THE DAILY SCOOP – GGMillion$ Season 2024 Episode 35
WSOP Online Main Event won by Moritz Dietrich on GGPoker for $4 million
A total of over 6,100 entries built a prizepool of $29.1 million and the biggest prize in online poker history in this week’s WSOP Online Main Event, which took the place of GGPoker’s traditional weekly $10,000 GGMillion$ tournament. The buy-in was just $5,000 as a thrilling final table was eventually won by Moritz Dietrich as records tumbled and the Austrian took home over $4 million after some astonishing late stage drama.
Rolle Unable to Beat the Baron
This week, the GGMillion$ regular host Jeff Gross was joined by the iconic poker legend Phil Laak as the very special guest co-commentator brought the action to life with a WSOP bracelet and over $4,000,000 on the line for the winner! The chip leader when the final table of nine began was the Russian, Evgenii Akimov, starting on 86 big blinds. Behind him, in second, was the Portuguese player Rui Ferreira (67BB), followed by Austria’s Moritz Dietrich (57BB), Belarussian Ilya Anatski (43BB) and America’s sole representative at the final table, Isaac Baron (34BB).
The remainder of the field, all holding on to a chance of glory included China’s Hai Pan (30BB), Lithuania’s Audrius Stakelis (20BB), Portugal’s Diogo Coelho (16BB) and Germany’s Benjamin Rolle, who began as the short stack with just 14 big blinds.
Over minutes passed before the first knock out and, as the cards fell, it was the Lithuanian Audrius Stakelis who busted in ninth place for $502,771. All-in pre-flop with ace-king, he lost to Isaac Baron when the American’s pocket queens survived a clash of premium hands. The ladies held through the board that ran out J-8-3-T-9 to make an unnecessary straight for the winner.
Three hands later, Ben Rolle was still short and busted for $651,921. All-in pre-flop with an offsuit ace-queen, he lost to Baron whose pocket nines were good enough for the American player to win the pot. A flop of 9-8-6 was a heartsinker for Rolle and a six on the turn meant he was drawing dead. A meaninless ace came on the river as the German slid out of contention and Baron continued his hot start.
Ferreira Fires Away
Hai Pan departed in seventh place when he got it all in pre-flop with pocket 8’s. He called the all in by Moritz Dietrich who held queen-six of diamonds. The flop held only bad news for Hai Pan as a queen appeared giving Dietrich a bigger pair. The turn ten and river 4 did nothing for Pan as he headed to the rails with $845,342.
Baron now held a huge chip leader at the final table with over 111 big blinds, nearly 50 more than the second place poker player, Evgenii Akimov. Dietrich and Rui Ferreira were both hovering around 45 bigs while Ilya Anatski and Diogo Coelho were sitting short with 24 and 16 big blinds, respectively.
A big clash between the two short stacks left Anatski very short (under 5BB) when his Ace-King failed to improve against Coelho’s cowboys right before the break. It was just a matter of time before The Belarussian was all in, thankfully he had a premium hand with ace-jack of diamonds, unfortunately it was on a flop of 7-6-3 and Baron was the caller with a pocket pair of twos. The deuces were ahead and hoping to hold. The board laid a 2 on the turn, ensuring that the Belarus player was drawing dead to the river, which came down with a meaningless ten, as he left with $1,096,180.
Five handed play continued for over 2 hours with the chips flowing around the table. Eventually, Portuguese player Diogo Coelho committed his chips from the big blind with king-ten of clubs but ran into Rui Ferreira, who was the chip leader, holding pocket tens. The all-Portugal clash ended in the initial raiser’s favor when a board of J-7-7-3-Q eliminated Coelho from the competition for a score worth $1,421,478.
Four players remained, with Ferreira now the man in charge on 160 million chips. Moritz Dietrich (85m) was his nearest challenger, with Evgenii Akimov (71m) and the now short-stacked Baron (49m) significantly further back. Over the next half hour, however, Akimov was the big mover, taking the chip lead after a series of pots went his way and applying continuous pressure.
The Ultimate Runner-Runner
Akimov had the stack to call off when Baron shoved with pocket kings. Akimov only had six-four off and it looked like Baron would double when a flop of K-J-7 gave him top set. A five on the turn opened up the backdoor straight draw, and a sensational runner-runner straight was complete when an eight came to slay Baron’s hopes as he fell in fourth place for $1,843,337.
They’d come about the final three in odd circumstances but the final three were the top three at the start of play and Akimov continued his reign of terror. Ferreira was all-in with ace-king and Akimov had six-four again, this time with the six of spades. A flop of A-K-3 with two spades was interesting. The five of spades on the turn set up a 34% shot for Akimov and a fourth spade, the three, appeared on the river.
“Again, it’s six-four!” yelled Laak in sheer disbelief. With 307 million, Akimov had a huge 5:1 chip lead over Moritz Dietrich, but the Austrian player was undeterred, building back to level thanks to a rivered set of 5’s.
The beginning of the end was signalled on a hand 20 minutes into heads up play. A board of A-8-5-K-J helped Akimov river two-pair with king-jack to induce a shove from the Russian. It was met with a snap-call coming from Dietrich who had rivered Broadway with queen-ten.
“That was crazy… truly crazy!” said Gross on comms.
With a big lead, Dietrich chipped away at Akimov and finally wrapped it up when his eight-deuce was good enough to call on a board showing K-8-6-3 when Akimov bluff-shoved with just nine-five. No seven or nine came on the river and Moritz Dietrich was the WSOP Online Main Event champion! Watch all the action right here in the company of a thrilled Jeff Gross and Phil Laak.
| Place | Player | Country | Prize |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1st | Moritz Dietrich | Austria | $4,021,012 |
| 2nd | Evgenii Akimov | Russia | $3,099,896 |
| 3rd | Rui Ferreira | Portugal | $2,390,418 |
| 4th | Isaac Baron | United States | $1,843,337 |
| 5th | Diogo Coelho | Brazil | $1,421,478 |
| 6th | Ilya Anatski | Belarus | $1,096,180 |
| 7th | Hai Pan | China | $845,342 |
| 8th | Benjamin Rolle | Germany | $651,921 |
| 9th | Audrius Skakelis | Lithuania | $502,771 |
About the Author: Paul Seaton has written about poker for over 10 years, interviewing some of the best players ever to play the game such as Daniel Negreanu, Johnny Chan and Phil Hellmuth. Over the years, Paul has reported live from tournaments such as the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas and the European Poker Tour. He has also written for other poker brands where he was Head of Media, as well as BLUFF magazine, where he was Editor.