McCormick and Savage Lead The Way In $1,500 Razz
Bring In: 2,000
Completion: 5,000
Limits: 5,000-10,000
A dazzling entourage of players came out to play Event #43: $1,500 Razz today at Horseshoe and Paris, Las Vegas for the 2025 WSOP. This edition of the event drew out 472 hopefuls to generate a prize pool of $626,580 to be divided up between the final 71 players. The 97 survivors will return Saturday with their eyes on cashing as well as the $126,363 that will eventually be awarded to first place.
Leading the way is WSOP regular Tom McCormick, who sits with 343,000. With his first cash being 33 years ago as a third-place finish in the $2,500 Limit Hold’em, McCormick has made himself one of the most steady players at the WSOP for many decades. McCormick has shown his playing chops on games of all types, with 120 cashes as well as 16 bracelet event final tables across games like Limit Hold’em, Stud, Stud Hi-Lo, Omaha Hi-Lo, and No-Limit Hold’em. Today saw McCormick soar up the counts at tough tables with bracelet winners like Scott Abrams (209,000). With his sizable chip stack here today, he looks to make a run at claiming his first WSOP bracelet after many close calls.
Day 1 Top Ten Chip Counts
| Place | Player | Country | Chip Count |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tom McCormick | United States | 343,000 |
| 2 | Matt Savage | United States | 324,000 |
| 3 | Clint Wolcyn | United States | 317,000 |
| 4 | Steven Abitbol | France | 292,500 |
| 5 | Bijan Mirzasafi | United States | 260,000 |
| 6 | Phillip Hui | United States | 235,000 |
| 7 | Matthew Vengrin | United States | 232,500 |
| 8 | Gui Van | United States | 228,500 |
| 9 | Allan Le | United States | 220,000 |
| 10 | Calvin Anderson | United States | 212,500 |
Sitting just behind McCormick is tournament director and golf enthusiast Matt Savage (323,000). Having worked for the WSOP as a tournament director many years ago, Savage has had multiple WSOP cashes dating back to 2009, including a deep run in the 2022 iteration of this event that landed him in 22nd place. The multi-time Poker Hall of Fame nominee bagged up a sizable stack here today and looks to make another deep run in his hunt for the elusive WSOP bracelet.
Many other stars of the game found their way to bags at the conclusion of the day. Stars like Phillip Hui (235,000), Allan Le (220,000), Calvin Anderson (212,500), David Shmuel (181,000), Lawrence Brandt (178,000), and WSOP Main Event champions Huck Seed (87,000), and Phil Hellmuth (63,000) all saw their stacks grow and survive throughout the day. Seed and Hellmuth were engaged in a discussion during the latter part of the day about who the greatest Razz player of all time was, with Hellmuth and Seed both holding two Razz bracelets of their own.
Defending champion Scott Seiver was unable to defend his crown. Many of the game's brightest stars fell with him by the wayside like Brian Rast, Tom McEvoy, Linda Johnson, Brad Ruben, Marco Johnson, and Kevin Gerhart. They will have to look to one of the other stud-variant bracelet events later this summer to claim one of their own.
Players will return to play in the Horseshoe tomorrow at 1 p.m. to Level 16 with a 1,500 ante and limits at 6,000/12,000. The length of each level will be increased to one hour each, as players will play a scheduled 10 levels. A 15-minute break will occur at the conclusion of every two levels, with a 60-minute dinner break at the conclusion of Level 21.
Be sure to check back in with PokerNews for all of the exciting updates on the ground of the 2025 WSOP.