Carlos Mortensen

Has anyone ever won the World Series of Poker main event with pocket aces?

No. Well as far as we know because what Johnny Moss won with was not saved for posterity. But for the 35 winners we do know about, no one has won with pocket rockets.

Has anyone ever lost the WSOP main event with pocket aces?

Yes,in fact it has happened twice.

In 1979, Bobby Hoff had AA and lost to Hal Fowler's 7s6d.
In 2001, Dewey Tomko had AA and lost to Carlos Mortensen with KcQc.

Other notable final hands:

Greg Raymer (2004) and Jerry Yang (2007) both had pocket 8s on the final hand.

In both 1976 and 1977, Doyle Brunson's winning hand was 10-2.

Dan Harrington (1995) and Huck Seed (1996) won back-to-back with 9d8d.

In 1999, Noel Furlong held 55 and Alan Goehring had 66 but the fives won.

Bobby Baldwin (1978) and Tom McEvoy (1983) both won with pocket queens.

Sailor Roberts (1975) and Phil Hellmuth (1989) held 99 on their final hand.

And the worst starting hand to ever win?

Well we know a lot of the "final" hands involve big stacks calling with any two but that being acknowledged-in 1992, Hamid Dastmalchi held 8h4s and won the first prize of a million dollars.

The first event of the Spring Poker Season in Las Vegas is over and Juan Carlos Mortensen has added the World Poker Championship/Five Diamond Classic Trophy and $4 Million prize to his wallet and mantle. This was a very interesting tournament and week for me personally.

First, the season ending $25K buy-in WPT/Five Diamond always draws a classic field of professionals and wealthy amateurs. There were literally five recognizable faces at most tables. Now that is five faces that we in the poker media know but even a casual fan could pick out at least one player at each starting table and say:

"I know that guy, I saw him on TV."

With 50,000 starting chips both Day One flights started predictably slow but there was a lot of gamble in this event and lots a big stacks pushing at other big stacks almost every day. The Bellagio preferred structure is five 90 minute levels each day and no more; even with 50,000 chips and a great structure this was adequate time for a seven day event with 639 entrants.

Phil Hellmuth was seated near my media perch on several days and once again gave his immature, obnoxious performance; berating others players at the table and then hours later offering weak and insincere apologies. Around the tournament circuit, floor staff seem immune to enforcing penalties on such behavior but Phil gets a particularly blind eye turned to his television rich bad behavior.

On a very positive personal note, I was working with a great team for the Five Diamond including: Tiffany Michele, the emerging princess of poker interviewers; Justin Shronk, responsible for all the great video over on PokerNews.com; Amy Calistri, BJ Nemeth, Change100 & Dr. Pauly handled the tournment floor duties and photography. Its nice to work with people who know how to professionally do their job.

Finally, the tournament ended with a long and strong heads up between Carlos Mortensen and Kirk Morrison. Its a shame that the blinds eventually have to decide a winner in these WPT events. With 33M chips in play, the final level structure was: 100K ante and 600K/1.2M blinds.

Next, the WSOP Circuit event at Caesar's on Monday.

photo credit: BJ Nemeth