2017 World Series of Poker Main Event Begins Saturday

Card Player’s 2017 WSOP coverage is sponsored by BetOnline Poker.

It’s here!

The 2017 World Series of Poker still has some preliminary events to wrap up, and a very tight Player of the Year race to determine, but the $10,000 buy-in main event officially kicks off Saturday at 11 a.m. in Las Vegas.

The $10,000 main event was introduced back in 1972 and has since become THE dream for anyone who has ever played the game seriously. It was won Thomas “Amarillo Slim” Preston, who topped a field of eight players to earn the entire prize pool. (Johnny Moss was voted the best all-around player in 1970, and also won the $5,000 buy-in main event in 1971.)

Along the way, there have been hundreds of memorable story lines. Doyle Brunson went back-to-back in 1976 and 1977. Stu Ungar matched that accomplishment in 1980 and 1981 before getting his record-setting third main event title in 1997.

In 1982, Jack “Treetop” Strauss came back to win the main event after being left with just a single chip, giving an origin story to the phrase “a chip and a chair.” In 2003, a man appropriately named Chris Moneymaker sparked an online poker boom with his main event win.

Johnny Chan almost did the unthinkable back in 1989, coming remarkably close to winning his third straight main event title. The guy that beat him? That was none other than the Poker Brat himself, 14-time bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth.

The 2016 main event attracted a field of 6,737, creating a total prize pool of $62,327,800. Qui Nguyen, a Las Vegas-based poker player and former nail salon worker, shook off the fact that he had only ever cashed once at the WSOP and somehow managed to win the title and the $8,005,310 first-place prize.

The biggest difference between the 2016 and 2017 editions of the main event is that the November Nine concept is dead. For nine years, the final nine players in the main event would bag up for the summer and return to the Rio in Las Vegas to play out the final table months later, usually in November.

Instead, the 2017 final table will start after a two-day break on July 20, with the champion crowned on July 22. Everyone in the main event will start with 50,000 in chips and enjoy two-hour levels. Approximately 15 percent of the field will make the money.

Check out the schedule for the main event below.

For more coverage from the summer series, visit the 2017 WSOP landing page complete with a full schedule, news, player interviews and event recaps.

If you can’t make it down to the WSOP at the Rio, you can still play with BetOnline Poker. Click the banner below for more information. Card Player readers are eligible for an initial deposit bonus offer of 100 percent up to $2,500. Enter code ‘NEWBOL’

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