Michael “Grinder” Mizrachi Wins 2025 WSOP Main Event

By Scott Roeben, on July 17 2025
4 min read 3 comments
Gambling Las Vegas

A seasoned poker pro, Michael “Grinder” Mizrachi, snagged the $10 million top prize by prevailing over 9,735 competitors in the 2025 World Series of Poker Main Event on July 16, 2025.

This year’s prize pool was the largest in WSOP history: $90,535,500. Mizrachi’s win puts his lifetime poker earnings at more than $29 million.

But it’s not really about the money. It’s about the poker groupies. Which is absolutely not a thing, but this story needs some padding, so we’re adding jokes.

A grinder is a gambler who consistently plays a large volume of games, often at lower stakes, to earn a steady income over time, as opposed to going for big wins. Given this windfall, it’s unclear if this guy’s still a “grinder.”

In addition to the $10 million prize, Mizrachi (pronounced “mizz-rocky”) also won the coveted Main Event bracelet, valued at $500,000.

Here’s a look at the hand that clinched the win.

As an added perk, Mizrachi was inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame.

It’s a little awkward, because the WSOP snubbed Mizrachi earlier this summer, despite his impressive accomplishments, including winning another prestigious event, the WSOP Poker Players Championship, a record four times (including at this year’s World Series of Poker).

Among his many accomplishments, Mizrachi was already a seven-time WSOP bracelet winner.

Bracelets are given out for all the various tournaments within the World Series of Poker. This year there were 100 bracelet events.

People don’t call it “bling” anymore, olds. Don’t embarrass yourself.

Here’s how his win was described in the official news release: “Down to just three big blinds on Day 8 of Main Event play, Mizrachi faced overwhelming odds to claim this historic win. But from that low point, he surged with newfound momentum, delivering what could be considered one of the most dominant bracelet-clinching performances in poker history. Eliminating two of the final four players in the first two hands on Day 2 of the Final Table, he secured the championship in just 24 total hands.”

“Blinds” are mandatory contributions to the pot. That means at one point, Mizrachi was just a few hands away from being eliminated from the Main Event.

By the time the final table got down to four players, Mizrachi had 76% of all the chips in play. If the “Grinder” ever needs another nickname, he might go with “Big Stack.”

Mizrachi’s play was so dominant, the entire Main Event spanned just 79 hands, making it the fastest Main Event final table in modern history.

The annual World Series of Poker is held at Paris and Horseshoe in Las Vegas.

Because we need to pad this story further, let’s talk about $10 million.

Ten million bucks in $100 bills weighs about 220 pounds, or about as much as a newborn baby elephant.

This isn’t to scale, but it certainly is adorable.

Stacked up, $10 million is about 36 feet tall, or as tall as a three-story building.

If the $10 million were in $1 bills, the pillar of cash would be about 3,583 feet tall, or taller than three Eiffel Towers, one on top of another.

The volume of $10 million is about two cubic feet, or about the size of a rolling Igloo cooler.

Let’s talk taxes for no reason, shan’t we?

The I.R.S. is going to want a 37% cut right off the top, or $3.7 million. (Here’s an overview of the tax ramifications of winning big at WSOP.)

Thankfully, gamblers can use losses to offset their wins.

There’s been a lot of talk lately about a new tax law going into effect in 2026 that would let gamblers deduct just 90% of their losses from their wins, as opposed to the current 100%. This new law will hit professional gamblers like Michael “Grinder” Mizrachi hard. He is going to have to write off every penny of losses to try and mitigate the tax hit.

As our fellow youths say, “mo’ money, mo’ problems.”

Another notable aspect of this year’s World Series of Poker, for the first time in 30 years, a woman played in the final table.

Leonore “Leo” Margets fell out of the running on the first day of the Main Event final table, with a respectable seventh place. She won $1.5 million. She’s from Spain, and the tax rate is nearly 50%, so she’ll keep about half of that prize.

There’s always next year. Wow, that’s the first time we’ve ever written that sentence where we’re not entirely sure it’s true.  If everyone could stop bombing each other, that’d be great.

There was also a controversy related to chip dumping. It’s inside baseball, but an interesting kerfuffle involving an investigation into possible collusion between players.

This is the first year the World Series of Poker is under new ownership since Caesars Entertainment (then Harrah’s Entertainment) acquired the brand in 2004.

In late 2024, Caesars sold the WSOP to NSUS Group, whoever they might be. As part of the sale, Caesars Entertainment gets to operate the event for 20 years.

We love us some video poker, but it takes a special type of person to master and succeed at live poker.

The WSOP is always populated with interesting characters.

A great poker player combines math, game theory, psychology, discipline and stamina to outmaneuver opponents, manage risk and avoid nodding off during long, long stretches of nothing interesting happening.

Poker players must also possess nasal fortitude, the ability to endure trash talk and volatile “personalities” like Phil Hellmuth. Hey, we are a noted expert of watching poker on TikTok.

Michael Mizrachi’s WSOP Main Event victory is one for the books! Which is the best cliche we could whip up at a moment’s notice. Now, we have to get back to playing the other, better, version of poker.