Jared Bleznick Captures First Bracelet in $50k No-Limit Hold'em High Roller

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Jul 14, 2024 5 min read

Five players came into the final day of Event #92: $50,000 High Roller No-Limit Hold'em here at the 2024 World Series of Poker hosted at Horseshoe and Paris Las Vegas. All were guaranteed at least $499,097 but had the shared goal of claiming the top prize of $2,037,947.

After the dust had settled, Jared Bleznick was the last player standing in the 178-entrant field. Bleznick overcame a final table consisting of some of the best No-Limit Hold'em players in the world, last defeating Jesse Lonis in heads up play to take home $2,037,947, the lion's share of the $8,499,500 prize pool, and his first WSOP bracelet.

Event #92: $50,000 High Roller No-Limit Hold’em Final Table Results

Winner's Reaction

"My whole career I was mostly a cash game player, mostly a heads up player" Bleznick commented following his win. "This means more to me for the public, for my friends, for my family and for people who said that I've never won a bracelet. I already know I can compete at the highest level and I've never given myself a chance to play a lot of tournament poker. I love tournament poker, I want to keep playing more and more. It does mean a lot to me. Having to do it in No-Limit Hold'em without any experience (playing High Roller No-Limit Hold'em tournaments) is unbelievable".

Bleznick continued, describing how poker has evolved over the years and his mindset towards staying competitive with today's top pros.

"I think the best thing about poker is that it keeps changing. It's like any business, or anything in life. The top players from ten years ago are not the top players today. Like Jesse Lonis, he's a young kid, one of the top players in the world and he wasn't playing five years ago. So there's new guys coming in, figuring out new things and getting better. My job is to overcome all that, try to figure out what they're doing and beat that style, which is something I've always been good at playing heads up poker".

Bleznick came into the final day second in chips while Christoph Vogelsang held a commanding chip lead over the rest of the field. Despite big pay jumps and heavy ICM pressure, Bleznick showed no fear in playing multiple big pots with Vogelsang throughout the final table.

"I was going after Vogelsang. I didn't care if he had more chips. I wanted to play pots with him, because he plays like a computer and that's the type of player I want to play against. When I know exactly what he's up to and what he's doing, I want to play pots with the chip leader at the time. Even if he has position on me, I don't care. When there's five left I'm playing to win. When I play for big money, my biggest edge is that I'm used to this, I'm comfortable and I want to play big pots with people that I feel I have an advantage over".

Bleznick had one last person to thank for motivating him towards his victory.

"The person I want to thank the most is Shaun Deeb. I made all these side bets with him and it forced me to play all these tournaments. I never would have played this tournament if I didn't have side action. I've been friends with him for a long time, and just beat him out of a lot of money. But the reality of it is this summer was about proving that I can win. My whole career I beat everyone playing heads up but in a tournament structure I just wanted to prove that I can beat all these guys. Obviously I just did it, but Shaun motivated me".

Final Day Action

With most players starting the day under 20 big blinds the action was fast and furious from the start of play today. Justin Saliba was eliminated by Bleznick in one of the first hands of the day in a brutal cooler that saw Saliba get all the money in with ace-king versus Bleznick's ace-queen only for the latter player to make a flush after catching running spades. That hand saw Bleznick, who began the day second-in-chips, close the distance between himself and Vogelsang. Not long afterwards, Nacho Barbero doubled through Vogelsang at which point the three players were very close in chips with Lonis trailing behind in fourth place.

Lonis went on a heater following the first break, doubling up twice through Barbero to keep himself in contention while Barbero was left with crumbs and bowed out in fourth shortly afterwards.

Immediately following Barbero's elimination Bleznick was involved in arguably the most important pot of the tournament for him. With the blinds having increased to the point that all three remaining players had very little room left to maneuver, Vogelsang open-shoved with ace-nine only for Bleznick to wake up with pocket tens. Bleznick's hand held up in the biggest pot of the tournament up to that point to send Vogelsang out in third place and enter heads up play against Lonis with roughly a 2:1 chip advantage over his opponent.

The heads up duel between Bleznick and Lonis was over quickly. Lonis was able to win a couple of small pots off of Bleznick early on but Bleznick was able to get paid off with a few well-timed value bets, leaving Lonis very short. Lonis soon found himself getting the rest of his chips in with pocket sevens and was in great position to double up versus Bleznick who had called with ace-four. Bleznick pulled ahead on the flop after catching an ace and remained ahead to eliminate Lonis and claim the victory.

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