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Derek McMaster and Yong Kwon Wins Bracelets at 2019 WSOP

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Two bracelets were awarded Sunday at the 2019 World Series of Poker. Yong Kwon took down the first $400 WSOP.com ONLINE bracelet of the year after dominating a final table that included 15-time bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth.

Meanwhile, Derek McMaster took down the $1,500 Omaha Hi-Lo Event. Also, the final table of the $50,000 50th Annual High Roller was set with Ben Heath leading a star-studded final.

Yong “LuckySpewy1” Kwon Wins $400 WSOP.com ONLINE NL Hold’em Event

The first WSOP.com ONLINE bracelet event played out on Sunday. The $400 NL Hold’em Event drew a field of 2,825 entries to create a prize pool of just over $1 million. The final table of this event sported multiple big names, with none larger than 15-time WSOP bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth.

Hellmuth, playing as “lumestackin” came into the final table about the middle of the pack in chips. With five players left, Hellmuth was the short stack and was all-in with pocket threes against K-10 for Yong “LuckySpewy1” Kwon. The flop and turn missed both players, but the river fell a ten to give Yong the win and knock Hellmuth out in fifth place.

After knocking out Hellmuth, Kwon had more than a 4:1 chip lead on the rest of the field. He held onto this lead for the rest of the event. Heads-up, he faced Gabor “MeatisMurder” Szabo and had more than a 2:1 chip lead.

In the final hand, Szabo shoved with 8d-5c and Kwon called with Ac-5h. Both players flopped trips and Kwon’s ace held to give him the hand and the bracelet. In addition to his first career WSOP bracelet, Kwon earned $165,263 in prize money.

Derek McMaster Wins $1,500 Omaha Hi-Lo Event

The first non-Hold’em bracelet was awarded on Sunday in the $1,500 Omaha Hi-Lo Event. The event drew a field of 853 players to create a prize pool of $1.15 million. The final table of this event had a solid core of players that included WSOP bracelet winners Ben Yu and David Halpern. Other notables were John Esposito and Tom McCormick.

Halpern was the only bracelet winner to make it close to winning, but he fell in fourth place. John Esposito fell in third place to set up a heads-up match between Derek McMaster and Jason Berilgen. Berilgen tried to keep things close but he was never able to take the chip lead at any point. Eventually, McMaster pulled out to an overwhelming 56:1 chip lead and soon closed it out to take his first WSOP bracelet and $228,228 in prize money.

This was the first time that McMaster has cashed in a WSOP event, and he made the most of it with a bracelet win.

Final Table of 50th Annual High Roller Set

The $50,000 50th Annual High Roller Event played to a final table on Sunday and Ben Heath will lead the final six into action as the chip leader. Joining him at the final table will be Sam Soverel, Dmitry Yurasov, Chance Kornuth, Andrew Lichtenberger, and Nick Petrangelo.

Every player at the final table has a bracelet with the exception of Ben Heath. Petrangelo won the $100k NL High Roller last year but every player has a reasonable chance of taking down this bracelet. The final table will play out on Monday to award a champion.

Inaugural Short Deck Event Draws Poorly

WSOP officials decided to take advantage of the Short Deck NL craze that’s been sweeping the high stakes world and offered a $10k version of the variant at this year’s WSOP. However, the turnout was very disappointing as only 61 entries came out to play in the event.

By the end of Day 1, just 18 players remained with Gabe Patgorski taking the chip lead. Other notables returning to play on Monday include Justin Bonomo, Jason Somerville, Ben Lamb, Sean Winter, Galen Hall, and Anson Tsang.

Why the small turnout? As Daniel Negreanu explained on Twitter, people don’t have a spare $10k to play a game they don’t know. Still, we expect this event to return in the future, and a smaller pricing point should definitely help attendance.

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