Simply put, 2023 is Bin Weng’s year. The 40 year-old pro from Philadelphia started 2023 with his first $1 million cash at the Borgata’s $5,300 buy-in The Return, and he finishes it by adding another $958,279 to his booty by winning the $25,000 World Poker Tour World Championship High Roller event yesterday.
In between, he won two more WPT titles ($3,500 WPT Seminole Hard Rock Poker Showdown for $1,128,250 and the $10,500 Everyone for One Drop for his lifetime-best for $2,227,054), a WSOP Circuit ring ($1,700 Main Event in Las Vegas in February for $227,344), and the $1,600 Mystery Bounty event at The Wynn Fall Classic for another $147,078.
With an additional 10 more final tables as part of his 50 in-the-money finishes, Weng is a huge favorite to win just about all the poker Player of the Year prizes. He’s sat on top of the Global Poker Index leaderboard for 22 weeks, and this victory all but ensures he’ll be named the 2023 GPI Player of the Year a minute after the clock clicks into 2024.
Weng won $6.6 million in 2023, after starting the year with a little over $1 million in lifetime tournament cashes.
Weng and Boivin flip for it
The $25,000 World Poker Tour World Championship High Roller event attracted 194 entrants. When the dust settled, Weng and Thomas Boivin were the last two players left, so they made a deal to split the remaining money and flip for the title. It’s no shock with the way Weng has been running that he won.
The final nine were another who’s-who of poker who are well-known on the high roller and WSOP circuits. They had 10 bracelets between them. Weng doesn’t have one — yet.
Top nine of $25,000 World Poker Tour World Championship High Roller event
- Bin Weng, $958,279
- Thomas Boivin, $958,278
- Justin Saliba, $525,087
- Alex Kulev, $397,254
- Joni Jouhkimainen, $295,116
- Danny Tang, $219,306
- Joe McKeehen, $173,844
- David Peters, $141,590
- Orpen Kisacikoglu, $117,659
The tournament attracted many of the usuals, including ten-time bracelet winner Erik Seidel (21st), four-time WPT champion Darren Elias (18th), bracelet winner Brian Kim (17th), WPT champion Seth Davies (16th), bracelet winner and 2010 WSOP main event third-place finisher Joseph Cheong (15th), WPT champion Brek Schutten (13th), bracelet winner and WPT champion Dylan Linde (11th), bracelet winner Orpen Kisacikoglu (9th), four-time bracelet winner David Peters (8th), three-time bracelet winner and 2015 WSOP Main Event champion Joe McKeehen (7th), bracelet winner Danny Tang (6th), bracelet winner Joni Jouhkimainen (5th), bracelet winner Alex Kulev (4th), and two-time bracelet winner Justin Saliba (3rd).
That’s a lot of hardware.
The WPT World Championships continue with days five and six of the $10,400 headliner today and tomorrow, with the final table being streamed via WPT.com Thursday.
