Event 12
It was shortly after midnight on the final day of the 2017 Borgata Poker Open when a relative unknown became the newest World Poker Tour Champions Club member. Guo Liang Chen came out on top of a field of 1,132 entrants to take the top prize of $789,058 ($15,000 will go toward his entry in the WPT Tournament of Champions, which takes place next year at the end of Season XVI). In addition to both WPT and BPO trophies, he took home a luxurious Hublot Big Bang Steel watch and a $5,000 membership to JetSmarter, the official private jet partner of the World Poker Tour.
Guo Liang Chen – 2017 WPT Borgata Poker Open Champion
Photo courtesy of Joe Giron and the WPT
The Championship event was the culmination of 18 days of tournaments during which 19 trophies found new homes. Another record was set in this department as well. For the first time ever, three open trophy events were won by women! After picking up her first Borgata Open title in July during the Summer Poker Open, Anna Antimony earned her second during this series, winning the very tough $1,000 SixMax NLH event.
Esther Taylor won her first Borgata Open trophy when she became the first woman to ever win the Heads-Up Championship at Borgata. After making the final table of the Bounty Deep Stack the night before and finishing 8th, Shaotong Chang came back the next day and won the Deep Stack NLH Post-Lim and her first Borgata Open title.
Zhaoxing Wang won the Super Stack Elevator NLH event, taking home his third Borgata Open title in less than one year. Poker pro Dan Buzgon picked up his second Borgata Open title in the Almighty Million, beating a final table that was stacked with poker talent including Jon Borenstein and Kevin Saul.
Vincent Basilicata took home his third Borgata Open trophy after a six-year absence from the winner’s circle. Matt Zimmerman also recorded his third Borgata win, all of which came in the last 14 months. Congratulations to all these winners and all the other trophy winners who earned their first Borgata Hotel replica trophy during this series! A complete list of main event winners is below.
AP = Player-Adjusted Payouts
On behalf of Borgata, we would like to thank all the participants for making the 2017 Borgata Poker Open a great success! From the BPO bloggers, @AlCantHang, @MattClarkPoker, @TKBluffs, and myself, thanks to Borgata tournament staff and the World Poker Tour for another excellent tournament series!
The next series is the Fall Poker Open, which runs November 7-22. Stay tuned to the Fall Poker Open information site and the Fall Poker Open Blog for details on that upcoming series. Hope to see you there!
$500+$60 Super Survivor NLH Re-Entry
Level 19: Blinds 5,000/10,000/1,000 ante
Total Entries: 313
Players Remaining: 30
30 players have all survived here in Event 12 and they will all be taking home $5,000 for their efforts. Allan Rabinovich made the money but it was not without a sweat.
Rabinovich moved all in on a 
flop only be snap called by his opponents 
. He was all but drawing dead with 
but the 
and 
completed the board. Rabinovich’s miracle runout was all he needed to make his way into the money and earn $5,000.
Other players to survive include Mike Dentale, Barry Leventhal and VIP Nguyen just to name a few. A full list of the survivors will be posted as soon as it’s available.
$500+$60 Super Survivor NLH Re-Entry
Level 5: Blinds 150/300/25 ante
Total Entries: 259
Chris Biemer
The $5K Survivor is running in the very front of the Event Center so its progress is hidden a bit. When taking the first look at the field, we found a very nice 259 entries already grinding away. That’s a lot of $5,000 payouts in the works with plenty of time to join the fun.
Chris Biemer is in the field this afternoon and he’s already booked himself a nice profit for the series. He made his way deep in the $2 Million GTD Kickoff and made the final table for a $97,000 fifth place finish. A decent boost to his $847 in career earnings to that point.
$500+$60 Super Survivor NLH Re-Entry
Level 1: Blinds 50/100
The only non-trophy Main Event has just begun. This Super Survivor will have multiple winners, so no trophy is awarded. Approximately 1 out of every 10 players will win $5,000.
Players began with 20,000 chips and Levels are 30 minutes long. Late registration and unlimited re-entries are available until the start of Level 10 (about 9:15pm).
They’ll play until only 10% of the field remains and those will be the ‘Super Survivors’!
Last year, this event fell earlier in the BPO series. It drew 200 entrants and 19 players earned the full $5,000!