The Doyle Brunson Five Diamond World Poker classic has earned another winner. Daniel Christopher Alaei grabbed the coveted seat surviving the rigid battle against 328 players. He won an enormous prize of $1.4 million on the said event.
Alaei is a dedicated NLHE player who play a lot of cash games and had already made a $3.7 million dollar income from live he participated since the start of his career. He owns two WSOP bracelets and had been successful in winning the $10,000 World Championship Omaha Hi/Lo 8-or-better event. Daniel also won 18-cashes from the WSOP making him gain more than $1.5 million.
During the primary day of the $15,000 WPT event, he decided to leave the main game in order for him to participate to the side games. He said, “I signed up to play and some guys were starting up a big cash game,” “So, I played in that over the tournament for the rest of the day.” The final table finally came and Daniel was faced with very tough opponents on his table. This player pool was comprised of Josh Arieh, Faraz “The-Toilet” Jaka, Shawn Buchanan, Scotty Nguyen, and Stephen “MrTimCaum” O’Dwyer.
Holder of five WSOP bracelets, Scotty Nguyen tried to play at his best but just ended up in the fifth place and not the title. He took home $249,976. Then he was commended by his colleagues and he thankfully replied:
“Everybody is a good player these days. You’ve got to respect that. All these young kids these days, they come in to play and they have nothing to fear. They have nothing to lose, only gain.”
He ended up head up with 2 time WSOP winner Josh Arieh in the final two. The last hand came up and Arieh had pocket 7′s in a 10-2-5 flop. Arieh go all in post flop. However, Alaei holds a 10, 8 card and called. Arieh ended up being second with a wealth gain of $952,290.
“It was not an easy call for me,” Alaei stated. “If he had a 10, I was pretty much dead.”
Alaei got the pot of $1.4 million and wins the WPT title. He was questioned about how he feels for his win. He stated that he wanted to win for a long while now and it feels great. All his friends already gained the title and he’s the only one who’s not.
Alaei won the pot amounting to $1,428,430 for his success. When he was asked about his feeling for winning his first WPT title he said, “This is great. I’ve wanted one of these for a while. I was one of my only friends who didn’t have one.”