Level 38
: Blinds 5,000,000/10,000,000, 10,000,000 ante
Marcelo Aziz raised to 20,000,000 on the button with 3?2? and Yinan Zhou defended from the big blind with Q?6?. The flop of Q?8?2? hit both players but Zhou once again found the bigger piece.
Zhou checked to Aziz who continued with a bet of 17,000,000 and Zhou check-raised to 55,000,000. Aziz quickly called and the 5? rolled off on the turn.
Zhou announced all in on the turn, putting Aziz to the test for his remaining stack but the Brazillian quickly dumped his bottom pair into the muck.
Level 38
: Blinds 5,000,000/10,000,000, 10,000,000 ante
Marcelo Aziz
Marcelo Aziz limped in on the button and Yinan Zhou jammed all in from he big blind. Aziz quickly called off his stack of 199,000,000 and the cards were on their backs.
Marcelo Aziz: A?7?
Yinan Zhou: A?8?
Zhou held the dominating hand but the flop of 7?3?3? gave Aziz two pair and the lead. The 2? and 2? runout was clean for Aziz who scored a double up to narrow the gap.
Level 38
: Blinds 5,000,000/10,000,000, 10,000,000 ante
The players have actually decided to take a full 60-minute dinner break with the blinds scheduled to go up to a 12,000,000 big blind when they return at approximately 8:30 p.m. local time.
The four-time basketball champion didn't make many poor decisions during his career on the San Antonio Spurs. He's known for having a high basketball IQ. But he made an uncharacteristic mistake in poker's largest guaranteed tournament ever that would cause his coach, Gregg Popovich, to sit him on the bench.
PokerNews caught up with Parker as he bagged up his chips on Day 1a and talked about his thought process in the hand, battling with seasoned pros and which of Parker's former Spurs teammates is the best poker player. He's currently battling in Day 2 of the $50 million guaranteed event.
Level 39
: Blinds 6,000,000/12,000,000, 12,000,000 ante
Marcelo Aziz limped in on the button with J?10? and Yinan Zhou made it 60,000,000 to go from the big blind with A?10?. Aziz called and they went to a flop of K?6?5?.
Zhou continued with a bet of 30,000,000 and Aziz made it 90,000,000 to go with the inferior hand. Zhou wasn't about to give up with ace-high as he called to see the 5? on the turn.
Zhou checked this time and Aziz counted out a bet of 75,000,000. Zhou used a time bank and then made it 280,000,000 after picking up a flush draw. Aziz wasted little time before sending his cards to the muck and Zhou shouted to his rail in celebration.
Level 39
: Blinds 6,000,000/12,000,000, 12,000,000 ante
Yinan Zhou limped in on the button with 7?6? and Marcelo Aziz made it 55,000,000 to go in the big blind with 10?4?. Zhou called and the dealer fanned the flop of K?7?5?.
Aziz continued the charade with a bet of 65,000,000 and Zhou ripped all in for 480,000,000, prompting a quick fold from Aziz to extend his lead.
Level 39
: Blinds 6,000,000/12,000,000, 12,000,000 ante
Marcelo Aziz
Yinan Zhou just called on the button and Marcelo Aziz shoved all in for his last 285,000,000 in the big blind. Zhou snap-called and started a pre-mature celebration with his rail after seeing the cards.
Marcelo Aziz: K?6?
Yinan Zhou: A?6?
Once again, Zhou found himself in a dominating position as he couldn't bare to watch the cards hit the felt. The dealer fanned the flop of J?7?5? which left Zhou in the lead with his ace-high. The 6? on the turn gave both players a pair of sixes but Aziz was down to just three outs.
The river was the 6? and the two embraced in a handshake as the rail erupted in celebration. Aziz was eliminated in second place and Zhou was overcome with emotion, becoming the 2024 WSOP Super Main Event champion.
Level 39
: Blinds 6,000,000/12,000,000, 12,000,000 ante
Yinan Zhou
Today, 24-year-old Yinan Zhou bluffed poker's toughest opponent, busted his poker idol and became the first-ever World Series of Poker (WSOP) Paradise Super Main Event champion as he won the $25,000 buy-in event in the Bahamas for $6,000,000 and his first bracelet.
The Super Main Event, a $50 million guaranteed event that fell short of that lofty and historic goal by $550,000, drew 1,978 runners across four live starting flights and three online flights.
China's Zhou grew up watching clips of Justin Bonomo and even modeled his table posture after poker's second-most-winning player. Zhou got to play with Bonomo at the final table today and halted his pursuit to inch closer to all-time money leader Bryn Kenney.
"I played at the final table with my idol and busted him," Zhou told PokerNews in a winner's interview. "That's awesome."
He also pulled off an impressive bluff against chip leader and sixth-place finisher Michael Addamo, who a few years ago was nominated for "Players Choice for Toughest Opponent" at the GPI awards.
Michael Addamo
"I'm feeling calm, to be honest," Zhou said. "When I started the final table nine-handed ... I (felt) very nervous, especially the big river bluff against Addamo. But when we got down to six, I (felt) very calm ... I just enjoy(ed) this final table."
WSOP Paradise Super Main Event Final Table Results
Place
Player
Country
Prize (USD)
1
Yinan Zhou
China
$6,000,000
2
Marcelo Aziz
Brazil
$4,600,000
3
Mustapha Kanit
Italy
$3,600,000
4
Liv Boeree
United Kingdom
$2,800,000
5
Christopher Nguyen
Austria
$2,100,000
6
Michael Addamo
Australia
$1,650,000
7
Justin Bonomo
United States
$1,300,000
8
Vadzim Lipauka
Belarus
$1,000,000
9
Georg Lehmann
Germany
$750,000
Boeree Makes History on Day 5
Despite rarely playing tournaments, science communicator, podcaster and former PokerStars ambassador Liv Boeree made the final table and even had the support of the world's richest person behind her.
The 2017 Tag Team bracelet winner ultimately finished fourth for a career-best $2,800,000, which is the biggest cash for a woman in tournament history after Wenling Gao's runner-up finish in the 2020 GGPoker WSOP Online Main Event for $2,748,605. Boeree's payout is about 1/165,714th of Elon Musk's net worth, or enough for 23 years of Burning Man Ultra VIP Experience tickets.
Some 2,300 miles away, Boeree's other half, former Musk aide Igor Kurganov, made a run at the WPT World Championship in Las Vegas and spoke to PokerNews'Calum Grant about his relationship with the highly powerful tech entrepreneur.
Jeff Platt & Liv Boeree
All eyes were on Bonomo he was threatened with disqualification on Day 4 over his Palestinian keffiyeh. Bonomo didn't bring a Palestinian flag to the final table like he had teased, but he did say "free Palestine" into the camera after falling in seventh place for $1,300,000.
Earlier on X, Bonomo promised to donate a portion of his winnings to Palestinian causes. When asked if he knew how much of his seven-figure score he planned to donate, he told PokerNews he didn't know yet and still had some accounting to do.
Justin Bonomo
A win for Italy's Mustapha Kanit would've put him at the top of the country's money list, but the eccentric pro fell in third before a heads-up battle between Zhou and Brazil's Marcelo Aziz, who had a story for the ages as he freerolled into the event online before earning a $4,600,000 payout for a runner-up finish.
Headsup Marcelo Aziz Yinan Zhou
"I Take Pride in My Country"
Zhou, who started playing poker in 2018 as an 18-year-old and has played "millions of hands online, both cash games and tournaments," was the second Chinese bracelet winner of the series. Lei Yu, who Zhou described as a "Chinese super pro," took down Event #6: $5,000 Deepstack No-Limit Hold’em for $293,050.
Ren Lin even paused his heads-up match against Nick Schulman in The Closer to congratulate Zhou and hop in a few winner's photos.
Yinan Zhou
"I take pride in my country," Zhou said. "Maybe this year is very good for us Chinese players."
On Streets We Call the Zhou
Zhou's bluff against Addamo, who is usually the one doing the bluffing, took place with seven players remaining and saw Addamo leading out on the turn with top pair as Zhou raised the Australian with just ace-high. Addamo called and checked on the overcard river, only to fold the best hand when faced with another bet.
How did Zhou have the courage to make such a move? "Because I come here for (the) win. I'm not (coming) here to fold."
Yinan Zhou
That wraps up the first-ever WSOP Super Main Event at the tail-end of an exciting stop in Paradise. Check out the live reporting hub in the meantime as the last tables are broken down in the Atlantis convention center.
