Finalists Set to Vie for Poker's Richest Title

LAS VEGAS (July 18) -- A Vietnamese-American medical supplies salesman, an Italian aspiring filmmaker and a 22-year-old Canadian college dropout are three of the nine World Series of Poker finalists who will vie for an $8.9 million top prize this fall.

They and six others survived a grueling all-night marathon session that began at noon Saturday with 27 of the 7,319 entrants remaining and ended early Sunday when Wichita car salesman Brandon Stevens, 35, busted out in 10th place.

With that, play was halted until Nov. 6, when the so-called November Nine will duke it out for the most prestigious and lucrative prize in either gambling or sports. The tournament, formally known as the World Series of Poker Main Event, is a $10,000 No-Limit Texas Hold 'Em competition that serves as the last of 57 contests that make up the WSOP season in Las Vegas, which began in May. All nine finalists received their minimum winnings of $810,000 after the session ended.

The chip leader is Jonathan Duhamel, 22, of Boucherville, Quebec, who has a fondness for playing in hoodies and had generally only played cash games on the Internet before the World Series. He gave up pursuing a finance degree at University of Quebec at Montreal when he was 19 in order to focus on poker, a move that clearly is paying off.

"I decided I could make more money doing this, that I was very good at it," Duhamel told AOL News early after the November Nine was set. "I think I was right."

Duhamel has about 66 million of the 210 million chips in play; chips are not worth anything, but a player must win all of them in play to win the tournament. His closest competitor is John Dolan, 24, of Fort Myers, Fla., who has 46.25 million chips.

The number of entries for this Main Event was the second-highest ever, up from 6,844 last year but well behind the tournament's heyday of 2006 when 8,773 people played. Since then, a 2006 federal law made playing on the Internet considerably more difficult and the red-hot popularity of poker that birthed numerous TV shows cooled.

That's why the WSOP's organizers always root for colorful figures to make it to the November Nine. This year's bunch, however, doesn't quite provide the saucy kick of past years when, for instance, a 47-year-old lumberjack from rural Maryland who didn't even have a credit card came in second.

All nine 2010 finalists are either current or aspiring poker pros who play constantly on the Internet and, in some cases, live in casinos. Their success may capture the imagination of aspiring poker players, but it probably won't appeal as much to those who enjoy the spectacle of seeing a hobbyist who honed his skills in a home game hit it big.

The most unusual and popular of the 2010 crop is seventh-placer Mike "The Grinder" Mizrachi of Miami, a 29-year-old father of three who has three brothers who also "cashed," or won money, in the tournament. That unprecedented feat means one family has won more than $920,000, mostly from Mizrachi, but his three brothers led his boisterous cheering section. Mizrachi already has won a career total of $7.2 million in live poker tournaments, including the $1.6 million he pulled in during a WSOP event in May.

"This is just an unbelievable ride, unbelievable," said Mizrachi, who began playing online when he was underage, as did his brothers, using money their parents gave them for school supplies. "I really cannot believe I'm here. This is such a high."

Mizrachi and his clan "have great sex appeal for the masses," said Barry Shulman, CEO of CardPlayer Magazine and winner of two WSOP tournaments. "I only really know Michael, so I don't know ... but everybody has some kind of story."

The explosive growth of the tournament has been a mixed blessing for the game. The so-called "name" pros that are universally known because of past success and frequent TV appearances rarely make it deep because the field is so large. This year, two-time Main Event champion Johnny Chan, immortalized in the 1998 flick "Rounders" as Matt Damon's inspiration, finished 156th this year, his first time winning money in the tournament in two decades.

To enter the Main Event, players can either pay the $10,000 buy-in or, as in the cases of both Duhamel and 24-year-old South Korea-born pro Joseph Cheong of La Miranda, Calif., win a tournament at a casino or on the Internet and have the entry fee covered for them. Cheong is in third place with 23.5 million chips. A full list can be found on the World Series of Poker's website.

The oldest of the pack is Vietnam-born medical supplies salesman Cuong "Soi" Nguyen of Santa Ana, Calif. Yet at 37, the eighth-placer is a decade younger than the eldest November Nines of past years. And the 2010 group includes six Americans, two Canadians and an Italian, aspiring filmmaker Filippo Candio, 26, representing the least geographic diversity in many years. Players from more than 92 nations were among the entrants.

"Considering that poker is global, it's shocking that it is six Americans," said poker pro Phil Hellmuth, who holds the record for the most WSOP tournament championships, including the 1989 Main Event. "I'm not surprised that it's web pros, though, as they outnumber real-world pros 60 to 1."

The shock of winning so much money was evident on the exhausted face of Jason Senti, 28, of St. Louis Park, Minn., who works as a poker tutor for online players via his website, BlueFirePoker.Com. Senti, a vocalist and guitarist in a local band, seemed flustered by the question of what he planned to do with $800,000.

"I'll probably save it, I haven't even thought about that," said Senti, who is in ninth place with 7.6 million chips. "Right now I'm so tired and also so amped up, I can't think about it."