Chino Rheem made PokerGO Tour history at the 2025 PGT PLO Series II in late October. The 45-year-old poker pro from Los Angeles came out on top in the points race to secure the series championship, becoming the first contender to ever earn three PGT series titles overall. He was previously crowned the champion in both the 2023 PGT Mixed Games II and 2025 PGT Mixed Games festivals.
Rheem is also a three-time World Poker Tour champion, a European Poker Tour main event winner, and he even final tabled the World Series of Poker main event. After this most recent run inside the PokerGO Studio at ARIA Resort & Casino Las Vegas, the longtime tournament fixture has nearly $18.1 million in recorded scores.
This latest series victory saw Rheem cash in seven of the 10 pot-limit Omaha events that made up the schedule, with four final-table finishes. His total earnings of $798,900 for the festival were the most of any player.
Rheem saved the best for last. His lone title came in the $25,000 buy-in finale. He beat out a field of 68 entries to earn $510,000, locking up the series championship in the process. As a result, he was also awarded the PGT Gold Cup and a $10,000 PGT Passport.
The win grew Rheem’s point total to 597, giving him a 110-point margin of victory over Bryce Yockey, who won two titles during the series. While Yockey managed more first-place finishes, Rheem had twice as many final-table showings and more than twice as many cashes.
Rheem kicked off the series with a runner-up showing in the first event, navigating his way through a field of 146 entries to earn $106,000. He then recorded a min-cash in event no. 3 and a ninth-place showing in event no. 5. While he did not cash in event no. 6, it would mark the last time that he hit the rail empty-handed during the festival, rattling off finishes of sixth, fifth, eighth, and first.
Frederic Normand was the only other player to cash in more than half of the tournaments offered, with six in-the-money finishes.
Rheem’s success at this festival also helped propel him to second in the season-long PGT points race and 26th in the Card Player Player of the Year race presented by CoinPoker.
Superstars Shine Early
More than $9.1 million was awarded during the series. As with most PGT stops, the stakes kept rising as the days flew by. The first trio of events all cost $5,000 to enter, resulting in the three largest fields of the series.
Event no. 1 was a standard PLO tournament with 146 entries. After two days of action, 2025’s hottest tournament player was posing for his latest winner’s photo.
Jesse Lonis added $175,000 to his already massive earnings total this year, extending his advantage in several key POY statistical categories in the process. The 30-year-old poker pro currently leads all contenders in points (10,507), POY-qualified titles (eight), and final tables (25) after this series.
Lonis, who took down the PGT PLO Series held back in April, needed just over an hour to close out the win at the final table. Just like last spring, Lonis had significant side action on the line, with a prop payout worth more than the first-place prize.
“Was a sick one to win, had a $50k must-win side bet with five others,” said Lonis in a social media post. “Made the dynamic and decisions completely different!”
Eight of Lonis’ 15 top tournament paydays have been recorded since New Year’s Day, including a career-best $3.4 million in the $100,000 high roller at Triton Montenegro. Lonis’ career earnings now sit at nearly $27.4 million, thanks in large part to his incredible streak in 2025.
Lonis wound up cashing three times during the series, with this win and another final-table finish. He now sits 1,136 POY points ahead of the nearest competition in the POY standings. His 10,507 has already surpassed the final total of 10,174 that won Adrian Mateos the POY title in 2024, with Lonis still having two months to add to his tally.
One day after Lonis’ impressive win, perennial POY contender Alex Foxen issued a dramatic response. He took down the very next event, a $5,300 PLO Quattro Bounty event, for a total payday of $177,000 between the first-place prize and his bounties.
Foxen’s victory also pushed him up to second place overall in the POY standings with 9,371 points. He now has five titles, 19 final-table finishes, and more than $10.8 million in POY earnings. This win was Foxen’s only final-table showing of the series, but he did cash four more times.
Foxen now has four PGT wins on the year. With 24 cashes in PGT events totaling 2,816 points, he remains the player to beat in the season-long rankings for the high-stakes centric tour. He is the only player with more points than Rheem (2,340).
Event no. 3 was the final $5,000 buy-in on the slate, and won by living poker legend Erik Seidel, who beat out a field of 143 entries to earn $171,500. This was the latest in a long list of victories that includes 10 gold bracelets, a World Poker Tour main event title, and several marquee high roller wins.
The 65-year-old New York native broke onto the scene with his runner-up finish in the 1988 WSOP main event, and has gone on to accumulate more than $49.7 million across 447 recorded in-the-money finishes.
Double The Stakes
Ben Lamb took down the first of three $10,000 buy-in tournaments on offer. The two-time WSOP main event final tablist and two-time bracelet winner overcame 117 entries on his way to hoisting the trophy. The $292,500 first-place prize grew his career haul to more than $19.2 million.
More than $5 million of Lamb’s earnings have come in PLO tournaments, including his $814,436 win in the 2011 WSOP $10,000 PLO championship. That puts Lamb just outside the top 10 on the game’s all-time tournament earnings leaderboard.
Sean Winter cashed in three of the first four events, placing eighth, third, and sixth to bring his haul to $162,800 heading into the midpoint of the series. After all of those close calls, the Floridian broke through with a win in event no. 5, which featured a progressive knockout (PKO) format.
The high-stakes regular earned $122,300 from the main prize pool as the champion, along with $155,000 in bounties to bring his total haul to $277,300. Winter added one more cash during the second half of the schedule, placing sixth in event no. 8. He went on to finish third in the standings with 459 total points.
Winter now has more than $36.8 million in lifetime cashes, with 19 recorded victories along the way.
The final $10,000 title was secured by two-time bracelet winner Bryce Yockey. The 88-entry turnout made for a $237,600 top prize for Yockey, who defeated WPT champion and bracelet winner Matthew Wantman heads-up. Yockey was far from finished making moves at this series, though.
Raising The Stakes Again
Veselin Karakitukov took down the first of the three $15,000 events. While he might not be a household name for tournament poker fans, the Bulgarian four-card crusher has $3.8 million in recorded earnings, including two massive cashes in WSOP PLO high rollers. Those two scores collectively account for more than $1.3 million of his career haul.
Karakitukov navigated his way through a field of 86 entries to earn $348,300, defeating Joao Simao heads-up to close out the win.
The $15,000 mystery bounty drew 65 entries, with Taylor Wilson coming out on top in the end. Wilson claimed the $195,000 first-place prize, and essentially doubled that sum with $190,000 worth of bounties.
That $385,000 total payout represents the second-largest live result of Wilson’s career. Back in January, he took down a $25,500 high roller during the 2025 Lucky Hearts Poker Open in South Florida for $511,900.
Wilson’s victory came in his second final-table appearance and third cash of the festival, including a fourth-place showing in event no. 5 just a few days earlier. He would go on to finish sixth in the series standings.
Bryce Yockey bested 65 entries in event no. 9, locking up $290,000 for the win, which came just three days after his triumph in event no. 6. All told, his two wins and three cashes during the series brought his series-wide total to $537,600.
Yockey added 232 PGT points with his second victory, increasing his points to 487. That gave him a 32-point lead over second-ranked Sean Winter in the standings heading into the $25,000 buy-in finale.
Yockey defeated Ben Tollerene heads-up for the win this time around. This was Tollerene’s 16th final-table showing of the year, with two titles won along the way. He now has nearly $11.9 million in POY earnings and 6,917 points, which places him eighth in the POY standings.
Karakitukov placed fourth for his second big score of the festival. With 358 total points, he finished in fifth place in the battle for series champion honors.
Rheem Comes Up Clutch With A Buzzer-Beating Win
The $25,000 finale generated a $1,700,000 prize pool that was reserved for the top 10 finishers. Sean Rafael was the first player to hit the rail for the day, and the last to do so without a payday. He bubbled when his overpair of aces and nut flush draw were unable to overcome the two pair of two-time bracelet winner Dylan Weisman.
LaDarren Banks recorded his fourth cash of the series, finishing 10th for $51,000. German bracelet winner Christopher Frank soon followed for the same payout. Jason Mercier then won a big three-way all-in on the final table bubble to bust both Alex Foxen (8th) and Weisman (7th). The duo both earned $68,000 for their efforts.
Despite scoring that double elimination, Mercier ended up as the next to hit the rail. The six-time bracelet winner got the last of his stack in against two-time bracelet winner Joao Simao, and the Brazilian turned a better hand to narrow the field to five. Mercier took home $94,000, growing his tournament earnings to $21.5 million.
Rheem won several hefty clashes with Artem Maksimov during five-handed play, with the final being the last of Maksimov’s tournament. The chips went in with Rheem’s pair of aces and nut flush draw facing second pair, straight draws, and a lower flush draw for his opponent. The turn and river kept Rheem ahead, though, and Maksimov settled for $127,000.
Two-time bracelet winner Sam Soverel also lost a big one to Rheem, finding himself with just a handful of big blinds to work with afterwards. Simao won the rest with trip fours to end Soverel’s run in fourth place for $170,000.
Shortly after that, Simao squared off against Isaac Haxton in a set-over-set scenario. Haxton would improve to quads to win the pot and eliminate Simao in third place for $230,000.
The final showdown began with Rheem up nearly 2:1. The stacks hung stayed the same in the early going, but the decisive hand that swung the match soon arrived.
Haxton raised from the button with [pcn]AdAc7s3d[/pcn] and Rheem defended his big blind with [pcn]Jd10s8s7h[/pcn]. The flop came down [pcn]6s5s2d[/pcn] and Rheem checked with his flush and straight draws. Haxton bet, Rheem check-raised, and Haxton called to see the [pcn]3s[/pcn] roll off on the turn. Rheem checked and then called Haxton’s bet. The [pcn]9s[/pcn] completed the board, prompting another check from Rheem. Haxton fired 2,550,000, leaving just a single 5,000 chip behind. Rheem shoved and Haxton folded, leaving himself with a shot at an improbable ‘chip-and-a-chair’ comeback that never materialized.
Haxton earned $331,000 as the runner-up. This was his third final-table finish and fourth overall cash of the series. His 360 points were good for fourth in the final standings. The bracelet winner and two-time Super High Roller Bowl champion now boasts nearly $63.6 million in lifetime cashes, the sixth-highest total of any player in poker history.