Give it to him straight

Kenny Huynh upgraded his trip sixes to a straight to win his first World Series of Poker bracelet early Monday.

Huynh (screen name Chopuh) won Event 19 of the WSOP Online, a $400 No-limit Hold’em tournament, earning $133,856.82. He prevailed in a field of 2,545 entries (1,757 players and 788 rebuys).

He won heads-up against Matthew Berger (610610), who earned $82,732.86.

In the final hand, both players held trip sixes on a board of four-five-six-six, but Berger held the lead with nine-six to Huynh’s six-three. That changed on the river when a deuce fell, giving Huynh a sixhigh straight. He went all-in, and Berger called with his trips and lost.

Huynh had more than $200,000 in career tournament earnings coming into the event, according to the Hendon Mob Poker Database, but he had only one cash for $979 in WSOP tournaments before Monday’s victory.

Jim Barnes

and bets on sports and horse racing. He has more than 54,000 subscribers, and he said the majority of his income derives from Youtube and streaming his online sessions on Twitch.

But while he plays the degenerate, he has rapidly improved his poker game. He went to the WSOP for the first time last year and scored for $208,643 by finishing third in the Colossus, a $400 No-limit Hold’em event with 13,109 entries.

That spurred him to get poker coaching to improve his game, he said, and now that is paying off.

The momentum from his bracelet win was immediate. The next day, he finished 23rd for $6,381 in a $1,500 event, and the day after that he took 16th for $11,640 in the $3,200 No-limit Hold’em High Roller, the biggest buy-in event of the U.S. leg of the WSOP Online. He has since cashed in two other events.

Now he said he’s considering trying to get out of the country to play the international leg of the WSOP Online, which started Sunday on Ggpoker and is only available to players physically outside the U.S. — an unthinkable prospect before his recent run, when his average tournament buy-in was about

$100.

But the plan for now is to finish out the U.S. leg, in a more comfortable setting.

“The first thing I need to do,” he said, “is set up in Jersey — not in a car — for the rest of the month.”

Contact Jim Barnes at jbarnes@ reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0277. Follow @Jimbarneslv on Twitter.