2025 World Series of Poker May 27th - July 16th
For now, Grinder’s on the front page if ESPN.com. Pretty decent writeup I guess.
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https://www.espn.com/espn/betting/story/_/id/45757909/michael-mizrachi-wins-2025-world-series-poker-main-event
Spoiler
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I've watched MM play quite a bit of poker over the years and he always struck me as a unique player. Sometimes I think, man hes just a really good live player who lacks some technical skills. Other times I thought man, this dude is just pretty ****ing lucky and really is out there on a limb in a lot of hands.
I've come to a conclusion, without the least bit of hate. Although he hangs out with some douchebags he is undeniably one of the most fortunate* players of all time.
I have a similar table presence as him in that hes not trying to hide tells and plays like its a home game in the most pressurized spots, and I respect that. Good for him, there's always got to be lottery winners in life.
I've watched MM play quite a bit of poker over the years and he always struck me as a unique player. Sometimes I think, man hes just a really good live player who lacks some technical skills. Other times I thought man, this dude is just pretty ****ing lucky and really is out there on a limb in a lot of hands. I've come to a conclusion, without the least bit of hate. Although
You don’t win 4 PPC’s, which are mostly limit mixed games, if you aren’t a helluva player. “Lottery” theory only goes so far.
Can anyone find a single example of a post flop 3b+hand since the dawn of televised poker where it wasn’t air vs air? It’s literally always the same, both monkeying around while commentators gasp how sick of a play it is and the hands he is repping. He aint repping **** lol
When did anyone ever 4bet click IP with 2p+?
unorthodox is just a euphemism for ******ed
Dunaway T6s call, Mizrachi should be shoving really wide from the SB. Dunaway has to do something to avoid get blinded out / losing FE. Dunaway has to gii in the next 3 hands or so. You would rather shove than call. It isn't a terrible call. You need to look at the dynamics of future hands and not just cEV or cEV adjusted for ICM. There isn't much ICM issues at that point. I am not a wizard, but good at SNGs.
I've watched MM play quite a bit of poker over the years and he always struck me as a unique player. Sometimes I think, man hes just a really good live player who lacks some technical skills. Other times I thought man, this dude is just pretty ****ing lucky and really is out there on a limb in a lot of hands. I've come to a conclusion, without the least bit of hate. Although
So he is another fish who is consistently lucky like Negreanu? How does one get lucky and win a 9-game slow structure tournament with about 100 high stakes players 4 times?
I agree he makes some technical mistakes, most obviously in short stack tournament play, as discussed in this thread.
Dunaway T6s call, Mizrachi should be shoving really wide from the SB. Dunaway has to do something to avoid get blinded out / losing FE. Dunaway has to gii in the next 3 hands or so. You would rather shove than call. It isn't a terrible call. You need to look at the dynamics of future hands and not just cEV or cEV adjusted for ICM. There isn't much ICM issues at that point. I am
It’s a clear fold in a sitngo
Dunaway T6s call, Mizrachi should be shoving really wide from the SB. Dunaway has to do something to avoid get blinded out / losing FE. Dunaway has to gii in the next 3 hands or so. You would rather shove than call. It isn't a terrible call. You need to look at the dynamics of future hands and not just cEV or cEV adjusted for ICM. There isn't much ICM issues at that point. I am
Have to disagree with this one. Yes, he is the clear short stack but having few chips is no excuse for suddenly having zero chips. He still has 9 bb, and can push either from SB the next hand or from BTN the hand after. Heck, even passing through the blinds once more wouldn't be a complete disaster IMO.
Even if Grinder is showing super wide from SB, T6hh is still behind. I ran it through 'PokerStrategy Equilab', and even against a 70% (!) push range from SB (which includes hands like 93s, 63s etc.), a suited T6 still only have 42.71% equity.
Can Grinder push this wide? Probably. Is he unlucky to run into a hand that actually had him dominated? Sure. But I just can't fantom the thinking behind calling it off there when you will get so many spots to be first in the next couple of minutes. Or actually get dealt a decent/good hand the next time someone jams on you.
It's honestly mind-boggling to me how players can make it this far and be so clueless about short stack strategy. Although in his defense, Dunaway is probably ten times better than me to pick up pots earlier in the tournament and thus don't find himself short stacked too often.
Dunaway is not a good player. He is an amateur, maybe a wealthy one. I mentioned before that he 4! to almost 4x the 3! with KK. This his opponent was 3! bluffing, but could have lost a lot of action. Just terrible play. You have to be sort of a decent player to come in 3rd in this event, but he seems like basically a donk.
Griff, who can in 2nd last time was an amateur, but probably a winning 1/3 or 2/5 player and didn't make obvious huge mistakes.
As discussed in this thread, Mizrachi also made huge short stacked mistakes.
Ivey does not even smile/ gives the Ivey stare in a winners photo. Amazing LOL
Have there been any WSOP winners that did not get incredibly lucky? Perhaps some obviously more than others. Did Jamie Gold run the hottest ever or was it The Grinder or someone else?
This is a 10,000-player tournament, and there's no other way to get to FT than a super sunrun. That should be obvious to everyone. That's how the game works.
If she knew Kenny had 66, how should she have played it What's his range of checking hands, that will likely either win her the blinds anyway after the flop or could be very tricky to play oop against a big stack
There's no way limp-call 100% of shoves is the best strategy in this specific situation. In a $230 weekly buyin during the rebuy period, sure.
designing a strategy so that you could have won against (or lost the least against) your opponent's exact hand once you learn it after the fact isn't anything good poker players do. you see this in the strat forum all the time where people say things like "should have just open ripped my AA for 44 bigs pre so the BB didn't defend whatever and get lucky" which is idiotic nonsense, because we don't have that information when we are making decisions.
she has a strategy based on her overall range, and Kenny's overall strategy with his entire range.
she can still win more than the blind's against his checking hands. say he has 84o, flop is T83 or whatever, he's going to pay at least one bet. The only way she's going to get more money from him when he has garbage is to complete, and then either get more postflop, or he may raise some of his garbage hands as a bluff, which she will then jam over and win more money.
she rates to have the best hand, and they are 20bb deep effective, so there is not some crazy reverse implied odds factor, and there's no tiny stack so no massive ICM factor.
limp/jam over raise or call shove >>> 3x and call shove / open jam >>> limp/fold >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> open fold
The chance of winning a tournament with 100 players 4 times in 15 attempts if the winner was chosen by random is .0013% = 15C4(.01)^4(.99)^11. The chance of winning a 100 player tournament and a 10,000 player tournament is .0001%= .01 * .0001. So maybe he is just a lottery winner.
Dunaway is not a good player. He is an amateur, maybe a wealthy one. I mentioned before that he 4! to almost 4x the 3! with KK. This his opponent was 3! bluffing, but could have lost a lot of action. Just terrible play. You have to be sort of a decent player to come in 3rd in this event, but he seems like basically a donk. Griff, who can in 2nd last time was an amateur, but pro
Not saying this is you, but many of the 2+2 people who think Dunaway is a donk are much easier to play against and much less of a threat to final table the main than he is.
Dunaway is a poor man's Mizrachi, and even if he makes technical mistakes, he is still very difficult to play against in a tournament where players are erring too far on the side of caution.
Can anyone find a single example of a post flop 3b+hand since the dawn of televised poker where it wasn’t air vs air? It’s literally always the same, both monkeying around while commentators gasp how sick of a play it is and the hands he is repping. He aint repping **** lol
When did anyone ever 4bet click IP with 2p+?
I agree with you. Think at the very least he should have called the flop and made Hendrix blink.
24 left, 3bb stack, UTG and about to go through the blinds, pick up AKs and that's all she wrote!
Think the only short stack that won an all in at final table was grinder ak vs kk.
All the rest busted first hand all in at risk.
Not saying this is you, but many of the 2+2 people who think Dunaway is a donk are much easier to play against and much less of a threat to final table the main than he is.
Dunaway is a poor man's Mizrachi, and even if he makes technical mistakes, he is still very difficult to play against in a tournament where players are erring too far on the side of caution.
Right. There may not be two NLHE events more difficult to fluke at the WSOP than the Monster Stack and Main, both of which are very slow and deep with plenty of opportunities to punt off your chips. Dunaway didn't get to these spots purely by accident. We actually didn't see much of him on stream until the final 27, but clearly he was doing a lot of things well.
He kinda played really passive at the final table in maybe bad ways. Flat 56 suited on the button and give up.
But he did ladder to 3rd.
This is a 10,000-player tournament, and there's no other way to get to FT than a super sunrun. That should be obvious to everyone. That's how the game works.
Well, I'm seriously wondering whether it is obvious to EVERYONE. It baffles me how so much people suddenly see him as some kind of god, while all in all, he just had an insanely lucky run. And then gets rewarded with an instant Hall Of Fame place. How does that even make any sense ?
This is a 10,000-player tournament, and there's no other way to get to FT than a super sunrun. That should be obvious to everyone. That's how the game works.
Yet people are idolizing this guy like he is Tom Brady or Tiger Woods.
There is no doubt that you have to know what you are doing to put yourself into position to win one of these things. That being said, there are thousands of people in these tournaments who know what they are doing but still have to get incredibly lucky to win.
The same thing is happening in best ball fantasy football. The guy's who have been incredibly lucky to have won Best Ball Mania now have podcasts. The best ball nerds idolize these lottery winners and take their word as the gospel.
Schulman getting teary eyed in the booth after Grinder's win...........Ali with the classic one-upmanship
This is a 10, 000-player tournament, and there's no other way to get to FT than a super sunrun. That should be obvious to everyone. That's how the game works.
Well, I'm seriously wondering whether it is obvious to EVERYONE. It baffles me how so much people suddenly see him as some kind of god, while all in all, he just had an insanely lucky run. And then gets rewarded with an in
While I agree with this, but live MTT poker is a results oriented business. I think it's certain that there has been and are incredibly skilled MTT players out there whose live career never really kicked off due to just running like shit for an example the first 100 live tourneys they played, and then just returned back online or are making money but never reach the most massive final tables, not yet at least.
And then we all know there are some famous players who are now set for life due to some incredible sun run binks and then secured commercial endorsements. Not saying Mizrachi is one of them.
Poker is indeed alive as long as people don't understand positive and negative variance, and it's actually kind of funny always reading headlines like 'The Grinder outplays 10k entrants and wins the most wanted bracelet in poker'. Yeah the dude was winning flips and he knows that's what it takes in addition to playing well. GG.
There is a lot of luck involved, but no one ever won the ME and PPC in the same year, and no one ever won 4 PPCs. Unusual to win the ME and win any WSOP high roller in the same year. It is also really rare for a well known player to win the ME with these close to 10K fields.
Obviously, if he didn't hit that ace on the river with AK vs. KK allin preflop, he would have been out early in the final table of the ME. Obviously, it isn't chess or gold or tennis and he isn't the best player because he won the ME.
