2017 World Series of Poker Update: Scott Blumstein Wins the WSOP Main Event

A deuce on the river earned Scott Blumstein poker’s biggest prize.

The unknown Morristown, New Jersey native was simply one of 7,221 poker players to sit down at the 2017 World Series of Poker Main Event a few weeks ago. Today’s he’s joined poker royalty by winning the tournament.

Entering the Main Event Blumstein had only four WSOP cashes to his name and all of them came in WSOP Circuit events. The grand total of those cashes was $8,206. After winning the Main Event his cashes total has skyrocketed.

Blumstein began the final table with the chip lead. As the opposition was whittled down, first to six then to the final three, Blumstein’s chip stack continued to grow. With three players left, he had 226 million chips, compared to a combined 134 millions chips held by his opponents.

The final three were Blumstein, Benjamin Pollak and Dan Ott. Pollak, from France, was the first to be eliminated. All three players were in on the hand with Blumstein holding ace-queen, Pollak queen-10 and Ott king-nine. A king on the flop was the difference, giving Pollak the high pair with kings which held up to eliminate Pollak. For his third place finish, Ott pocketed $3.5 million.

When heads-up play began Blumstein held 237 million chips compared to 123 million for Ott. Blumstein used his bigger stack to gradually take chips from Ott. At one point Ott was down to only 32 million chips before a double-up got him back up to 64. He would not get any higher.

Blumstein was holding ace-two unsuited on the final hand when Ott went all-in holding ace-eight suited diamonds. After a call from Blumstein, the flop showed jack-six-five, providing no help for either player. A seven on the turn kept Ott in the lead and also gave him an open-ended straight-draw. With the river to come, Blumstein had only three outs. Astonishingly, one of them hit on the river as a two was flipped over, giving Blumstein the title.

Ott settled for $4.7 million for second place, as Blumstein hauled in $8.15 million. Including Blumstein’s big payday, a record-setting $231,010,874 was won at this year’s WSOP. A record for entries was also set, as 120,995 poker players tried their luck at this year’s WSOP.