The annual migration cycle of poker players to Las Vegas for the WSOP is now over, and runners are now returning to the other poker hot spots for more action.
One such aggregation of poker feeding is Seminole Hard Rock in South Florida, where you can always count on poker's biggest names to swing through town for some of the largest prize pools outside of Vegas.
It's a venue that continues to hold a place on almost everyone's schedule, including 2025 WSOP Main Event Joe McKeehen, who just took down the Seminole Hard Rock Poker Open Championship.
As it turns out, it's been a long time coming for the North Wales, Pennsylvania pro.
“Down here in Florida, I don’t feel like I’ve ever done as well as I should have,” McKeehen told SHRPO live reporter BJ Nemeth. “It feels like every time I get into the situation, I just can’t. This time around, I was very focused.”
McKeehen won a lengthy heads-up battle. McKeehen win headlines wild series
McKeehen outlasted a wild final table that included Loni Hui, Darren Rabinowitz, Jose Nadal, Eddie Pak, and eventual runner-up David Greufe. The finale started with Greufe and Hui holding most of the chips, but McKeehen crawled back from third to beat both of them in three-handed play.
"I caught some cards and I won some big pots. It seemed every time the pot got really big, especially three-handed, I had the best hand. That was helpful.”
It took just over three hours of play to knock out the first seven players, but McKeehen and Greufe were very deep, so finding a winner lasted even longer than that. In the end, McKeehen outlasted 673 entries in the $5,300 buy-in to score a top prize of $462,600, which was adjusted during heads-up play.
$5,300 SHRPO Championship final table results
- Joe McKeehen - $462,600*
- David Greufe - $390,804*
- Loni Hui - $250,000
- Eddie Pak - $188,000
- Francisco Rivera - $142,000
- Daniel Chalifour - $108,000
- Jose Nadal - $83,000
- Robert Burlacu - $65,000
- Darren Rabinowitz - $51,000
Elsewhere at the SHRPO series, statistical anomalies were on tap as three different players won four events in the series. Local crusher Raminder Singh added four wins, bringing his Seminole total to a record 20, while Jean Laurent and Mehmet Signic also joined the list. They are the first three to ever do it.
Images courtesy of Seminole Hard Rock.
