush draw came home and the Montana resident collected $78,758 for his deep run.

Next on the block was WSOP staple Victor Ramdin, who collected $142,526 for his efforts. Ramdin’s day was a rollercoaster of chips, but at the end of it all he got short and moved most of his chips in preflop and was unable to connect with a pair against Bjorn Verbakel. The runout did not make any usable low for Ramdin, and he ended his deep run in fourth place.

The three-handed jockeying between the chip stacks saw each player take the lead at one point or another. Despite doubling through Williamson to take the lead early in the final table, it was Verbakel who would fall next. He would get in his aces with a flush draw and made low against Williamson’s full wrap, but river an unfortunate set that gave Williamson the wheel, and the WSOP bracelet winner exited the tournament in third place for $142,526.

Heads-up play started with Abrams holding only a slight lead against Williamson, but that changed in the first hand, where Abrams picked off a bluff from Williamson with an overpair to widen the gap. Two hands later, both players found themselves getting in their chips with Williamson holding the bottom two pair and a flush draw and Abrams holding top pair, top kicker with a low draw. The turn gave Abrams outs for a flush draw himself, and the river peeled off favorably for Abrams to win the high with a flush along with the nut low. Abrams shook hands with Williamson, who finished in second place for $194,814 for his best finish in a WSOP event since 2005.

Thank you for reading along on PokerNews. Stay tuned for all updates regarding the 2023 WSOP.

Many within the high roller community have taken a stance against the often erratic and controversial Martin Kabrhel, some accusing the Czech poker player of marking cards during the recently completed $250,000 buy-in World Series of Poker (WSOP) Super High Roller.

In response, via a series of tweets, Kabrhel, who finished third, denied cheating and threatened legal action against Andrew Robl, the player who first brought forth the allegations.

Robl, a high-stakes cash game pro who failed to reach the money, asked his Twitter followers why Kabrhel isn’t banned from the WSOP. He certainly isn’t the only poker player to call for such action.

Numerous well-known players within the high-stakes community such as Haralabos Voulgaris, Dan Smith, and Chance Kornuth have backed up Robl’s tweet. Smith, the sixth place finisher, went so far as to directly call out the alleged cheater during PokerGO’s final table broadcast. Phil Hellmuth, who typically abstains from publicly addressing poker cheating scandals, even tweeted out that he felt “uncomfortable” with Kabrhel at the table.

Chris Brewer Runs Bad Even When He Runs Good

For the past couple of years, there’s seemed to have been a common theme in many high rollers — Chris Brewer would take a bad beat or run into a cooler at the most inopportune times. After Isaac Haxton won a bracelet earlier this summer, he was at the top of many poker fan’s list of “Best to Have Never Won a Bracelet.”

That all ended on Sunday when he finally got over the hump and took down Event #40: $250,000 Super High Roller for $5,293,556.

What should have been a public celebration of a popular poker pro’s career-defining moment and scoring the third largest prize of the 2023 WSOP (the top two spots in the Main Event will earn more), the focus has been on controversy, which had nothing to do with Brewer and his impressive accomplishment.

“He was super sketchily ogling cards on day 2 when I watched, playing bad hands, and making crazy bluffs that worked every time bc opponents were weak. No conclusive evidence but it sure looked funny. I was surprised more people weren’t covering their cards,” Brian Rast tweeted.

Will Jaffe, however, took a different angle: “Personally thought Kabrhel provided more entertainment to viewers in 15 minutes last night than a lot of you guys have in the last 15 years. Obviously marking cards is a major issue but cmon man both Jake Schindler and Bryn Kenney played in this same event.”

Kabrhel Threatens Legal Action

Not only did Robl and other high-profile players pile on, there are hundreds, and maybe even thousands of comments on Twitter from random poker fans accusing Kabrhel of cheating. As such, the high-stakes player denied the allegations and said he’s going to fight back.

Some poker players have shared video clips from the Super High Roller of what they claim suspicious behavior from Kabrhel. Robl even retweeted a clip shared by Malia Miranda that appears to show the cards briefly stick to Kabrhel’s fingers. Of course, he could have eaten some sticky chicken wings prior to sitting down at the poker table.

Not everyone was quick to jump to conclusions and make assumptions based on those brief clips or Robl’s tweet, however. Dan Colpoys referred to Kabrhel’s tweets as “reasonable” and called on the WSOP to release a statement in regards to a potential investigation.

View Martin Kabrhel’s Poker Player Profile