Las Vegas Weekly

November 10, 2009 · 10:56 AM

Photo Gallery: Joe Cada becomes WSOP’s youngest winner at 21

By Robin Leach

Joe Cada holds up his newly acquired World Series of Poker bracelet after winning the 2009 WSOP at The Rio.

Photo: WSOP/Harrah's

It took just about three hours for 21-year-old Joe Cada to produce the winning cards and walk away with $8,547,042 in winnings and the prized bracelet proclaiming him World Series of Poker champion.

Joe became the youngest player to win in WSOP’s 40-year history. Now all he wants to do is return next year and become the first back-to-back winner! His journey to fame and fortune had begun in July when 6,494 players from all over the world first sat down at The Rio.

Joe’s mom, Ann, is a downtown Detroit casino dealer, and she was on hand at The Rio this morning shortly after 2 a.m. when he defeated Darvin Moon.

Said Joe: “I never thought this was really possible. I ran really well, and it was one of those dreams, and I’m thankful it came true.”

His opponent, Maryland logger Darvin, won $5.18 million for second place. We learned that he’d not only won his seat at the table with a $140 buy-in at a West Virginia casino tournament, but that he also didn’t own a cell phone or had ever sent or received an e-mail. In fact, his trip here in July for the tournament was his first ever on a plane to Las Vegas and returning here for this match was only his second time in the air to our entertainment capital of the world.

The November Nine began on Saturday after a near four-month break to build excitement and anticipation for the match-up. From Saturday’s play through this morning’s victory, the Final Table had lasted just under 15 hours with 276 dealt hands. Motley Crue rocker Vince Neil, with showgirls on hand, introduced the two players last night to the frenzied rowdy in the Penn & Teller Theater.

Joe and Darvin went back and forth in the chip leader position several times during the 88 hands. They were given one 20-minute break between play. At one point, Darvin was up 100 million in chips. At another point, Joe was ahead by less than 4 million chips.

Big thanks to Emily Jillette, who was our special correspondent for the live Twitter reports and real-time photos that began last night at 10 and ended just after 2 this morning. Her colleague Barry Greenstein added some of the more technical aspects of card play for us. (Go to Twitter.com/Robin_Leach for their tweets.)

As I’ve said previously, my knowledge of poker is abysmal, so we turned to our friends at the WSOP for their reports:

Joe came into the final table with a decisive advantage over his opponent. However, about an hour into the match, Darvin’s aggressive play remedied his chip deficiency, even putting him in a commanding lead at one point with 149 million in chips to Joe’s 49 million.

“Well, you got to take the man’s game away from him,” said Darvin of his aggressive strategy. “Use the man’s game and see where he goes.”

All was not lost for the young poker pro from Shelby Township, Mich. A bit of light shone for Joe after a river gave him a straight and a hefty 20 million in chips.

The hand of the match developed a little more than 2 1/2 hours after play began.

With the board showing [10c] [10d], Joe fired out 3 million in chips. Darvin responded with an all-in re-raise. After some consideration, Joe made the call, tabling while Darvin turned over. For the championship bracelet, Darvin needed a six or Jack on the river but was denied both when a three was turned over.

“That’s the hand I messed up,” Darvin reflected. “I should have raised on the flop where he had middle pair.”

Joe, back in the driver’s seat, never looked back. The final hand saw the two remaining players all-in pre-flop with Joe’s pocket nines vs. Moon’s Q-J suited. The flop came 8c-2c-7s, improving neither player’s hand, while a king on the turn and another seven on the river ended Darvin’s spectacular run and catapulted Joe into poker superstardom.

While a lot has been said about Darvin’s humility and indifference to the fame and fortune that comes with poker celebrity, he was adamant about his intentions on winning it all.

“Oh hell yeah, $3 million, what do you mean what’s the difference?” replied Darvin when asked if there was a big difference to him between first and second. “Am I sad about it? Am I depressed? Hell no.” For his second-place finish, Darvin earned $5,182,928.

A tearful Joe gave a nod to his opponent and addressed the crowd after WSOP Commissioner Jeffrey Pollack presented him with poker’s most coveted prize.

“I want to thank my friends and family for taking time away from work and school to be here,” he said as his cheering section erupted in mayhem.

Just over a week before his 22nd birthday, the young poker pro acknowledged the fantastic achievement he had just accomplished.

“I’ve dreamed of winning this tournament, and to do it the first year out of the gate is unbelievable,” Joe said. “This is just amazing.”

Barry told me: “It went way longer than I expected. I thought it would be a relatively fast game, 28 hands or so. They played over 80 hands and had five or six all-ins, one called.”

Now known as the youngest poker champion ever to win at WSOP, Joe is almost a year younger (340 days) than Denmark’s Peter Eastgate, the previous youngest winner who won it last year. Before Peter, 11-time gold bracelet winner and Las Vegas resident Phil Hellmuth, who watched the play early this morning until Joe’s victory, had held the previous record for 20 years.

Emily’s last tweet of the morning at 2 a.m. summed it all up: “This was so much fun, and The Rio has been fully sold out the entire time, which is even better.”

Robin Leach has been a journalist for more than 50 years and has spent the past decade giving readers the inside scoop on Las Vegas, the world’s premier platinum playground.

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