If there’s one thing poker legend Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi and Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani have in common, it’s that they both make the impossible look routine. One rewrote poker history in Las Vegas while the other is rewriting baseball in Los Angeles. And according to Mizrachi, 44, their rare streaks belong in the same sentence.
“After the Poker Players Championship, I won for the fourth time, which has never happened in history,” he told Parade exclusively on Friday, October 25 at the World Tournament of Slots. “It’s like something like what Shohei Ohtani just did in baseball or something crazy.”
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He’s not wrong. Mizrachi’s 2025 run was a poker first: he became the only player ever to win both the $50,000 Poker Players Championship and the World Series of Poker Main Event in the same summer. The PPC is a brutal mixed-game marathon built to crown the best all-around player in the world, and Mizrachi’s now won it four times. Then, just weeks later, he outlasted a field of nearly 10,000 players to take the Main Event title and his eighth career bracelet.
As for Ohtani, his dominance last year remains baseball’s version of the same miracle. The 31-year-old two-way icon didn’t just hit 50 home runs, but also stole 50 bases, becoming the first player in MLB history to do both in one season. It’s a feat so wild that even lifelong fans are still wrapping their heads around it. Add in his record-shattering $700 million contract and another MVP-level World Series chase, and Ohtani’s doing things no one thought possible.
SHOHEI OHTANI HAS DONE IT50 HOME RUNS | 50 STOLEN BASESHISTORY pic.twitter.com/GRVJUCbpja
— MLB (@MLB) September 19, 2024That’s exactly the parallel Mizrachi was drawing.
“That’s how hard it is,” he said of his never-before-seen double-title run. “It’s probably never going to happen again. Like with Ohtani, it’s never happened in baseball. With mine, it’s never happened in poker. So it’s craziness to think about what I did — nothing but amazing. And obviously it was some legendary stuff… You’ll never see it again in our lifetime, it might happen, but not probably in our lifetime.”
Even the World Series of Poker agreed, honoring him with a rare mid-series induction into the Poker Hall of Fame following his unprecedented double win.
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Mizrachi was in the Bahamas for the World Tournament of Slots, an invite-only event at Atlantis Paradise Island that brought together 500 players chasing a $1 million prize. But the poker champ wasn’t there to claim the life-changing prize — he was there to cheer on his mom, Susan “MommaGrinder” Laufer. She was one of the 500 players hitting the reels.
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Still, Mizrachi couldn’t resist a little competition of his own. He jumped into a special heads-up exhibition match against last year’s WTOS winner, Stephanie Hall, where he kept his winning streak alive and claimed the crown in their one-on-one showdown. And if you ask Laufer, none of this is surprising. “He always had a unique style of playing,” she told Parade of her son’s poker skills. “When he played professionally, his style was the same as if he were at home with friends and family. He shows no fear when MommaGrinder is here.”
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While Laufer didn’t take home the win, the million-dollar moment still stole the show. Hector Barahona of Toronto came out on top as the 2025 champion, claiming the grand prize after a two-day whirlwind of spins and bonus rounds. His victory was sealed in true Vegas-meets-Bahamas fashion, with Vanna White stepping onstage at the Atlantis gala to hand over the larger-than-life check.
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?Hector Barahona is the NEW @myvipwtos World Tournament of Slots Champion and has won $1,000,000. His excitement is positively infectious. Congratulations Hector (and Hector's family?)!@myVEGAS @MGMSlotsLive @MyKONAMISlots @PopSlotsCasino pic.twitter.com/BiYsSfRq0h
— PokerNews (@PokerNews) October 26, 2025“I’m so excited about the $1 million," Barahona told PokerNews. "I’m going to do so many things. Of course I’m going to help my family out… I like to make other people happy, so I’m going to use it to do that.”
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