Who said poker was a young man’s game? The final table of the 2015 World Series of Poker Main Event has been set and among the nine still standing are the two oldest players to feature in the November Nine since the concept was first introduced in 2008.
At 61, Neil Blumenfield has four years on predecessor Steve Gee, who was 57 when he finished ninth in the 2012 WSOP Main Event, and in any other year would have made the new record his own.
Yet he is a mere baby compared to 72-year-old Belgian Pierre Neuville. A former board game maker, Neuville has made the trek to Las Vegas every year for the past seven years – amassing almost US$600,000 in winnings from 19 WSOP cashes in that time.
Incredibly, his hectic 2015 schedule has seen him play 25 events with just one other cash but this result more than makes amends with the November Nine all guaranteed at least US$1 million. Neuville is in decent shape heading to the final table, sitting fourth in chips as he aims to become the oldest Main Event champion in the tournament’s 46 year history.
While all nine players have guaranteed themselves a career-best score by making it this far, at least two of them have previously made their mark at the WSOP including dominant chip leader Joe McKeehan. Only last year McKeehan went agonizingly close to a WSOP bracelet when he finished second in the inaugural Monster Stack event, collecting US$820,863 for his efforts.
He is in great shape to go one better this time with his 63,100,000 stack more than twice that of nearest rival Zvi Stern.
The other man to keep an eye on is 27-year-old Max Steinberg – the only player in this year’s November Nine to have already won a WSOP bracelet. Steinberg outlasted a field of 2,795 players in a US$1,000 No Limit Hold’em event in 2012 for around US$440,000 and with a stack of 20,200,000 is in decent shape to make a run at the US$7,680,021 top prize.
Daniel Negreanu collapses to the ground after being eliminated from the 2015 WSOP Main Event in 11th
The biggest disappointment of yesterday’s play – certainly as far as the crowd watching on at the Rio was concerned – was the elimination of Daniel Negreanu in 11th. The six-time WSOP bracelet winner looked on track to reach the November Nine for the first time but couldn’t gather any momentum when it mattered most to fall just two places short.
The nine remaining players will return to the Rio’s Penn & Teller Theater on Sunday 8 November to play down to a winner.
The 2015 November Nine
Seat 1 Zvi Stern 29,800,000
Seat 2 Pierre Neuville 21,075,000
Seat 3 Josh Beckley 11,800,000
Seat 4 Max Steinberg 20,200,000
Seat 5 Tom Cannuli 12,250,000
Seat 6 Joe McKeehen 63,100,000
Seat 7 Patrick Chan 6,225,000
Seat 8 Federico Butteroni 6,200,000
Seat 9 Neil Blumenfield 22,000,000
