Card Player Player of the Year Weekly Update

It has been a busy two weeks on the tournament trail, and there have been drastic changes on the Card Player Player of the Year leader board. Almost every spot in the top 10 has been shuffled over the course of a busy two weeks, with one exception. Mike McDonald still holds the top spot, but he has some worthy competitors nipping at his heels. One thing was for sure over the past two weeks, with tons of major events deciding champions — including World Poker Tour L.A. Poker Classic, the NBC National Heads-up Poker Championship, and the European Poker Tour Scandinavian Open — there was no shortage of POY points to be awarded.

Most of those points were snapped up by none other than Phil Ivey. Ivey is currently in second place in the POY standings with 2,610 points. He was a major factor at both the LAPC and the NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship during the past two weeks. First, Ivey beat 664 other competitors to win his first WPT title, 2,400 points, and $1,596,100 in prize money at the LAPC. Ivey also broke his own record by making an eighth WPT final table. The very next day, Ivey won his first-round match at the NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship against online qualifier Alisha Kunze. He then went on to defeat Johnny Chan in the round of 32, J.C. Tran in the sweet 16, and Gus Hansen in the elite eight before he fell to the eventual champion, Chris Ferguson, in the final four. Ivey added another 210 POY points to his total for that finish and an additional $125,000. Ivey is also second on the money-won list for the year; he has won $1,721,100 playing tournament poker, and he is behind only Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier, who won every penny of his $2 million at the record-breaking EPT PokerStars Caribbean Adventure in January. He also broke into the top 10 all-time money winners with his recent scores. He immediately put this money to good use and he donated $50,000 to the Empowered 2 Excel charity. Click here to read more about Ivey’s charity donation.

Quinn Do jumped into a three-way tie for eighth place with Andreas Gulunay and Hafiz Khan by finishing as runner-up to Ivey at the LAPC. The second-place finish gave Do 2,000 points and $909,400 in prize money. Tim Vance jumped into 11th place, just 80 points behind Do by winning the EPT Scandinavian Open last weekend. This event drew a field of 460 players to Copenhagen, Denmark, and Vance walked away as the champion with 1,920 points and $1,210,699 in prize money.

POY Weekly Update — Quick Hits:

• Michael Binger won no-limit hold’em event No. 27 at the LAPC to win 768 points and $125,730 in prize money. This was the third final table of the year for Binger, who also made appearances at the no-limit hold’em bounty event (second place), and the sixhanded no-limit hold’em event (fourth place) at the Aussie Millions in January. Binger now has a total of 1,796 points, and he is currently in 13th place in the standings.
• Bernard Lee made the final table at the World Series of Poker Circuit event at the Horseshoe Casino in Council Bluffs, Iowa. He earned 240 points along with $37,965 in prize money for his fourth-place finish.
• The final four players at the NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship received POY points last week. Ivey and Huck Seed both earned 210 POY points and $125,000 for their third-place finishes, while Andy Bloch received 300 points and $250,000 for finishing as runner-up. Ferguson walked away with 360 points and $500,000 in prize money for winning the event.

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