We’ve reached the end of yet another year. With only a week left in 2025, this is the perfect time to look back and remember some of the top events that defined the past twelve months.
It was an exciting year for poker in many ways, with several landmark and memorable events. Some of them were good, the others not so much, but all of them make up the reality of the ever-changing poker world that remains as unpredictable as ever.
So, without further ado, let’s dig into the top nine events and stories that defined poker in 2025, in no particular order, except for how much of an impact they had on yours truly and the poker community in general.
#1 Michael Mizrachi’s Incredible Summer
If we had to pick one story to serve as a highlight for 2025, it would have to be Michael Mizrachi’s summer in Las Vegas. “The Grinder” did not just win the Main Event, defeating almost 10,000 players in the process, but he was also inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame while skipping the usual procedure.
Following his monumental triumph, Mizrachi was presented with the honors by his friends and peers, and even the biggest poker purists didn’t complain about this impromptu decision. “The Grinder” put on a show unlike anything we’ve seen in a while, and his induction into the Poker Hall of Fame was just a matter of time anyway.
The greatest poker accomplishment belongs to @TheGrinder44. 👑
— PokerGO (@PokerGO) July 17, 2025
Michael Mizrachi won the $50K Poker Players Championship for a fourth time… then blazed through the @WSOP Main Event for $10,000,000. You couldn't have scripted it any better than this. pic.twitter.com/GLWSUTnmMB
Mizrachi’s run to the final table and his eventual victory had the entire poker world buzzing with excitement. It would be hard to come up with a more perfect Main Event story as the title went to not just a great player, but also someone who’s enjoyable to watch and could do great things to promote the game we all love.
#2 Leo Margets Makes WSOP History
Mizrachi’s story wasn’t the only one that captured the attention of poker fans and media during this year’s WSOP Main Event. In fact, the only way the tournament could have produced an arguably better narrative was if the title went to a female player, for the first time in the history of the competition.
Of course, we’re talking about Leo Margets, who made the Main Event final table, becoming the first woman to do so since 1995. This was an epic achievement in its own right, but there was a significant part of the poker world lining up behind Margets, cheering her on to go all the way.
Personally, I was rooting for Margets – Mizrachi heads-up, at which point it would be hard to decide who to root for.
Unfortunately, that did not happen. Leo busted fairly early, finishing in seventh place, after losing a fairly standard coin flip in a pretty brutal way. It was an abrupt end to what could have been the biggest poker story we’ve seen in decades.
#3 One Big Beautiful Bill & It’s Ugly Fine Print
Not all poker stories can be as amazing and heartwarming as the first two. In fact, 2025 delivered poker players in the United States one of the biggest blows since Black Friday.
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which was passed in July, is a comprehensive document that contains countless provisions, but one of them has a very direct impact on the poker community, introducing significant changes to taxation rules.
Starting in 2026, players will be allowed to deduct only 90% of their losses against their winnings, which means that there are scenarios in which you could end up losing for the year and still owing taxes. This adds a significant burden for tournament players who already have to pay a significant portion of their winnings in taxes.
These new rules created quite a turmoil in the poker and wider gambling communities, leading to several prominent political figures suggesting fixes and solutions. However, none of those panned out, and it looks like new rules will come into force shortly.
#4 Martin Kabrhel’s Antics Divide the Poker World
Although this is an ongoing story with many more chapters to be written, we can’t look back at 2025 without mentioning Martin Kabrhel. The Czech poker crusher with over $18 million in live tournament earnings has been the center of attention almost everywhere he went, but not for his accomplishments on the felt.
While Martin’s poker skills can’t be denied, it was his antics at the table that made him one of the most notorious characters of the year. With his behavior, Kabrhel has arguably seized the title of the speech play master from Will Kassouf.
Martin uses every tool available to him to annoy his opponents. From constant talking to extreme tanking, his MO is to get the players out of their comfort zone, get them on tilt, and profit from this. While he doesn’t openly talk about this being his strategy, it certainly looks like it watching from the outside.
But make no mistake, not everyone is against Kabrhel. There are many poker fans out there who love his animated behavior and enjoy seeing him annoy other pros who try to hide their emotions behind their scarves and hoodies.
Love him or hate him, Martin is made of a different fabric, and he is here to stay, and the poker world will have to get used to him.
#5 The Millionaire Maker Controversy
The Main Event may be the one to watch at the WSOP, but this year, another tournament attracted quite a bit of attention as well. It was the $1,500 Millionaire Maker or, more specifically, the event winner Jesse Yaginuma.
If you don’t remember or have somehow missed this story, Yaginuma was one of the players who qualified for the series via ClubWPT Gold. The sweepstakes site had a special promotion for its qualifiers where, if any of them were to win a bracelet, they’d receive an additional $1,000,000 in cash.
Yaginuma managed to outlast the field of nearly 12,000 players and got to heads-up. The first place in the tournament was $1.3 million, but if Yaginuma were to win, he’d actually pick up $2.3 million.
This setup resulted in one of the strangest heads-up skirmishes poker fans had an opportunity to witness, leading to accusations of collusion between Jesse and his final opponent, James Caroll. Strange plays, unusual folds, and more resulted in Yaginuma winning and receiving his extra million.
As for the collusion accusations, the WSOP eventually made an unusual decision that no bracelet would be awarded in the event, while Yaginuma and Caroll got to equally split the remaining prize pool, taking home just over $1.1 million each.
The investigation into WSOP Event 53 has been completed.
— WSOP – World Series of Poker (@WSOP) July 1, 2025
We have concluded that in order to uphold the integrity of the game and to uphold our official WSOP Tournament Rules, no winner will be recognized and no bracelet will be awarded for this year's tournament. The remaining… https://t.co/giL0Ij9Cwj
What happened with the $1,000,000 Jesse got from ClubWPT Gold, and if that money was split as well, remains a mystery.
#6 Operation Royal Flush – A Downfall of a Massive Illegal Gambling Ring
The One Big Beautiful Bill wasn’t the only thing that shook the poker community to its core this year. A few months later, in October, the DOJ unsealed an indictment that revealed one of the largest illegal gambling rings in history.
While a lot of it had to do with sports betting, the investigation also revealed the existence of private poker games that lured their victims with a chance to play against sports stars. This alone wouldn’t be particularly shocking, but, as it turns out, these were rigged games, so those invited to attend never had a chance of winning.
To accomplish this goal, game runners were using rigged shuffling machines that would read and transmit the information about the cards, allowing them to predict the winner of each hand. According to the available information, these rigged games resulted in over $7,000,000 in illicit gains.
#7 WSOP Introduces Its WSOP+ App to the Main Series
The 2025 World Series of Poker was the first time the WSOP officials made it mandatory for all players to have the WSOP+ app installed on their phones to be able to participate in the series. The app was tested previously in the Bahamas, but bringing it to the summer series was a major decision.
Naturally, there were some concerns surrounding it, as the Las Vegas series is a massive affair with tens of thousands of players.
As it turned out, those fears were not justified, as the WSOP+ app was praised by the entire poker community, making the whole experience much smoother. From faster registration to seat tracking to chip counts, there was not a single major issue to speak of. Everybody loved it.
Following the success in Las Vegas, the WSOP+ app was extended to all WSOP Circuit stops as well, becoming a staple at all World Series tournaments.
#8 AI Scandal Takes Down New Poker Docuseries
In November of 2025, poker fans were treated to a new poker docuseries. Filmed in the Bahamas during the 2024 WSOP Paradise, the series, called No Limit, was touted as a game-changer, a type of content that would appeal not only to the fans of the game but to people outside of poker.
It was a big promise, but once the series started to air on YouTube, most viewers felt like it wasn’t much different from other similar shows. It wasn’t a bad product by any means, but it set expectations too high with its ambitious claims.
This wasn’t the end of problems for No Limit, however.
After six episodes were released, it came to light that the production crew used AI to create certain segments, quite literally putting words into players’ mouths. It was Allan Keating, one of the main characters appearing on the show, who revealed that a few comments shown in the series were never actually uttered by him.
It was an AI-generated script and a voice-over job.
Although the show creator, Dustin Iannoti, claimed that this was the only time AI was used in this fashion, the World Series of Poker, the series owner, decided to pull it off YouTube after six out of eight total episodes had aired.
WSOP has recently learned that AI-generated content was used in the No Limit docuseries to alter players’ words without authorization.
— WSOP – World Series of Poker (@WSOP) November 23, 2025
We have removed the videos and will redo the editing to ensure the final product reflects our standards.
We sincerely apologize to everyone…
For now, the future of No Limit remains uncertain. The WSOP said they’d bring it back once they made sure no similar flaws were present in other episodes, but there is no guarantee that fans will ever get to see the final two episodes of the series.
#9 WSOP Paradise Super Main Event Shatters Its Record-Breaking Guarantee
December was a very active month for tournament players with EPT Prague, WPT World Championship in Las Vegas, and WSOP Paradise in the Bahamas happening pretty much at the same time. Of these three, it was WSOP Paradise that caught most attention, especially with its $25,000 Super Main Event that carried a $60,000,000 guarantee – the largest-ever in live poker.
It was a very ambitious move by the WSOP, and there were many doubts about the event meeting its guarantee. With such a massive buy-in, it wasn’t exactly in your regular Joe’s price range.
However, the tournament surprised everyone, maybe even organizers themselves, blowing the original guarantee out of the water. In the end, the prize pool climbed to $72 million, largely due to many pros going trigger-happy with re-entries. Be that as it may, we’ll hear no complaints from Bernhard Binder, a player from Austria who outlasted the field 2,891 total entries to pick up his best career cash by far, earning a cool $10,000,000!
