The 2016 World Series Of Poker November Nine was finalized late Monday evening, as the remaining competitors will take a months-long break before battling it out for the $8 million top prize and the coveted main event bracelet.

2016 Wsop Winner

2016 WSOP Winners The Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada was packed with players and fans who wanted a piece of WSOP action. 68 out of the 69 events have officially ended, and there were several stand-out performances this year. World Series of Poker Bracelet Winners. The table below displays all WSOP Bracelet winners for the selected event. To view a different event select it by using the drop down box below. For more than forty years, the World Series of Poker has been the most trusted name in the game. WSOP Bracelet Winners. 2020 World Series of Poker Online; $500 WSOP.com No-Limit Hold'em Kick-Off Jonathan Dokler Buy-in: $500 1st Place Prize: $130,426.

The finalists are chip leader and two-time bracelet winner Cliff Josephy (74,600,000), Qui Nguyen (67,925,000), Gordon Vayo (49,375,000), Kenny Hallaert (43,325,000), Michael Ruane (31,600,000), Vojtech Ruzicka (27,300,000), Griffin Benger (26,175,000), Jerry Wong (10,175,000) and Fernando Pons (6,150,000). They are each guaranteed a seven-figure payday. Below is a detailed look at the card players.

The final table bubble was Josh Weiss, who entered 10-handed play with just a handful of blinds. It didn’t take long before Weiss was gone and the finalists started celebrating.

The main event this year had a prize pool of $63,327,800, of which roughly $25.5 million will be awarded to the final nine players.

The 6,737-player starting field was the most the main event has had in five years. A total of 1,011 players made the money, the most in the history of the event. The WSOP gave each player a starting stack of 50,000, up from 30,000 in previous years. There are more than 336 million chips in play.

Eighty countries were represented in the main event, and the average player age was just above 40. The final table’s average age is just over 35 years.

Notable eliminations on day 7 included 2009 November Niner Antoine Saout (25th for $269,430), eight-time WSOP Circuit champion Valentin Vornicu (23rd for $269,430), high-stakes cash game player Jared Bleznick (16th for $338,288), 2010 Card PlayerPOY winner Tom Marchese (14th for $427,930) and Australian poker pro James Obst (13th for $427,930).

Marchese, who has more than $13 million in lifetime tournament earnings, was the best player entering day 7 and was looking for his first WSOP bracelet. After exiting the feature table stage, Marchese was met by Phil Hellmuth, who told him that he’d “be back here again.”

“All you can do is try to pay attention to the action, and get some reads on your opponents,” Marchese said of playing against so many unfamiliar faces in the no-limit hold’em championship. “Obviously you can generalize with a bunch of players based on where they are from or what they look like. All I could do was make the best decisions based on the information I had.”

Even though there was $8 million up top, Marchese said the main event was basically just another day in the office. He has five seven-figure scores to his name. “I’ve played for a lot of money in a bunch of [tournaments] and this wasn’t really any different. I was fortunate enough to go as far as I did, but at the end unfortunate to not go further. It is what it is.”

Here’s a deeper look at the 2016 November Nine:

Seat: 1 — Griffin Benger

Chip Count: 26,175,000
Location: Toronto, ON
Age: 31
Profession: Poker Player
Lifetime Earnings: $1,386,295
Biggest Poker Score: 2013 EPT Berlin High Roller — 1st Place ($562,343)

Seat: 2 — Vojtech Ruzicka

Chip Count: 27,450,000 (6th)
Location: Prague, Czech Republic
Age: 36
Profession: Poker Player
Lifetime Earnings: $1,149,027
Biggest Poker Score: 2013 EPT Deauville High Roller — 3rd Place ($426,907)

Seat: 3 — Fernando Pons

Chip Count: 6,225,000 (9th)
Location: Palma, Spain
Age: 37
Profession: Account Manager
Lifetime Earnings: $20,653
Biggest Poker Score: 2012 Campeonato de España de Poker — 2nd Place ($19,127)

Wsop Winners List

Seat: 4 — Qui Nguyen

Chip Count: 68,075,000 (2nd)
Location: Las Vegas, NV
Age: 39
Profession: Gambler
Lifetime Earnings: $52,986
Biggest Poker Score: 2013 Aria $125 Nightly — 1st Place ($3,220)

Seat: 5 — Cliff Josephy

Chip Count: 75,000,000 (1st)
Location: Muttontown, NY
Age: 50
Profession: Poker Player
Lifetime Earnings: $2,641,620
Biggest Poker Score: 2006 Aruba Poker Classic — 2nd Place ($446,975)

Seat: 6 — Michael Ruane

Chip Count: 29,800,000 (5th)
Location: Maywood, NJ
Age: 28
Profession: Poker Player
Lifetime Earnings: $44,962
Biggest Poker Score: 2012 EPT Campione Main Event — 30th Place ($17,244)

Seat: 7 — Gordon Vayo

Chip Count: 50,450,000 (3rd)
Location: San Francisco, CA
Age: 27
Profession: Poker Player
Lifetime Earnings: $974,714
Biggest Poker Score: 2014 WSOP $3,000 NLH — 2nd Place ($314,535)

Seat: 8 — Kenny Hallaert

Chip Count: 43,325,000 (4th)
Location: Hansbeke, Belgium
Age: 37
Profession: Poker Player
Lifetime Earnings: $1,714,610
Biggest Poker Score: 2011 EPT Deauville Main Event — 6th Place ($210,962)

Seat: 9 — Jerry Wong

Chip Count: 10,325,000 (8th)
Location: Brooklyn, NY
Age: 34
Profession: Poker Player
Lifetime Earnings: $1,317,539
Biggest Poker Score: 2013 PCA Main Event — 3rd Place ($725,000)

For more coverage from the summer series, visit the 2016 WSOP landing page complete with a full schedule, news, player interviews and event recaps.

2016 Wsop Champion

Vietnamese-American Qui Nguyen won the 2016 World Series of Poker Main Event early Wednesday morning. On the final day of battle at the final table, the 39-year-old Nguyen defeated both Cliff Josephy and Gordon Vayo to capture the coveted WSOP bracelet and bundles of cash worth over $8,000,000.

The start of the day was action-packed with Josephy doubling up in the first hand, only to lose 90 percent of his stack four hands later. Josephy made a comeback but eventually exited in third place anyway, leaving the heads-up part to Vayo and Nguyen. They played heads-up for several hours before Nguyen ultimately knocked out a short-stacked Vayo with king-ten versus jack-ten.

2016 Wsop Main Event Winner

The final day of play started with three players still in contention for the title, after four players had been eliminated on the first two days of play at the final table of WSOP. Nguyen led with a massive stack of 165 big blinds, over twice as much as both Josephy and Vayo. Here's how they lined up as play got underway on the final day:

Wsop Main Event Winners

As soon as tournament director Jack Effel asked the dealer to shuffle up and deal and the ESPN cameras got rolling, the players got right into it. What followed was one of the most intense and action-packed set of hands ever seen at a World Series of Poker Main Event final table.

Right in the first hand, Josephy doubled through Nguyen. Wearing a hat and sunglasses for the first time this tournament, Josephy successfully five-bet shoved with ace-queen as Nguyen called with ace-four. The latter was drawing dead by the time the turn came out and Josephy started stacking.

While the first hand of the final day was a dream coming true for Josephy, the fifth hand of play would be the complete opposite. The nightmare for Josephy started with him raising and getting called by Vayo. Nguyen squeezed and both Josephy and Vayo wanted to see a flop and called. The flop came king-three-deuce rainbow and Nguyen bet just shy of 10 million. Josephy and Vayo called, growing the pot immensely. A four hit the turn and Vayo and Nguyen checked before Josephy bet 21 million. Vayo shoved for 75 million and Nguyen folded before Josephy eventually called. Vayo showed a set of threes and Josephy raised his arms in the air, realizing he had just a single out with his set of deuces. A blank on the river resulted in a monstrous 200 million stack for Vayo while Josephy was left with just eight big blinds.

On the very next hand, Josephy doubled through Nguyen and repeated that feat not much later, this time with a suck out, to get back to the stack size he had started the day with. While Josephy had 'his' chips back and seemed composed, in the end, he would still be next to go. He lost a big pot against Nguyen when he tried to bluff him off of top pair unsuccessfully. The remainder of his stack went in minutes later, getting it in with queen-three against the king-six of Vayo. Both paired up on the flop and as the turn and river blanked, Josephy had to say his goodbyes.

With that, the tournament was down to heads-up play and the bundles of cash were brought out to the table.

Vayo led, but not for long. What followed was as entertaining a heads-up match as any. Vayo and Nguyen played as fast paced as before. Nguyen even snap shoved a couple of times.

2016 Wsop Me Winner

While the cards were not initially favoring Vayo, the commentary team over on ESPN wondered out loud why he was playing so passively in certain spots. He folded the better hand more than once and seemed hesitant to bet even when he made his hand. In the meantime, Nguyen chipped away at his opponent time and time again, only to ultimately double him up every single time, failing to find the knockout blow.

One of the most intense hands for the two got all the chips in the middle on a queen-high board. Nguyen had by far the best hand with ace-queen while Vayo had just queen-five for top-pair with not much of a kicker. Vayo, once again, put his arm around Nguyen and together they awaited their fate. Spades on the turn and river made Vayo a miraculous runner-runner flush and the two gladiators went back to their corners to fight on.

While the two were jovial and friendly with each other as soon as all the chips were in the middle, there were still decisions to be made and the atmosphere was tense. Nguyen looked cold-blooded when putting Vayo to the ultimate test, staring at his opponent without any emotion from behind his sunglasses and trademark raccoon hat. Vayo's body language gave away his emotions and the commentators and railbirds on Twitter said he didn't look happy to be where he was.

Eventually, Vayo was grinded down again and made a stand. He pushed his last 18 big blinds with jack-ten suited over a button raise by Nguyen only to get called by the dominating king-ten. Vayo flopped a double gutshot, but his draw would fail to complete. After blanks on the turn and river, Vayo made his exit in second place, good for $4,661,228.

Nguyen, the self-proclaimed gambler born in Vietnam but now living in Las Vegas, is now the new World Series of Poker champion and he took home $8,005,310. Nguyen said he would donate a portion of his winnings to the Wounded Warrior Project, a military and veteran charity service organization empowering injured veterans and their families.

2016 Wsop Bracelet Winners

_{* Winner photo courtesy of Jayne Furman, WSOP.com}

• Tags

  Qui NguyenGordon VayoCliff Josephy

• Related Players

  Cliff JosephyGordon VayoQui Nguyen