Eliot Thomas

With just 20 players remaining in Event #97 of 100 on the 2026 World Series of Poker schedule, the $25,000 High Roller H.O.R.S.E. could prove to be vital in the race for WSOP Player of the Year (PoY). All three of the current top contenders remain in contention, with points leader Alex Foxen joined in the top 10 chip counts by Naoya Kihara and reigning Player of the Year Shaun Deeb.

Lucas Jumalon has three weeks to sit with a single question: can he turn his WSOP Main Event chip lead into $10,000,000? In that time, he'll do more interviews than he's ever done in his life, discover he's become one of the most-googled names in poker, and get profiled on ESPN — all before the final table resumes on August 3rd. So who is the player sitting in pole position to become poker's next world champion?

The final nine players in poker's biggest tournament, the WSOP Main Event, have officially been set. Twenty-two-year-old Lucas Jumalon leads the way after a stunning Day 8 performance saw him build a towering stack of 194,000,000 chips. He will return on August 3 in pole position, just eight eliminations away from becoming poker's newest world champion.