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If you were to ask the poker world two years ago who Jeremy Becker was, you most likely would've been met with blank stares. But Becker's meteoric rise is proving to be no fluke after shipping event number two and the first $10,000 buyin of the 2024 Poker Masters presented by PokerStars NAPT, for $255,000 in prize money and his first PGT trophy. This is Becker's biggest career score and his first ever six-figure cash, and the New York native has now amassed over $2,000,000 in lifetime career earnings, according to The Hendon Mob.
Becker mentioned that he got into poker in college as a teen since his school happened to be close to a casino where the legal age to play was only 18, and after getting the hang of it rather quickly, he never looked back.
Becker was able to overcome a nearly five-to-one chip deficit to defeat Michael "Texas Mike" Moncek in heads-up play to win Event #2: $10,100 No-Limit Hold'em, catapulting him to the top of the Poker Masters Purple Jacket Leaderboard.
The event number two field of 100 entrants created a prize pool of $1,000,000 and the final 15 players earned a piece of it. Jesse Lonis just missed out, busting on the money bubble. Vladas Tamasauskas (15th), Chris Hunichen (14th), Kenneth Kim (13th), and Sam Laskowitz (12th) were the first to fall once the money was reached. Andrew Lichtenberger (11th), Dan Smith (10th), and Event #1 champion Spencer Champlin (9th) followed shortly after.
Nick Schulman fell just short of the final table in eighth place, getting his chips in with ace-eight against Becker's ace-king. An eight found the flop to give Schulman the lead, but Becker turned a king and held up through the river to set the final table of six players.
Dylan Linde was eliminated by Sean Winter in seventh place after raising all in from late position and then calling Winter's three-bet shove from the big blind. Linde's ace-queen offsuit fell to Winter's pocket three's on a jack-high runout.
The final table action quickly heated up as the always jovial Ren Lin came in with the short stack and moved all in from the button with ace-seven offsuit, only to run into the kings of Daniel Sepiol in the big blind. Lin couldn't spike an ace to survive and was out the door in sixth place for $50,000.
It would be two whole levels before losing another player, but after making back-to-back final tables it was Nicholas Seward who would bow out in fifth place. Seward found himself all in with ace-eight of hearts against the ace-nine offsuit of Moncek, and would pull ahead by spiking an eight on the flop, but running nines for Moncek sealed the elimination and sent Seward home in fifth for $65,000.
The red-hot Daniel Sepiol came into the day second in chips, just behind Becker, but became one of the low stacks after shipping ace-four offsuit preflop into the short stack of Moncek, who woke up with queens. Moncek would go on to hold and then eliminate Sepiol a short while later by turning a straight with his pocket sixes in an all in pot against Sepiol’s queen-nine suited. Sepiol had a queen-high straight redraw, but it did not fruit, and would take home $90,000 for the effort.
Sean Winter would be the third-place finisher and after working his short stack up to the chip lead at one point, suffered a bad beat at the hands of Moncek when Moncek was able to crack Winter’s kings with king-nine suited by flopping a straight. Winter had chop-outs but could not catch up and was out the door in third, cashing for $115,000.
Moncek started heads-up play with nearly a five-to-one chip lead, but after back-to-back doubles from Becker, he was able to even things up. A big shift came when Becker hero-called a big river bluff from Moncek with king-high against Moncek's ten-high, and then Becker was able to eliminate Moncek shortly after by spiking a ten with queen-ten offsuit against Moncek's ace-seven offsuit in the final all in pot.
Place | Name | Country | Payouts | PGT Points |
1st | Jeremy Becker | United States | $255,000 | 255 |
2nd | Michael Moncek | United States | $165,000 | 165 |
3rd | Sean Winter | United States | $115,000 | 115 |
4th | Daniel Sepiol | United States | $90,000 | 90 |
5th | Nicholas Seward | United States | $65,000 | 65 |
6th | Ren Lin | China | $50,000 | 50 |
Following today's Event, Jeremy Becker takes over the top spot and Spencer Champlin moves into second. Champlin scored his second cash of the series, but fell short of making the final table. Dylan Linde and Nicholas Seward also collected their second cash's of the series and will be looking to make some headway in the coming events. After today's final table appearance, Ren Lin rounds out the top ten Puple Jacket Leaderboard.
Rank | Player | Points | Wins | Cashes | Winnings |
1st | Jeremy Becker | 255 | 1 | 1 | $255,000 |
2nd | Spencer Champlin | 190 | 1 | 2 | $190,475 |
3rd | Michael Moncek | 165 | 0 | 1 | $165,000 |
4th | Sean Winter | 115 | 0 | 1 | $115,000 |
5th | Dylan Linde | 112 | 0 | 2 | $112,050 |
6th | Jessica Vierling | 98 | 0 | 1 | $98,250 |
7th | Nicholas Seward | 98 | 0 | 2 | $97,750 |
8th | Daniel Sepiol | 90 | 0 | 1 | $90,000 |
9th | Dan Shak | 52 | 0 | 1 | $52,000 |
10th | Ren Lin | 50 | 0 | 1 | $50,000 |
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