Mohsin Charania, a US poker pro, has won the World Poker Tour (WPT) Bellagio Five Diamond Main Event, the second WPT title of his career.
The event, a $10,400 buy-in NL Hold’em tournament, drew a 586-strong field, generating a prize pool of $5,684,200. The last man standing, therefore, could take home the first-place prize of $1,477,890, the largest first-place prize awarded so far in the WPT’s current season.
Mohsin Charania, a 29-year-old professional poker player, hails from Chicago, Illinois.
He had previously won the European Poker Tour (EPT) 2012 Grand Final as well as the World Poker Tour (WPT) 2013 Grand Prix de Paris. His has so far earned a total of $4,802,584 playing live poker tournaments.
When the player field had reduced to 78, Charania had the shortest stack of chips. When the tournament reached the final table level, which was televised, he held the fifth biggest stack of chips. Despite this, he survived into the heads-up match with Garrett Greer, who was in the chip lead.
Greer raised from the button to 750,000 and Charania responded by betting all-in with 8,225,000. Greer called with an Ace of Clubs and a King of Hearts. Ultimately, Charania got into the chip lead position. The game was over after several more hands with Charania emerging as the winner and Greer ending up as the runner-up and collecting $869,683 and 1,750 POY Points. Since Greer had appeared at a WPT final table twice in the course of this year, he achieved the 49th position in the POY leader board. Since Charania had not appeared at any final table previously this year, he obtained the 64th place on the POY leader board. He could achieve this rank because of the 2,100 POY Points he earned for winning the prestigious WPT title.
Here are the final table results, along with the POY Points earned by each finalist. Brett Shaffer finished third, winning $562,736 and 1,400 POY Points. Ryan Julius finished fourth, winning $383,684 and 1050 POY Points. Ryan Fee, who finished fifth, went home with 875 POY Points and $272,842. The player who finished sixth was Tobias Reinkemeier, who won $218,842 and 700 POY Points. The player who finished seventh was Jared Jaffee, who won 525 POY Points and $167,684.
The players who finished eighth and ninth were Keven Stammen and Will Failla, respectively. While the former won $119,368 and 350 POY Points, the latter won $85,263 and 175 POY Points.
