Koray Aldemir Leads By a Mile as 2021 WSOP Main Event is Down to Three Players

Aldemir absolutely cruising

Austrian, a Brit, and a Yankee walk into a bar…and buy everybody drinks. This might have been the scene last night if Koray Aldemir, Jack Oliver, and George Holmes didn’t feel the need to get some rest, as the three of them are guaranteed to be a combined $15.3 million richer as the final three players remaining in the 2021 World Series of Poker Main Event.

And as was the case going into Tuesday’s final table, Koray Aldemir is lapping the field. With 264.6 million chips, he has double the stack of his two opponents. Oliver has 77.3 million and Holmes has 57.4 million.

It was really just one of those days for Aldemir. He entered the final table with an overwhelming chip lead and was able to use his stack to stay comfortable, putting pressure on his opponents throughout the night. People either had to back down and commit to big moves against him. To start the day, he had 140 million chips while Holmes, in second place at the time, had 83.7 million. Now Aldemir has 124 million more chips than he had to begin Tuesday, while second place has 6+ million fewer. That’s called widening your lead.

Dramatic triple-up

The schedule actually had play stopping when the table got to four-handed, but a game-time decision was made to let things keep going for a little bit. Though Aldemir has clearly been involved in some big hands, perhaps the most significant hand of the night was one in which the field nearly went from four to just two.

Oliver shoved for 20.5 million with J-9 and then Joshua Remitio went all-in over the top for 27.2 million with A-J. Aldemir, with little risk to his massive stack and sitting pretty with Q-Q, called both. The flop was a fascinating T-9-8, giving Oliver middle pair and an open-ended straight draw and, more importantly, life after going into the flop with the worst hand. A 3 on the turn did nothing, but then Oliver’s rail exploded with a 7 came on the river to give him a backdoor flush (and a straight to boot). Oliver tripled up to both stay in the game and give himself a stack with at least a little heft to it.

The moment @jackabet triples up 4 handed at the WSOP Main Event FT. What a moment pic.twitter.com/f5WwiJC7li
— Euan McNicholas (@euan_m_) November 17, 2021

That hand also crippled Remitio, who fell to Oliver in short order. So that hand not only gave Oliver plenty more chips, but ultimately bumped him up another $700,000 on the payout ladder. The remaining payouts are $8 million, $4.3 million, and $3 million.

It certainly looks like the 2021 WSOP Main Event is Aldemir’s to lose at this point, as Oliver and Holmes will have to find repeated small pots or one or two huge ones, but as we know, poker can be an unpredictable game. The three men will be back at it at 2:00pm local time on Wednesday and will play until the newest world champion has been determined.