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WSOP Tournament of Champions top 20 vote-getters revealed

by , Jun 16, 2010 | 4:05 pm

Comments (7)

This afternoon, the WSOP announced that the top 20 players receiving votes for their Tournament of Champions. The list is full of players (along with votes received) known by the casual poker player around the peak of the poker boom, circa 2005:

1. PHIL IVEY 16,267
2 DANIEL NEGREANU 16,239
3. DOYLE BRUNSON 13,796
4. PHIL HELLMUTH 12,673
5. CHRIS FERGUSON 11,585
6. ALLEN CUNNINGHAM 10,486
7. JOHNNY CHAN 10,434
8. SCOTTY NGUYEN 9,834
9. BARRY GREENSTEIN 9,806
10. JOHN JUANDA 8,835
11. ERIK SEIDEL 8,802
12. JENNIFER HARMAN 8,206
13. HUCK SEED 8,180
14. DAN HARRINGTON 7,342
15. T.J. CLOUTIER 6,281
16. SAMMY FARHA 6,085
17. HOWARD LEDERER 5,596
18. GREG RAYMER 5,404
19. JOE HACHEM 5,272
20. ANTONIO ESFANDIARI 5,129

These 20 will join Annie Duke, Mike Sexton, Mike Matusow, Joe Cada, Barry Shulman, WSOP Academy qualifier Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier and WSOP.com online qualifier Andrew Barton on June 27th. In a change from the original schedule, the field will play four levels on the 27th, then play an additional four levels the following day. The remaining players will return on July 4th to play down to a winner with the final table of nine sharing in the $1,000,000 prize pool. The full press release is available here.


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7 Comments to “WSOP Tournament of Champions top 20 vote-getters revealed”


  1. BJ Nemeth     says:
    June 16th, 2010 at 4:35pm

    With very few exceptions, these players also receive a lion’s share of the TV coverage on shows like “Poker After Dark” and “High Stakes Poker.” It’s one thing to have been popular in 2005; it’s another to have been popular in 2005 and keep showing up on TV year after year.

    Lots of bracelet winners who were household names (among poker fans) in 2005 are NOT on this list.


  2. bundas     says:
    June 16th, 2010 at 4:46pm

    Must be rigged as I voted for Tom S at least 6k times my self .. so he for sure should have made the list..

    The fix is in


  3. Kevin Mathers     says:
    June 16th, 2010 at 4:59pm

    Of the 20 on the list, the player who won their first WSOP bracelet the latest was Hachem in 2005. The fact that Erick Lindgren and the people who are behind Full Tilt Poker (with 8 other sponsored players in the top 20) couldn’t get him more than 5,129 votes is surprising.

    Wicked Chops Poker posted they would make a promo video to help people vote for them into the TOC. It appears they got no takers.


  4. DanM     says:
    June 16th, 2010 at 5:07pm

    There are a few of interesting things about this list — how close Howard was to not making it, for example … and maybe that Antonio Esfandiari did. I also was surprised at how well Allen Cunningham did. Guess it just goes to show us how important making the main event final table really is. Though still, I’d think — and will almost bet — that when it comes to guys who never won the Big One, that in future years fans would rather give that spot to David Williams over TJ Cloutier.

    Also Also … a surprisingly low number of votes overall, no?


  5. TOCurmudgeon     says:
    June 16th, 2010 at 5:35pm

    Dan Harrington made it. Woo Hoo! You know, this points up something interesting about poker: A lot of the poker media, certainly most online outlets, seem to be aimed at 18 to 30-year-olds; where the typical recreational player – the group that seems to have selected the T.O.C. participants – is likely to be somewhat older.


  6. traction     says:
    June 17th, 2010 at 4:02am

    I’m shocked the person who started this poker boom is not listed. Moneymaker


  7. Lone Rhino     says:
    June 20th, 2010 at 5:05pm

    No Chris Moneymaker? I call shenanigans…