Lessin wins WSOP Senior event

On Wednesday night, the 2020 World Series of Poker Online Series Event #30: $500 No-Limit Hold'em Senior's Event attracted 541 players who rebought 179 times. The 720-entry field resulted in a $324,000 prize pool, and after 10.5 hours of play it was Jonathan "SugarJ" Lessin of Long Branch, New Jersey walking away with the bracelet and $64,411.20 top prize.

According to HendonMob, Lessin has $158,814 in live tournament earnings including a career-best $87,998 for winning a $1,090 NLH event at the 2011 Borgata Winter Poker Open. As far as the WSOP is concerned, prior to the win, Lessin had seven WSOP-related cashes (all from WSOP.com) totaling a modest $5,218. That included two small cashes in earlier bracelet events.

After John "PapaJJJTN" Stout bubbled in 127th place, the march to the final table began. Among those to fall short but cash were Roland "prngls12" Israelashvili (107th - $648), Lena "helixpoker" Evans (95th - $680.40), Kenna "STAXS" James (85th - $712.80), Layne "scoop87" Flack (76th - $777.60), Phil "Lumestackin" Hellmuth (67th - $842.40), Greg "FossilMan" Raymer (43rd - $1,263.60), Terry "mrterry007" Fleischer (17th - $2,203.20), and final table bubble "vegasvice" (10th - $3,466.80).

The first final table elimination was that of East Coast grinder Al "BigAl16" Riccobono, who got his short stack in with ace-ten only to run into the ace-king of Allen "Nucman" Pock, who began the final table as the chip leader.

Carmen "cjdstable" Dimaria was the next to go after having pocket jacks cracked by the tens of Brian "ggtdm" McGill, and then Michael "bigfatpirate" Whidden bowed out when their ace-king went down in flames to the queen-nine of James "muskrrr" Moore, which rivered a straight.

Minutes later, Stuart "dusty16" Kemble bowed out in sixth place when their king-five failed to get lucky against the king-queen of McGill, and then Gregory "gwitsch" Witsch followed them out the door when their ace-five was outdrawn by Pock's ten-nine.

McGill took his leave after three-bet jamming with king-four suited only to get called by and lose to Pock, who held with ace-five. Despite winning that hand, Pock was next to go after getting it in on the turn with two pair only to see Moore turn over trip fives.

Moore took a more than 6:1 chip lead into heads-up play but Lessin fought hard and took over the lead. After a bit of jostling, Moore jammed a five-high flop with ace-high only to get called by Lessing's top two pair, which turned into a full house on the turn for the win.

(Article courtesy of World Series of Poker)