Daniel Negreanu Wins WSOP Asia Pacific Main Event

Daniel Negreanu, AKA Kid Poker is back! Well, he never really went away, he has continued his winning ways throughout his career, however his 5th World Series of Poker bracelet has eluded him for a whole 5 years....until now. By winning the Main Event at the WSOP Asia pacific he not only picks up that 5th bracelet but he also goes home with a sweet $1,038,825 to his name and arguably the biggest smile in poker. Negreanu says that it was worth the wait as he beat a field of 405 players and went on to dominate the final table leaving him tied on 5 bracelets with some of the best players the world has ever seen. He joins Stu Ungar, Jeff Lisando, Scotty Nguyen and Allen Cunningham in the 5 bracelet club. He's been close over the years including a runner up spot at the WSOP Europe Main Event in 2009 but now the wait is over and it's yet another achievement for the Canadian.

How the Final Table Panned Out

Benjamin Spindler did in fact start the day as chip leader but it didn't take Negreanu long to click into gear and during level 1 he took some big pots, most notably against Spindler and went straight out in front. Thomas was first to go to the rails but the $82,721 was a pretty decent consolation prize. It wasn't long after that 2 players went out in back to back hands and both Mikel Habb and then the aforementioned Spindler were eliminated leaving just the 5 players remaining. Crown Casino regular Kahle Burns went out in 5th place for a cool $201,994 when Negreanu did the damage with an A,K. Tsatsis went out in 4th place after a monster hand in which Negraenu's set of queens beat the set of jacks of Tsatsis and he was quickly followed by Winfred Yu who had led a charmed life at the final table but his luck ran out and Negreanu built his stack to what became an untouchable level as we went to heads up play. Although Marton dug in and gave it a good game it was Kid Poker's pair of 2's that scraped over the finish line beating Marton's A,7, and that was that. The money was all Negreanu's but more importantly so was the elusive 5th bracelet. Final positions were as follows.....

1. Daniel Negreanu $1,038,825
2. Daniel Marton $637,911
3. Winfred Yu $423,225
4. George Tsatsis $284,715
5. Kahle Burns $201,994
6. Benjamin Spindler $146,205
7. Mikel Habb $107,730
8. Russell Thomas $82,721