Ali Imsirovic didn't cash in the $50,000 PokerGO Tour Championship Main Event, but it wasn't needed to capture the first ever PokerGO Tour presented by Guaranteed Rate Player of the Year.
Rok Gostisa, on the other hand, shipped the season finale for $689,100 Tuesday night. He agreed to a chop heads-up against Michael Gathy, but won the largest share after playing it out for the trophy. Gathy went home with $598,900 for second place out of 46 entrants.
You Can't Stop Ali Imsirovic, You Can Only Hope to Contain Him
The past year has been a magical one for Imsirovic, who took down 14 high roller events and dominated the tour. Sean Perry won six tournaments and may have won it in most years, but he still finished in third place.
Michael Addamo, who won a pair of bracelets at the 2021 World Series of Poker (WSOP) and also six PokerGO Tour events, took second place with 3,083 points, 558 more than Perry (2,525).
Both players performed at a high level throughout the year, but neither could come close to matching the 4,364 points of the champion. Imsirovic, who was already an established pro, posted his best year to date with over $6 million in live tournament cashes. He cashed in 34 PokerGO Tour events, winning 14 of them.
“It still feels pretty surreal, to be honest," Imsirovic said about his Player of the Year title. "I never thought I would accomplish something of this magnitude in poker. Next, the goal is to just keep trying to get better and solidify and keep proving that I belong here.”
“It was my goal from the start. I really wanted to win Player of the Year, and I made sure to try and play as many of these as I could and hopefully run as good as I possibly could.”
The 2021 accolades are just beginning for the 26-year-old crusher from Bosnia. He holds a sizable lead in the Global Poker Index Player of the Year race. With just over a week remaining in 2021, it appears he will put an end to Alex Foxen's two-year reign as GPI POY.
Let's Chop it Up
Ten players remained heading into Day 2 of the $50,000 buy-in PokerGO Tour Championship at the PokerGO Studio in Las Vegas on Tuesday. But only seven of them went home with money.
Sean Winter and Justin Bonomo busted to start the day before Nick Petrangelo was eliminated on the money bubble.
That left seven players, including a few who don't traditionally appear in these high roller final tables. Gostisa, who beat Gathy heads-up for the title following a chop, has been on a tear this month.
He booked six PokerGO Tour cashes in December, including two titles. He also won a $25,000 no-limit hold'em tournament at Bellagio during the Five Diamond World Poker Classic High Roller Series. That one paid $283,500, and he'd go on to cash for nearly $1.3 million in December. Prior to the start of the month, he had around $400,000 in career live tournament cashes.
The final table results are as follows:
| Place | Player | Prize |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Rok Gostisa | $689,100 |
| 2 | Michael Gathy | $598,900 |
| 3 | Sergi Reixach | $345,000 |
| 4 | Jake Schindler | $253,000 |
| 5 | Jacob Ferro | $184,000 |
| 6 | Ren Lin | $138,000 |
| 7 | Dominik Nitsche | $92,000 |
Gostisa is a successful online poker player who is now dominating the live tournament high rollers. We'll see if he can continue doing so long-term, but the odds appear to be in his favor.
