Allen Kessler Breaks 15-Year WSOP Main Event Cash Drought

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Jul 09, 2019 5 min read

Allen Kessler is known as a vocal voice of the poker community and a particularly staunch advocate for improved tournament structures. With 343 tournament results and nearly $3.8 million to his credit over the past two decades, many are surprised that "The Chainsaw" has yet to win a bracelet. He has gotten close though, with nine top-nine results and four runner-up finishes.

Even more surprising though, is the fact that in 67 summer WSOP cashes, Kessler has never cashed in the WSOP Main Event despite playing in it every year since 2004. Now, he can put that one to rest.

Breaking the No-Cash Streak

Here at the 2019 WSOP Main Event, the field played down to the money late on Day 3, entering Day 4 with 1,286 players left of the 8,569 total runners. The Chainsaw was among them.

Asked if it was a relief to finally break the streak with a cash, Kessler responded: "A little bit. I was never in any jeopardy of not cashing though, because right away on Day 1 I had 300,000. So I knew I was going to cash."

Getting through Day 1 is no guarantee for making the money in an event with two-hour levels and 8,569 entrants, but Kessler, a master tournament casher, wasn't worried. He shared how he ended up in such a good spot after Day 1, a combination of making some big hands and picking good spots.

"Everything worked perfectly on Day 1. Today, not so much."

After bagging on Day 3, Kessler put out a tweet about his Main Event record which contained 15 zeros.

Many pointed out Kessler would need to get 54th place or better to get out of the red for the Main Event. Last year, Kessler did break the ice cashing in the €10,350 WSOP Europe Main Event where he got €23,025 for 40th place, so that may have taken some of the pressure off. But he also said there may have been a little added pressure coming in 0 for 15 on the Vegas Main Event. In 15 tries, Kessler only even had one close call, he told PokerNews during a break on Day 4.

"I had a really close call in 2009 or 2010. It's the very last hand of the night on Day 3 and in that scenario, only ten percent cashed. And I got really lucky because they called the number of hands and I was going to get a free pass into the next day because I was going to be under-the-gun instead of having to post. So I just decided I'm gonna go to the next day, they were only like 12 from the money and I'll be in the money for sure."

"I was never in any jeopardy of not cashing [this year] though."

But the story doesn't stop there: "Anyway, I look down, I have two jacks. I say, you know what, I'm just gonna go for it. So I went for it, I got a call from ace-queen and the board came out completely safe and queen on the river."

That one, like all the others before this year, ended in a goose egg too.

"But now I have two [Main Event] cashes in a row because I made the final four tables in the Europe one," Kessler pointed out.

Moving Up

With the monkey off his back, Kessler is now looking to move up the cash ladder, something his many investors on Stake Kings would also like to see. After selling out several pieces at 1.4 markup, Cliff Josephy aka "Johnny Bax" put out a Tweet offering to crossbook Kessler at 1.35.

No one took the deal though, as Kessler was the only one to offer to take the action. He takes pride in the fact that the bet would have been a losing one for Josephy.

"Right now, he would be down a lot of money because if he bought the whole tournament, I would be paying him $13,500. So he would owe me already $20,000 plus if I move up any more money."

"Now I have two [Main Event] cashes in a row because I made the final four tables in the Europe one."

While Kessler doesn't know exactly how much of himself he has in the Main, he knows it's over 50 percent. "But I don't really care because I've never cashed in the thing anyway," Kessler laughed. He's now hoping to turn around his Day 4, which got off to a bad start.

"I've had some really bad situations today," he said of the first two levels of the day. "I had ace-king of hearts, I lost like 150,000 on that, and two other hands."

Kessler had dwindled down to around 15 big blinds by the second break, but has fared much better since then, with more than twice as many blinds on the dinner break. Now guaranteed at least $24,560 with 550 players remaining, Kessler will be looking to ladder up further and make his first-ever Main Event Day 5 in poker's most prestigious tournament.

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