Mo Arani Wins World Series of Poker $5,000 No-Limit Hold'em Freezeout

Mo Arani is a cash game player based out of Dallas, Texas. He came into the 2022 World Series of Poker with more than $1.6 million in tournament earnings, with his largest score being a win in the 2013 Card Player Poker Tour Choctaw main event for $220,626. Arani added to his tournament resume in a major way during the final days of the series, besting a field of 756 players to win the $5,000 no-limit hold’em freezeout event for his first WSOP gold bracelet and a career-high score of $665,459.

The final heads-up battle for the bracelet pitted the Texan against Dutch player Johannes Straver. The two played for more than three hours before Arani was finally able to seal the deal.

“It feels surreal to win. I was getting out-played heads-up, I don’t have any heads-up experience, so I got some coaching and decided to take more spots and be ready to gamble more”, Arani told WSOP reporters after coming out on top. Two-time bracelet winner Calvin Anderson was one of the players on Arani’s rail who apparently advised him. “I never gave up. I was playing well when it was multi-way, the only time I felt like a worse player was during heads-up. But aside from that I was pretty comfortable in these spots.”

In addition to the title and the money, Arani also scored 1,824 Card Player Player of the Year points as the champion of this event. This was his first POY-qualified score of the year, but it alone was sufficient to catapult Arani up the standings and into 70th place on the 2022 POy leaderboard, which is presented by Global Poker.

The strong turnout for this event built a prize pool of $3,487,050 that was paid out among the top 114 finishers. Plenty of big names made deep runs inside the money, including bracelet winner Andrew Lichtenberger (60th – $11,523), bracelet winner and 2011 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure main event champion Galen Hall (51st – $12,703), two-time bracelet winner and Card Player columnist Steve Zolotow (43rd – $14,259), Jennifer Shahade (26th – $18,950), two-time bracelet winner Shankar Pillai (25th – $18,950), Kitty Kuo (22nd – $22,421), recent bracelet winner Nacho Barbero (17th – $22,421), five-time bracelet winner and two-time World Poker Tour champion Michael Mizrachi (12th – $33,011), and WPT and 2016 PCA main event champion Mike Watson (11th – $41,057).

The final day began with ten players remaining, with Peter Turmezey in the lead and Arani in seventh chip position. He survived to the official eight-handed final table as the shortest stack. Michael Katz (8th – $66,638) was the first to hit the rail at the final table, with his A-K suited losing a preflop race to the pocket fours of Adam Hendrix.

Arani chipped up a bit early at the final table, then scored a crucial double-up with A-K outrunning the pocket eights of Toby Lewis to move towards the top end of the chip counts.

Two-time bracelet winner Cliff Josephy’s run in this event came to an end when his J-9 suited ran into the pocket kings of Straver. Josephy made two pair on the river, but Straver improved to a flush using one of his kings to secure the pot and narrow the field to six. Josephy earned $86,917 as the seventh-place finisher, increasing his lifetime tournament earnings to more than $8.1 million.

Francois Pirault lost a race to Turmezey, earning $115,122 as the sixth-place finisher when his K-Q was unable to outrun the pocket tens of his Hungarian opponent.

Two-time European Poker Tour champion and 2018 Aussie Millions main event winner Toby Lewis was the next player to be sent packing. He called all-in with AK from the big blind facing the small-blind shove of Arani, who held Q8. The board brought five clubs, and Arani made a flush to eliminate Lewis in fifth place ($154,806). The UK poker pro grew his career earnings to more than $8.3 million with this score.

Adam Hendrix was also knocked out thanks to a battle of the blinds. Hendrix jammed from the small blind for around eight big blinds with Q-2 and was called with the Q-8 of Turmezey in the big blind. Both players made a pair of queens, but Termezey’s kicker played at showdown to see Hendrix eliminated in fourth place ($211,295). This was the seventh final-table finish of the year for Hendrix, who has won two titles so far in 2022. With nearly $950,000 in POY-qualified earnings and 3,417 total points, he now sits in 13th place in the overall POY standings.

Turmezey bowed out in third place ($292,665) when his A10, shoved from the button, ran into the QQ of Straver. Turmezey found no help on a king-high runout and was sent home with the first six-figure live tournament score of his career.

Arani took roughly a 2:1 chip lead into the heads-up showdown with Straver. He stretched his advantage to nearly 8:1 before Straver scored a few double-ups in rapid succession to see the lead change hands. After a couple of lead changes, Arani was in the ascendancy when the decisive hand of the match was dealt. The chips got in preflop with Arani shoving and Straver calling for around 7,000,000. Arani held 85 and was up against K10. Teh board came down 88643 to give Arani trip eights for the win.

Straver was awarded $411,279 as the runner-up finisher, by far the largest live tournament score of his career.

Here is a look at the payouts and rankings points awarded at the final table:

Winner photo credit: WSOP / Rachel Kay Miller.

You can follow the 2022 World Series of Poker on Card Player’s series landing page, sponsored by Global Poker, the fastest growing online poker room in the world. Check out the series schedule, as well as event recaps, news, and player interviews.

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