Fishman Leads the Biggest Badugi Tournament of All Time
Limits: 5,000-10,000
The 2025 World Series of Poker has once more set another record as 534 entrants came out to play Event #23: $1,500 Badugi to generate a prize pool of $708,885 for the final 81 players to share. This now holds the record as the largest-ever Badugi tournament in WSOP history, and the eventual winner of this tournament will be able to lay claim to that title.
As the dust settled here at Horseshoe and Paris, Las Vegas, just 98 ended with some chance of getting the $3,000 minimum cash and an even smaller chance of taking home the $138,114 and the WSOP gold bracelet.
Leading the way is young gun Ray Fishman, who ended his day with 441,000. Players who have frequented the WSOP over the past three years will be familiar with this young New Yorker, who has $104,908 in lifetime earnings and two deep runs this year already in two Omaha Hi-Lo Events. With 24 cashes in WSOP bracelet events, Fishman now sits poised for his 25th cash while being in the hunt for his first WSOP bracelet.
Fishman spent all day at a very talkative table that included the likes of WSOP bracelet winners George Wolff (217,000), Daniel Zack (198,000), and Andrew Brown (84,000). With his soaring stack and good finishes earlier this year, Fishman looks to be spearheading the next generation of mixed game talent.
Day 1 Top Ten Chip Counts
| Rank | Player | Nationality | ChipCount |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ray Fishman | United States | 441,000 |
| 2 | Brian Tate | United States | 353,000 |
| 3 | Aloisio Dourado | Brasil | 348,000 |
| 4 | Valentin Lita | United States | 314,000 |
| 5 | Arthur Morris | United States | 308,000 |
| 6 | Michael Krescanko Jr | United States | 290,000 |
| 7 | Johnson Phanyaseng | Canada | 278,000 |
| 8 | Carl Vaillancourt | United States | 266,000 |
| 9 | Daisuke Ogita | Japan | 260,000 |
| 10 | Jonathan Glendinning | United States | 245,000 |
Others that bagged included Arthur Morris (308,000), Patrick Stacey (224,000), David Funkhouser (220,000), Andrew Yeh (220,000), and Benjamin Yu (185,000). They look to add a draw bracelet to their resumes tomorrow and will be major competitors in a star-studded field.
Not everyone was able to find their path to a bag in this tournament. Former champions Michael Rodrigues and David Prociak fell to ensure a new champion would emerge. Some of the game's biggest names like Ari Engel, Billy Baxter, Todd Brunson, James Obst, Ren Lin, Dan Smith, and 17-time WSOP bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth were all eliminated from this tournament. Their quest for a draw bracelet will have to wait until a later event in this series.
Players today completed a full 15 levels and will return Friday at 1:00 p.m. in the Horseshoe Bronze Section to play, starting on Level 16, with blinds of 3,000/6,000 and limits of 6,000/12,000. Levels will be upped to one hour, and they will play ten levels.
Stay tuned to PokerNews to see all of the exciting updates on the floor at the 2025 WSOP.