With 10% of the field now paid a profit on their $10,000 buy-in as standard, 873 players were looking forward to money, even if the ‘min-cash’ was $10,616 for finishing in 873rd place, which was done by 11 players! Players from all over the world cashed, with Russian Vitaly Lunkin (829th), Canada’s Danny Li (697th), British snooker legend Steve Davis (579th), Italy’s Dario Minieri (543rd), Spanish player Cecelia Reyes (374th), the former 1983 world champion Tom McEvoy (371st) and English poker legend Surinder Sunar (324th) all busting outside the top places but in profit.
Epic Entertainment as Hundreds of Players Get Paid
The reigning champion Joe Hachem put up a brave fight and made it all the way to 238th place for $42,882. Hachem’s exit, though, meant that there would be a new world champion, and the race was then on to make the final table. Daniel Negreanu (229th), Bryan Micon (63rd), Humberto Brenes (36th), Prahlad Friedman (20th), and Jeff Lisandro (17th) all got close, but when Fred Goldberg busted in 10th, the final table was set.
This year, the first player to go to the rails at the final table won an incredible $1,566,858, so when Dan Nassif was that player, the amount of money he won was great enough that there was hardly any sting to the loss. The same was true for Sweden’s Erik Friberg, as the last non-American player departed in eighth place for $1,979,189. Douglas Kim (7th for 2,391,520) followed suit and only six players remained.
A Golden Moment
As the latter stages of the 2006 Main Event played out, the crowd at The Rio was packed inside what had become known as the ‘Thunderdome’. Richard Lee busted in sixth place $2.8m before Jamie Gold took a bit hit, losing a flip and looking a bit shaken at the turn of events. Everything had gone so smoothly to that moment that Gold, who it was mentioned hadn’t let his hotel room be cleaned for fear that it would spoil his run of luck, was starting to fear it had run out.
Rhett Butler lost with pocket fours to Gold’s king-jack as he left in fifth for $3.2 million, and soon after losing a big amount of his stack to a bluff from Paul Wasicka, Allen Cunningham faced a nightmare scenario, holding jack-eight on a board of J-6-4-3.
“You probably have a five-deuce.” Cunningham said. He actually did, and Gold credited Cunningham with a good call.
“Don’t just call, go all-in or something.” Gold jibed. Cunningham weighed it up then said, “This time I might have you, but I’ll fold it.”
A brilliant fold, but it earned Cunningham nothing more. Out in fourth for $3.6m, Cunningham lost with pocket tens to Gold’s suited king-jack.
“I feel like puking.” He said, watching the hand play out on the rail as a flop of ace-king saw Gold high-five Johnny Chan on the rail! Mike Binger had the best of it against Gold’s straight draw when Binger’s ace-ten was committed on a flop of T-6-5 against Gold’s four-three, which hit a seven on the turn.
The Biggest Main Event Prize Ever
Paul Wasicka was heads-up for the title, but the 25-year-old couldn’t beat the 36-year-old TV producer, as the $12m top prize was dumped on the table.
“I’m not going down without a fight.” Wasicka declared.
“You do your thing.” retorted Gold. With a six-to-one chip lead, the action didn’t last long, as in the seventh hand, Wasicka thought about committing his chips on a Q-8-5 flop with pocket tens after Gold shoved.
“No queen?” Gold asked
“No queen.”
“Then I got ya.”
Watch the 2006 WSOP Final Table Play out here:
Wasicka called it off and saw Gold’s queen-nine, which held through the ace turn, and as he held Johnny Chan’s hand, a four on the river. Jamie Gold had become champion, winning a record-setting $12 million.
“Another amateur, another improbable winner. Jamie Gold thundered past a cast of thousands.”
Incredibly, the ‘Hollywood ending’ saw Gold – who had 50% of himself – split the winnings, taking home only half of the top prize – $6m. Paul Wasicka – the professional –
Had all of his action and won $6,102,499 as runner-up.
To this day, Gold might not have been the most loved, but as Norman Chad asked him as a TV producer, he couldn’t have scripted it better.
“I think I played well, but of course I got lucky. I just feel really fortunate that things went my way.”
As Jamie Gold made an emotional call to his father, the curtain closed on perhaps the craziest WSOP final table of all time. Gold seemed to hit every board along the way, and his top prize of $12 million would stay as the record until the Main Event of 2023. It would be a full year before players would come back to Vegas to compete for the ultimate poker prize and over those 12 months, there would be a world of changes. Changes that would reshape the poker industry well into the future.
2006 WSOP Main Event – Part 1 2007 WSOP Main Event
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.