After a three-handed battle that lasted over 11 hours, Greg Merson and Jesse Sylvia went heads-up for the 2012 World Series of poker Championship with Merson holding a slight chip advantage. It took less than 20 hands for Merson to dispatch Sylvia, winning what amounted to a coin-flip on the last hand of the match.

Monday saw the October Nine return to the Rio to play down to the final three players, and Merson and Sylvia dominated throughout Monday’s action. Joining the duo for three-handed play on Tuesday was 21 year-old Jacob Balsiger, who acquitted himself well, lasting over 11 hours against Merson and Sylvia, and even taking over the chip-lead late in the night, but it was not meant to be for Balsiger, who was eliminated by Greg Merson in third place.

Balsiger’s elimination left Merson and Sylvia to play for the $8.5 million first-place prize-money that was placed in between the two, and it was Merson’s aggression that stymied Sylvia during the short heads-up battle. The final hand came down to a situation where Sylvia was basically forced to call based on the pot odds he was receiving, and call he did with QJs. Sylvia wasn’t in bad shape, facing the K5s of Merson, but the board ran out all blanks and Merson was crowned the 2012 WSOP Champion.

Here is a look at the final table payouts from the 2012 WSOP Main Event:

1. Greg Merson — $8,531,853

2. Jesse Sylvia — $5,295,149

3. Jake Balsiger — $3,799,073

4. Russell Thomas — $2,851,537

5. Jeremy Ausmus — $2,155,313

6. Andras Koroknai — $1,640,902

7. Michael Esposito — $1,258,040

8. Robert Salaburu — $971,360

9. Steve Gee — $754,798

We’ll have more thoughts and opinions on the 2012 WSOP Main Event final table throughout the day, so be sure to check back in later. For now, Congratulations to the 2012 World Series of Poker Main Event Champion Greg Merson!

Tags: 5 Million, Aggression, Ausmus, Bad Shape, Balsiger, Jacob, Main Event 1, Merson, Michael Esposito, Poker Main Event, prize money, Russell Thomas, Sylvia, World Champion, world series, World Series of Poker, World Series Of Poker Champion, World Series of Poker Championship, World Series of Poker Main Event, WSOP Main Event

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 31st, 2012 at 9:01 am and is filed under Poker News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.