Shaun Deeb won a close race to secure the 2025 World Series of Poker Player of the Year. Deeb cashed in 24 events this summer and made five final appearances with three runner-up finishes and one outright victory. He won his seventh WSOP bracelet by taking down the $100,000 Pot-Limit Omaha High Roller for a score worth over $2.95 million.
Deeb capped off his sensational summer with a second WSOP POY honor. He joined Daniel Negreanu as the only players to be named the WSOP POY more than once.
Deeb Holds off Benny Glaser and The Grinder
Deeb amassed 4,194.1 points to top the 2025 WSOP POY Leaderboard. English pro Benny Glaser finished in second place with 4,153.66 points, just 41 points shy of passing Deeb after a misstep in his last tournament of the summer.
Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi finished third overall with 3884.96 points thanks to two impressive victories in the $50,000 Poker Players Championship and the 2025 WSOP Main Event.
Meanwhile, Czech pro Martin Kabrhel finished in fourth on the leaderboard with 3,639.41 points, and Scott Bohlman took fifth with 3,328.86 points. The rest of the Top 10 on the leaderboard included Brian Rast, Joao Vieira, Daniel Negreanu, Klemens Roiter, and Zdenek Zizka.
The WSOP revamped its points system, which now excludes any bracelet events that occur outside Las Vegas. That meant players at the top of the leaderboard couldn’t hunt for bracelets and pad their points totals against softer fields in the WSOP Europe in Rozvadov or down in the Bahamas for the WSOP Paradise.
The WSOP POY leaderboard only tallies a player’s best ten finishes. The current points system places an emphasis on deep runs in higher-tiered buy-in events, including all the championship events at the $10,000 price point, along with every High Roller tournament with buy-ins at $25,000 and up.
The points system also rewards multiple final table appearances. Deeb reached the final table in five events, including one online event. He had one victory, three runner-up finishes, and one third-place finish. He tallied 1,359.61 points alone for winning the $100,000 PLO High Roller.
Mizrachi won two bracelets and cashed in 12 events with almost $11.4 million in prize money this summer. Yet, he didn’t accumulate enough points to be a legitimate threat to Deeb. Aside from his momentous victories in the Main Event and PPC, many of his results were mini-cashes in lower buy-in tournaments with seven under $3,200 and five less than $2,100.
Glaser won three bracelets and cashed in 11 events, but he only earned $785,898 in prize money. His results lacked the necessary deeper runs that would’ve netted him more points to overtake Deeb.
The Summer of Deeb
Deeb cashed in 16 live events and eight online events this summer. Only his best online finish could be included on the POY leaderboard according to WSOP rules. He finished in second place in Online Event #12 $600 NLH Monsterstack.
Four other live final table appearances kept Deeb in first overall, including runner-up finishes in Event #43 $1,000 Limit Razz and Event #84 $1,000 NLH. He also took third in Event #36 $10,000 PLO 8 Championship.
Deeb also helped his own cause by finishing in the Top 20 in Event #17 $25,000 Mixed PLO/NLH High Roller, Event #47 $2,500 Mixed Omaha 8/Stud 8, Event #55 $10,000 H.O.R.S.E. Championship, and Event #88 $50,000 NLH Higher Roller.
Deeb banked over $4 million this summer in WSOP prize money, including five cashes that were at least $100,000. His $2.95 million score in the $100,000 PLO High Roller set a record for the largest cash prize in a PLO event at the WSOP.
By winning a seventh bracelet, Deeb joined an elite group with 15 other players who have won at least seven bracelets over their careers. Only eight players won more bracelets than Deeb, including Phil Hellmuth (17), Phil Ivey (11), Johnny Chan (10), Doyle Brunson (10), Erik Seidel (10), Johnny Moss (9), Mizrachi (8), and Glaser (8).
Deeb Secures Second POY Banner
Deeb was only 32 years old when he won his first WSOP POY in 2018. He cashed in 20 events that year with four final table appearances and two bracelet victories. After taking down POY honors in 2025, Deeb joined Negreanu as a two-time winner.
Deeb came close to winning the POY two other times. In 2019, he narrowly missed winning the POY in consecutive years when he finished in second on the leaderboard behind Robert Campbell. In 2023, Deeb was the runner-up behind Ian Matakis.
The WSOP POY was created in 2004, and the winner would be commemorated with a championship banner that would hang from the rafters over the massive main tournament room. Negreanu won the inaugural PYO in 2004 and added his second banner in 2013.
Players who win multiple bracelets in the same year often put themselves in position to contend for the WSOP POY honors. That list of multi-bracelet POY winners included Jeff Madsen (2006), Tom “DonkeyBomber” Schneider (2007), Jeff Lisandro (2009), Frank Kassela (2010), Greg Merson (2012), Negreanu (2013), George Danzer (2014), Jason Mercier (2016), Deeb (2018), Robert Campbell (2019), Josh Arieh (2021), and Scott Seiver (2024).
Seiver, Danzer, and Lisandro won three bracelets in a single year, which helped them lock up the POY race. This year marked the first time a three-time bracelet winner failed to secure the POY race when Glaser finished in second overall behind Deeb.
21+. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER
