button in SafariDaisuke Ogita Among Contenders in Mini Main Event
After a hectic run of fast-paced play, Day 2 of Event #72: $1,000 Mini Main Event has come to a close with just nine players remaining from the 934 who began the day.
One of them will become a first-time World Series of Poker gold bracelet winner and take home the biggest payday of his career, a $1,000,000 first-place prize from a massive prize pool of $11,052,800, which was generated thanks to a whopping 12,560 entries.
Daisuke Ogita, who, according to The Hendon Mob, has some $2.6 million in career earnings, survived the carnage at the Horseshoe and Paris Las Vegas and is in the thick of the title hunt with the fifth-most chips.
This marks his second final table at the WSOP, the first being a third-place finish in a 2024 Mystery Bounty pot-limit Omaha event.
Amin Mostafavi, the overall chip leader, closed the day on a serious run. He was down to six big blinds when there were only three tables left, but spun it up in short order.
Final Day Seat Draw
| Seat | Player | Country | Chip Count | Big Blinds |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Jeffrey Evans | United States | 112,000,000 | 22 |
| 2 | Jaime Haletky | United States | 93,500,000 | 19 |
| 3 | Amin Mostafavi | United States | 162,000,000 | 32 |
| 4 | Akira Ide | Japan | 43,000,000 | 8.5 |
| 5 | Jaehwa Son | Canada | 64,500,000 | 13 |
| 6 | Yunye Lu | China | 44,000,000 | 9 |
| 7 | Ohad Enzel | United States | 43,500,000 | 8.5 |
| 8 | Richard Harris | United Kingdom | 101,000,000 | 20 |
| 10 | Daisuke Ogita | Japan | 92,500,000 | 19 |
There are other capable challengers still in the mix. Jaime Haletky has two circuit rings on his resume, including a main event win at Thunder Valley earlier this year. Yunye Lu has final-tabled events on the European Poker Tour and Asian Poker Tour. He was down to just three big blinds with only 24 players left after losing consecutive all-in calls. Within the next orbit, he picked up pocket kings twice and shot back up to over 30 bigs.
Final Table Results and Remaining Payouts
| Place | Player | Country | Prize (USD) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $1,000,000 | ||
| 2 | $625,000 | ||
| 3 | $475,000 | ||
| 4 | $360,000 | ||
| 5 | $275,000 | ||
| 6 | $210,000 | ||
| 7 | $165,000 | ||
| 8 | $130,000 | ||
| 9 | $100,000 | ||
| 10 | Dennys Ramos | Brazil | $80,000 |
Knockout Action
It was a bloody day on the Mini Main Event streets. Literally.
One player had to be forced by the tournament director to leave the playing area to deal with a bloody nose.
It is the nature of this particular turbo beast to have a slew of knockouts, and it didn’t disappoint, thanks in part to the average chip stack hovering in the teens throughout the day.
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Some 250 players were knocked out during the first two levels, and there were more than 700 eliminations in the first three hours of play.
Michael “Texas Mike” Moncek, a two-time bracelet winner, was one of the big name players to be sent to the rail during the day. Moncek was one of the first players to top the 2,000,000-chip mark, but his run ended in 271st place. The legendary Men Nguyen, who has won seven bracelets, went out in 300th place. Jim Collopy, Zdenek Zizka, Asi Moshe and Adrian Moreno are among the bracelet winners to have their day end prematurely.
The furious rush of all-ins, chip swings and knockouts may slow now that the final table is set.
Play will resume with the blinds at 3,000,000/6,000,000 with a 6,000,000 big blind ante, with the first cards hitting the table at noon local time.
Stay tuned here to PokerNews for updates on what promises to be an exciting finish to the Mini Main Event. And stay here to keep up with all the action at the 2026 WSOP.