Alexandru Papazian Wins Second WSOP Bracelet in Event #26: $888 CRAZY EIGHTS for $241,128
Romania’s Alexandru Papazian defeated Tal Noach in heads-up play to win Event #26: $888 CRAZY EIGHTS of the 2021 WSOP Online at GGPoker for his second WSOP gold bracelet and $241,128.
The event attracted 2,350 entries for a $1,982,460 prize pool.
Other Final Table Finishers
Other final table finishers include Patrick "CocoTheDog" Mahoney, who took a sizeable chip lead six-handed, but lost his lead and ultimately fell after getting coolered, running his ace-king into the aces of Noach. Nikola Minkov took his end of Day 1 short stack into a seventh place finish. Eugenio "Ausetep_255" Pernia squeaked into the final table after being the Day 1 chip leader and finished ninth.
Event #26: $888 CRAZY EIGHTS Final Table Results
| Place | Player | Country | Prize |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Alexandru Papazian | Romania | $241,128 |
| 2 | Tal Noach | Israel | $180,818 |
| 3 | Santiago "La Papualda" Varela | Uruguay | $135,595 |
| 4 | Cristian "Peitodeperu" Nagaki | Peru | $101,682 |
| 5 | Patrick "CocoTheDog" Mahoney | United States | $76,250 |
| 6 | Aleksey "somebody444" Churbanov | Russia | $57,180 |
| 7 | Nikola Minkov | Bulgaria | $42,879 |
| 8 | Igor “AMilhao” Thiesen | Brazil | $32,155 |
| 9 | Eugenio ‘Ausetep_255” Pernia | Venezuela | $24,112 |
Papazian Wins Second Bracelet in Crazy Eights Event
This occasion marks Papazian’s second WSOP gold bracelet. Papazian’s first WSOP bracelet came in 2017, interestingly, in Event #60: $888 Crazy Eights No-Limit Hold’em 8-Handed. For that effort, he took home his first bracelet and $888,888. There’s no doubt that Papazian is now a big fan of the Crazy Eight tournaments and it wouldn’t be surprising to see him playing them in the future whenever he can.
Papazian entered Day 2 second in chips out of the 31 remaining players, partially sparked by an end of day pot where he eliminated Alejandro "adolfito" Sterling while holding… pocket eights. He used that stack to make his way to the final table on Day 2, propelled by a big pot he won that eliminated Ian "potamophobia" Matakis in 14th place.
Once he made the final table, he was able to avoid large pots for the most part and eventually made his way into three-handed play. A big turning point in three-handed play occurred when he took most of the stack of Santiago "La Papualda" Varela with a set of deuces versus top pair. That led to him getting into heads-up play as the chip leader against Tal Noach, and eventually winning the tournament after calling Noach’s river bluff and holding top two-pair.
This concludes the PokerNews coverage for this event in the 2021 GGPoker WSOP Online Series. Stay tuned as PokerNews continues to bring you coverage of all the bracelet events.
. Noach check-raised Papazian's bet of 699,600 up to 2,600,000, and Papazian called. 
and Noach led for 3,660,000 which got a call from Papazian. The 
completed the board and Noach put all of his 9,482,308 chips into the middle. After briefly thinking about his decision, Papazian made the call.
flop and Papazian called. The 
turn saw another lead by Varela for 3,577,676 and once again a call from Papazian. The river 
saw another lead by Varela, this time for 6,155,352 and once again a call from Papazian.
was up against the 
to eliminate Varela in third place and get Papazian heads-up with Noach.
, and with Nagaki needing a queen or nine, the river was the 
, and Mahoney was drawing dead on the 
came on the river and Mahoney was eliminated.
, giving Noach a straight draw in addition to his two overcards. The turn was the 
, meaning Noach could also win the hand if the board paired again, and the river 
. The turn was the