2019 WSOP Main Event Tracking To Be Second Biggest Main Event Field of All Time

Published on July 7th, 2019 2:00 am EST

In 2006, Jamie Gold topped a field of 8,773 players to win the World Series of Poker main event.

Shortly after Gold took down the main event, the UIGEA (Unlawful Internet Gaming Enforcement Act) was passed into law in the United States, which led to companies like Party Poker pulling out of the country. The World Series of Poker disassociated itself from the poker rooms that elected to continue to serve the US (namely, Pokerstars and Full Tilt Poker), and this resulted in a drastic hit to the main event numbers from 2007 onwards.

In fact, the main event field went from 8,773 players in 2006, all the way down to 6,358 players in 2007.

There was a slow rebound in the years after, though that trend came to a screeching halt following "Black Friday" in 2011.

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Things are looking up once again, however, thanks, in part, to the growing legalization of online poker on a state-by-state basis in the United States.

In 2018, a total of 7,874 players turned out for the main event.

This year, the tournament is currently tracking for its second largest field size of all time, as over 8,200 players have registered for the tournament more than halfway through Day 2ab.

Players can continue to register all the way up until the start of Day 2c on Sunday, and these players will likely include the one and only Phil Hellmuth, who recently returned from a trip to Peru.

While the 2006 record is likely to stand for at least another year, there is practically no doubt that the record will be falling soon.

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Here is the breakdown for entrants so far this year:

Day 1A: 1,334
Day 1B: 1,914
Day 1C: 4,877
Day 2AB: 100

With another hundred or so registrations expected for Day 2C, the tournament should end with around 8,400 entrants, though a final number (as well as the final prize pool totals) will be released on Sunday evening.

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Filed Under: The World Series of Poker