Jason Mercier now has four WSOP bracelets and a decent score from side bets . (WSOP photo)

Monday night was a good night to be Jason Mercier. Not only did Mercier win his fourth career World Series of Poker bracelet and over $270,000, but he also cleaned up on the first of many bracelet prop bets he has this summer. Mercier beat Mike Watson to win the $10,000 buy-in No Limit Deuce to Seven event.

Meanwhile, the Millionaire Maker inched closer to a final table as did two other events. And don’t look now, but after a rough start to the 2016 WSOP, Phil Hellmuth is suddenly in a pretty good position to go on a deep run.

Event #14: Alessio Dicesare Leads Final 16 of Millionaire Maker

Day 3 of the $1,500 buy-in Millionaire Maker began with 90 players all chasing one of the two seven-figure payouts but ten levels of play whittled the field down to just 15 players. Sitting on top with 7,200,000 is Alessio Dicesare.

Jason Dewitt (5,770,000) and Garrett Greer (4,875,000) are right behind Dicesare. Sofia Lovgren, who spent some time as the chip leader late in the day, finished with 3,375,000 – just below the average stack.

Benny Chen, who won this event in 2013, finished 39th for $26,470. Other notables who cashed on Monday include Max Silver, Alex Jacob and Adam Levy.

The final 15 players return at 11 AM to play down to a winner.

Top Ten Chip Counts

  1. Alessio Dicesare – 7,200,000
  2. Jason DeWitt – 5,770,000
  3. Garrett Greer – 4,875,000
  4. Stanley Lee – 4,825,000
  5. Mikhail Semin – 4,380,000
  6. Luke Brereton – 4,270,000
  7. David Mowery – 3,750,000
  8. Frank Rusnak – 3,570,000
  9. Sofia Lovgren – 3,375,000
  10. Arkadiy Tsinis – 3,095,000

Event #16: Jason Mercier Beats Mike Watson To Win $10K NL Deuce

Jason Mercier spent the weeks leading up to the start of the WSOP booking as much action as he could on himself winning a bracelet. Monday night he came through and beat a final table that included Stephen Chidwick, Alex Luneau and eventually Mike Watson to win his fourth career bracelet and $273,335.

On the final hand of the night Watson raised to 100,000 and Mercier called and each player drew a single card. Mercier checked, Watson bet 200,000 before Mercier moved all in. Watson eventually called and turned over 9-7-4-3-2 but Mercier showed 8-6-4-3-2 to win the event.

Even though he walked away with a six-figure score, it wasn’t the biggest payday of the night for Mercier.

“I won’t get into specifics, I guess, but I won well, well over what first was, on the side,” said Mercier. “I’ve really wanted to win this $10K No Limit Deuce, every single time I’ve played it. It’s one of my favorite tournaments of the year. And also having so much side action it ended up being one of my biggest scores of all time.”

Mercier also has other prop bets on winning two and three bracelets this summer. The two bracelet bet pays somewhere around 18-1 and Mercier seems focused on making it an interesting summer.


Final Table Payouts

  1. Jason Mercier – $273,335
  2. Mike Watson – $168,936
  3. Lamar Wilkinson – $120,025
  4. David Grey – $86,302
  5. Benny Glaser – $62,810
  6. Stephen Chidwick – $46,277
  7. Alex Luneau – $34,522

Event #17: Danny Wong Leads Final 24 in $1,000 No Limit Hold’em

Just 24 players are left in the first $1,000 No Limit Hold’em event of the summer and Danny Wong is the only player over 1,000,000 in chips. Wong finished Day 2 with 1,058,000 and has a comfortable lead of the rest of the field.

Roberto Romanello sits second with 885,000 while Charles Carragher rounds out the top three with 848,000.

Just a week removed from his runner-up finish in Colossus II, Jiri Horak finished Day 2 with the fourth biggest stack, 718,000.

Day 3 begins at Noon PT and is scheduled to play to a winner.

Top Ten Chip Counts

  1. Danny Wong – 1,058,000
  2. Roberto Romanello – 885,000
  3. Charles Carragher – 848,000
  4. Jiri Horak – 718,000
  5. Christopher Leong – 686,000
  6. Nikolai Sears – 657,000
  7. Rik Vandijk – 611,000
  8. Cameron Rezaie – 580,000
  9. Matthew Schreiber – 563,000
  10. Koray Aldemir – 562,000

Event #18: Relative Unknown Jared Talarico Leading $3,000 HORSE

Just 23 players stand between Jared Talarico and his first career bracelet. Talarico has just a few small WSOP cashes to his credit but on Monday night he finished with the chip lead in the $3,000 HORSE event.

Talarico’s 825,00 puts him well ahead of the rest of the field. Gerald Ringe and Chino Rheem finished with 626,000 and 620,000 each. Marco Johnson (399,000) and two-time bracelet winner Michael Gathy (360,000) also finished in the top ten.

The bubble burst when 2015 $1,500 HORSE champion Arash Ghaneian was eliminated in 61st place. Following his exit a number of well known players were eliminated with a WSOP cash to show for it.

This event gets back underway at 2 PM PT and will play down to a champion – the third scheduled final table of the day. Shannon Sorr, Mike Leah, Robert Mizrachi, Phil Hellmuth, Justin Bonomo, Brock Parker, Bruno Fitoussi and Chris Bjorin were all players who cashed on Day 2 but did not advance to Day 3.

Top Ten Chip Counts

  1. Jared Talarico – 825,000
  2. Gerald Ringe – 626,000
  3. Chino Rheem – 620,000
  4. Glenn Engelbert – 548,000
  5. Todd Ickow – 459,000
  6. Marco Johnson – 399,000
  7. Pascal Leyo – 362,000
  8. Michael Gathy 360,000
  9. Jake Schwartz – 356,000
  10. Chris George – 328,000

Event #19: Michael Luong Leads After Day 1 of $1,000 Pot Limit Omaha

Only 136 players remain from the 1,106 that began the day in the $1,000 Pot Limit Omaha event with Michael Luong leading with 197,200.

While Luong flirted with the 200,000 mark, only six other players broke the 100,000 barrier. Troy Burkholder leads that group with 147,800.

Some of the notables to finish with chips included Ismael Bojang (78,100), Darryl Fish (73,200), (64,800), JC Tran (61,300), Ben Yu (59,200), Mohsin Charania (43,000), Jesse Sylvia (43,400) and George Danzer (12,800).

The top 166 players will earn at least $1,503 with the eventual champion walking away with the bracelet and $185,317.
Top Ten Chip Counts

  1. Michael Luong – 197,200
  2. Troy Burkholder – 147,800
  3. Bart Dowling – 132,000
  4. David Mzareulov – 115,000
  5. Zaed Shamoon – 108,100
  6. Pierre Milan – 107,200
  7. Mark Guthridge – 106,000
  8. Jared Bleznick – 98,800
  9. Jeffrey Landherr – 97,400
  10. Aleksey Filatov – 94,600

Event #20: Phil Hellmuth Doing His Best to Defend $10,000 Razz Title

Last year Phil Hellmuth grabbed his 14th WSOP bracelet by winning the $10,000 Razz event. He showed up late to this year’s event but that didn’t stop him from putting on a show. Hellmuth finished Day 1 with 319,000 – 34,000 behind the chip leader, David Benyamine.

The event attracted exactly 100 players with just 45 making it through the first day of action.

Not surprisingly the top ten chip counts reads like a murder’s row of poker pros. Robert Mizrachi, Jesse Martin, Mike Gorodinsky, Phil Hui and Stephen Chidwick are all in the top ten, but none are prominent right now than Jason Mercier. Just hours after winning his fourth bracelet, Mercier bagged up 144,000 chips in the Razz event – good enough for seventh.

Another bracelet by Mercier would obviously move his career total to five, but would also win the Team PokerStars pro a good chunk of change from prop bets.

It wasn’t all good news for some of the biggest names in the game though. Daniel Negreanu, Chris Ferguson, Mike Matusow and Billy Baxter were among the Day 1 casualties.

Top Ten Chip Counts

  1. David Benyamine – 353,000
  2. Phil Hellmuth – 319,000
  3. Aleksandr Denisov – 223,500
  4. Robert Mizrachi – 180,000
  5. Jesse Martin – 155,000
  6. Mike Gorodinsky – 145,000
  7. Jason Mercier – 144,000
  8. Phillip Hui – 140,000
  9. Mark Gregorich – 140,000
  10. Stephen Chidwick – 125,000