Written by Thomas | Thursday, June 3rd, 2010

Poker tournament all-star Michael Mizrachi took down the $50,000 Players Championship as part of the 2010 World Series of Poker earlier this morning, beating out a field of legends in the process – and even his own brother Robert, who also final tabled this huge buy-in event. The final table only lasted for over 225 hands, but featured many different styles of play, along with some huge hands, and some major swings. Mizrachi – also known online as The Grinder – won his first ever WSOP bracelet, and now can cross his name off the list of best players never to win the prestigious gold hardware.

In front of a huge crowd and several ESPN cameras, Mizrachi won the event in the early hours of the morning. Michael’s brother Robert also made the final table, to make things even more interesting. The tournament started with 116 poker players entering the tournament, that created a pool of over $5.5 million. For winning the tournament “The Grinder” won over $1.5 and a gold bracelet.

As the final table began, David Baker, Mikael Thuritz, Vladimir Schmelev, John Juanda, Daniel Alaei, David Oppenheim and Robert Mizrachi all sat with the Grinder. Michael’s brother Robert was the chip leader at this point, with David Baker a close second. Michael Mizrachi was 5th, with $2,175,000.

The poker play at the final table started out slow, until hands 13 and 14 when Daniel Alaei and David Oppenheim doubled up back to back. Later, Mikael Thuritz doubled up twice. Daniel Alaei was later eliminated, followed by David Baker to move the table down to 6. This was the first time in WSOP history that a pair of siblings finished this high in the tournament. The record was set by Annie Duke and Howard Lederer back in 1995, as they got 6th and 9th respectively.

Robert Mizrachi was the next to get taken out, and won over $340,000. His brother Michael knocked him out. When the table went down to four John Juanda was the next to fall, winning over $430,000 just a few short hands after Robert. When the table went down to three Oppenheim led with just shy of 10 million. Schmelev had around 5m illion, and Mizrachi was at 2.6 million. After 45 hands, the three players were pretty much dead even. Ten more hands were played and Mizrachi knocked out Oppenheim with some aggressive play. As they began heads-up play, Mizrachi had Schmelev by nearly $4 million. Schmelev looked to be on his way to beating the Grinder in the early going, as he took a 3-1 chip lead. As the players returned from break, Mizrachi made a big move. He shoved all in with Ace/7 of clubs preflop. Schmelev called with Ace/Jack of Diamonds. The flop came with a King of Clubs, 10 of Diamonds and 9 of Clubs.  Next, came the queen of hearts, and the river was the 5 of clubs to finish his flush.

Both players settled back in and Mizrachi became very agreessive. His chip stack was nearly 14 million, while Schmelev was nearly 3.4 million. Schmelev called all-in with a queen/8 flop, while Mizrachi had queen/5. The flop came and nothing was on the board for either player. The turn came and a 5 appeared.  The river was another miss for Schmelev and the tournament was over. Schmelev finished second place, and won $963,375.  Mizrachi with the win raised his overall poker winnings up to $8,758,298 in his career and made headlines among tons of Poker News sites.

Here are the Final Table payouts as follows:

Michael Mizrachi – $1,559,046
Vladimir Schmelev – $963,375
David Oppenheim – $603,348
John Juanda – $436,865
Robert Mizrachi – $341,429
David Baker – $272,275
Daniel Alaei – $221,105
Mikael Thuritz – $182,463

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