Main Event Drama as Moneymaker Bubbles the Money and Mizrachi Survives Cut
The 2026 WSOP Main Event reached Day 4 in Las Vegas last night as the money bubble burst in the World Championship. With 1,389 players starting the day, just 533 remained at the close of play, with the reigning champion and GGPoker Global Ambassador Michael Mizrachi still in contention to become the first back-to-back winner since Johnny Chan’s 1988 victory.
Moneymaker Bursts the Bubble
The 2003 world champion Chris Moneymaker came into the action with a decent stack, but after early hands hit him hard, he was sat on the money bubble as one of six players at risk of leaving with nothing. With only one player needing to bust by that point, Moneymaker knew that if multiple people were eliminated, then he’d have a split of the first payouts, and there would then be a blind hand dealt to determine who won the bubble saver prize of a $25,000 WSOP Paradise package.
Moneymaker, who changed his life and the game of poker forever when he won $2.5m as the 2003 champion after qualifying for the $10,000 Main Event via an $80 satellite, played the board of 8-7-7-8-7 with jack-nine after the chips were committed, with Antonio Vargas knocking him out with pocket aces in his hand.
As Jack Effel announced the all-in hands, Moneymaker was not the only evictee. The 2020 Online Main Event winner, Bulgarian pro Stoyan Madanzhiev, moved all-in and put himself at risk with ace-king but the pocket fives of Gregory Brown held. Lastly, Kazakhstan player Zhaken Seitbekov paired his ace but lost to a flopped set of sixes belonging to Dan Stavila to miss out too.
With two cashes and three players, that meant $30,000 would be divided three equal ways, so Moneymaker, Madanzhiev and Seitbekov all took home $10,000 – the price of their ticket into the Main Event. The bubble prize of a $25,000 package to WSOP Paradise was still on the line, with a board of Q-Q-9-J-4 leaving each player to turn over their cards. Moneymaker’s five-deuce was no good, nor was Madanzhiev’s six-five. Zhaken Seitbekov’s king-deuce gave him the kicker required to lock up the $25,000 package.
Mizrachi Among Those Still Chasing Glory
With a total field of 9,208 players, the 2026 World Championship has already been confirmed as the fourth largest Main Event in history, and with just 533 still in the hunt for the $10 million top prize, reigning champion Michael Mizrachi is still in their fighting to be the first player to retain the Main Event title since Johnny Chan back in 1988. ‘Grinder’ only has 440,000 chips but as he told Jeff Platt after his Day 4, that’s 22 big blinds and around 20 more than he was left with at one stage last year.
“Plenty”, as Mizrachi declared it.
Leading the field at the conclusion of Day 4 was the American Sam Sweilem (3,800,000), with his fellow U.S. players Steven O’Nan (3,600,000) and Kyle Mart (3,480,000) also inside the top four place. Third on the leaderboard was Russian legend Artur Martirosian (3,495,000) with Colombian pro Farid Jattin (3,040,000) also inside the top 10 chipcounts.
PokerStake players are littered among the players who will come back to play down to the business end of the world’s biggest poker tournament. PGT legend Brock Wilson (2,415,000, below), the reigning WSOP Player of the Year Shaun Deeb (1,500,000), Mixed Games tournament boss Chino Rheem (655,000), and the seven-time WSOP bracelet winner Josh Arieh (610,000) will all be looking forward to the action restarting.
Foxen Proves Himself to be Poker Royalty
Poker legend and 2026 bracelet winner Alex Foxen made a royal flush as he bagged up a massive 1,695,000 chips, and he wasn’t the only one to total so much that the aim from the start of Day 5 should be to go very deep indeed in this year’s Main Event. The Global Poker Award-winning content creator Caitlin Comeskey (1,740,000), Japanese vlogger Masato Yokosawa (1,545,000), high roller Sean Winter (1,525,000), and the bracelet winner and presenter Tony Dunst (1,245,000) are all sitting pretty for Day 5 of the Main too.
Four previous Main Event winners are still hoping they’ll win it again in 2026. The 2019 winner Hossein Ensan (2,580,000) was top of the former champions, with 2004 winner Greg ‘Fossilman’ Raymer (535,000) and 2013 winner Ryan Riess (455,000) joining the defending champion Michael Mizrachi (440,000) in the seat draw. Other big names like Ryan Leng (990,000), Stephen Chidwick (760,000), Boris Angelov (580,000), Martin Zamani (545,000), David Peters (430,000), and Patrick Leonard (295,000) have varying expectations to match their stacks.
Plenty of big names busted the Main Event after the money bubble burst. PokerStake seller and six-time WSOP champion Kristen Foxen (1,331st) took home a min-cash of $15,000, as did bracelet winner Stephen Song (1,049th) and the British online crusher and two-time WSOP winner Chris Moorman (1,041st).
Jesse Lonis (921st), Alex Livingston (897th), Ren Lin (746th), 2017 champion Scott Blumstein (666th), 2005 champ Joe Hachem (803rd), and the 2018 champion John Cynn (617th) all made a little more money but missed out on a Day 5 stack.
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