Stephen Chidwick and Alex Foxen Win 2019 Player of the Year Titles

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The two major Player of the Year titles in the industry is the CardPlayer Player of the Year and the GPI Player of the Year. Both POY titles were in doubt up until the end and two of the game’s finest ended up splitting the awards.

Stephen Chidwick had a stellar 2019 and edged out Alex Foxen for the CardPlayer POY title. Foxen closed out the year with a WPT title win and leapfrogged over Sean Winter to take the GPI Player of the Year title for the second year in a row.

Stephen Chidwick Wins CardPlayer Player of the Year

The CardPlayer Player of the Year title is one of the most competitive POY titles in the game and often is decided the final month. Last year, Stephen Chidwick fell just short, finishing runner-up to Jake Schindler. This time around, he managed to take down the title and became the first British player to win CardPlayer Player of the Year.

Chidwick had an incredible 2019 campaign. He finished the year with 22 qualifying cashes in live events. He started the year with three final tables in High Roller events at the PCA. In February, he won two events at the U.S. Poker Open. After a runner-up finish in a Triton Poker Jeju event, he took about a three-month break from poker after the birth of his daughter.

Chidwick then returned to the 2019 World Series of Poker and won his first career bracelet in the $25k PLO Event. In September, he made four final tables at the British Poker Open, winning Event #7. He then closed out the year with a pair of final tables, including a win in the EPT Prague Super High Roller.

For the year, Chidwick earned $7.34 million. He finished with 7,484 points or 130 more than runner-up Alex Foxen. It has been an amazing three-year run for Chidwick in the POY. He finished 7th in the 2017 POY race, second last year, and finally took down the title this year.

Alex Foxen Wins GPI Player of the Year

The other major POY title that was decided in December was the Global Poker Index Player of the Year. For much of December, Sean Winter had a slim lead over Bryn Kenney, Kahle Burns and Stephen Chidwick. A player that seemed out of the running was Alex Foxen.

Then came the final table of the WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic. If Foxen could somehow win the event, he would suddenly leapfrog from 10th to 1st. Well, Foxen managed to take down the event for his first career World Poker Tour title. This gave him 690.65 points and allowed him to jump to first overall.

Foxen finished the year with 3,806.09 points, giving him the GPI POY title for the second straight year. This makes Foxen the first back-to-back champion and the first two-time GPI POY title winner.

Foxen had a fantastic 2019, nearly equaling his career-best year in 2018. He made $6.34 million in live tournaments that included his first World Poker Tour title. Throughout the year, Foxen had numerous final table appearances and 14 six-figure scores.

Foxen only managed a pair of victories in 2019. In addition to his WPT title, he won a High Roller event during the WPT bestbet Bounty Scramble in October.

Alex Foxen exploded onto the high roller circuit in 2018, earning $6.6 million for the year, including a runner-up finish in the Super High Roller Bowl in December 2018. He and his girlfriend Kristen Bicknell ended up sweeping the GPI POY titles.

Bicknell won the Female GPI Player of the Year title in 2019. This was the third-straight title for Bicknell.