Online Player of the Year Update — Nov. 21, 2008

With less than six weeks remaining in the 2008 Card Player Online Player of the Year Race, players are using the relatively quiet month of November to rack up last-second points in an effort to boost themselves up the leader board. The Full Tilt Online Poker Series X recently concluded and was a major factor in deciding the current top 10.

Since taking a monster lead with a third-place finish in the World Championship of Online Poker main event, Alex "AJKHoosier1" Kamberis hasn’t slowed down, making back-to-back final tables in the PokerStars $200 rebuy. His second trip to the final table included an outright win for $51,250. Just two days later, he finished second in the Super Tuesday for another $59,000. Just last week, Kamberis made two final tables in the $100 rebuy to give him a total of 8,900 points on the year.

Despite not having a single six-figure score on the year, tournament grinder Steve "gboro780" Gross still finds himself sitting in second place on the OPOY leader board. Gross has been the perfect model of consistency, getting most of his points through the big rebuy events and with his ability to close once he makes it deep. While Peter Eastgate celebrated his $9 million score, Gross went on a Nov. 9 tear, winning the PokerStars $100 rebuy, the Full Tilt Poker $50,000 guarantee, and tacking on a fourth-place finish in the Sunday Mulligan. In total, Gross pocketed nearly $140,000 that day to go along with his 1,440 points. Last Wednesday, Gross closed the gap a bit with yet another outright win in the Absolute Poker $100K Pro Bounty Guarantee. He is still more than 1,300 behind Kamberis, but if his hot streak continues, he’ll only need one big Sunday score to get it done.

The FTOPS X was more than kind to third-place resident Daniel "djk123" Kelly. The 19-year-old Villanova student made three final tables during the series, including a win in event No. 14 for $104,870. In total, 1,920 points were shipped to Kelly, who has now put himself in a position to make a late-season run at the top spot.

Spots four through nine feature a clustered mess of pros who are separated by just 258 points. Needless to say, anything can, and will happen, heading into the home stretch for the 2008 OPOY race.

Below are the top 10 players, displaying their rankings and winnings.
 

 
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