Eelis Parssinen Wins Event #8 of PGT PLO Series for Series Lead

The eighth event of the 2024 PGT PLO Series saw Eelis Parssinen win again at the PokerGO Studio at ARIA as he outlasted a field full of superstars in the $15,000 Pot-Limit Omaha event. Winning a top prize of $348,600, Parssinen not only took home his second title of the series but sneaked ahead of Samuli Sipila at the summit of the leaderboard. With two events to go, the race for the $10,000 PGT Passport and Championship trophy couldn’t be closer.

First Day Sends Big Names Home

Within the context of this year’s PokerGO Tour PLO Series, many of the biggest players on the leaderboard did not make the final stages for a change. With an 83-entry field creating a prizepool of $1,245,000, only the final dozen players in the field got paid. That meant a very unlucky 13^th place for someone, and the bubble boy turned out to be Bryce Yockey. The American had enjoyed an excellent series to that moment but lost to Brazilian player Joao Simao, who made a backdoor flush to reduce the tournament to two tables of six.

‘Cowboy’ Dan Smith replicated a min-cash from earlier in the series when he busted in 12^th place for $31,125. Smith was all-in against two players with next to no chips and Sam Soverel made a straight to oust the popular high stakes regular. Shortly after Smith’s exit, James Calderaro lost to Alex Foxen for a score of $37,350 in 11^th place, while on the other table, Jordan Spurlin won the same amount in 10^th.

After a lengthy battle, Sam Soverel’s tournament went from looking like it might provide him with another deep run to ending in eighth place for $37,350. Losing with pocket aces in the hole to the 10-time WSOP winner Erik Seidel’s turned flush, Soverel’s exit was followed by that of another modern American poker hero in Jesse Lonis. Also crashing out to a flush, Lonis won $49,800 as Alex Foxen’s heart flush bagged him 1.5 million heading into the final table of seven players.

Garza Slips, Foxen Leaps

With seven players left, Lou Garza – he of the WSOP bracelet-winning proposal from 2023 – led the field with an incredible 4.04 million chips. That all changed around the final elimination of Day 1, however. Alex Foxen made the nut flush to take some from Garza and after short stack Erik Seidel doubled up through the leader Garza, Foxen busted another to take the lead.

Calling off his stack with on the river of a board showing , John Fauver’s aces and fives were no good against Foxen’s for a full house of deuces over fives. That pot gave Foxen 3,695,000 chips and with Garza now second on 2.47 million chips, everything was on the line with six players heading into the overnights still hopeful of victory.

After a bad start to the day, Garza was the man who left first on the final day, cashing for $62,250. His pocket queens lost to Parssinen’s pair of aces as the pocket rockets shot down Garza’s hopes of another epic victory. It was around this time that Erik Seidel doubled up through Alex Foxen but that was only a stay of execution for the 10-time WSOP bracelet winner. All-in with a pair of kings in the hole, Seidel lost to Duek whose hit trips on a board of gave Duek trips as Seidel slid out for $87,150.

Parssinen Claims Second Event Win

Brazilian player Joao Simao was out in fourth place for $118,275 as the Argentinian player Duek grabbed further control of the leaderboard. Simao had pocket aces in the hole but lost to Parssinen’s pocket queens when another queen landed on the flop to give the Finnish player the superior hand and reduced the field to three.

Leading with 4.8 million, Duek now had close company at the top of the leaderboard, with Parssinen on 4.1 million. Alex Foxen was on 1,475,000 chips and having led with half a dozen players left, Foxen needed to recover. Doubling up through Duek, Foxen got back into the game, and Duek was suddenly the short stack. Holding pocket tens, Duek lost to Parssinen’s when the Finnish player hit a king on the flop and made what turned out to be the best hand of two pair on the turn, sending Duek home with $161,850.

Heads-up, Parssinen held the lead, and a set on the river of an early exchange with Foxen gave the eventual winner a 5:1 chip lead.

Foxen doubled once, then took the lead with another but Parssinen came back again and with the lead, Parssinen flopped top pair and held with ease to send Foxen home in second place for $224,100. The top prize and $348,600 went to the Finnish player and that put him into a marginal lead at the top of the overall PGT PLO Series leaderboard.