Mercier’s good fortune continues at Main Event

Jason Mercier’s Main Event got off to a dubious start Monday when his alarm didn’t go off because of a dead cellphone battery and he overslept.

Once he arrived at the Rio Convention Center, Mercier’s day improved considerably.

That pretty much sums up the past six weeks for one of poker’s biggest stars.

Mercier has endured an erratic summer and was down more than a half-million dollars at one point last month before collecting his third career World Series of Poker bracelet. The 28-year-old from Davie, Fla., continued his recent run of good form during Day 1B of the $10,000 buy-in No-limit Texas Hold ’em World Championship.

Mercier more than doubled his starting stack during the first three levels of play and unofficially had more than 70,000 chips when the players returned from the 10:30 p.m. break.

“It’s not the life of all poker players,” Mercier said of his recent wins and losses. “A lot of people are tight with their bankrolls, but I like to be kind of aggressive and take shots if I think it’s a good spot or good tournament or good cash game.”

Day 1B drew 1,1716 entrants, and Adil Khan of Coral Springs, Fla., was the unofficial leader with 153,500 chips at the 10:30 p.m. break with one level of play remaining.

The final starting flight of the Main Event starts at noon today at the Rio, and the majority of players are expected to register for Day 1C. The tournament runs through July 14, and the top 1,000 places will be paid.

The final nine players return Nov. 8 at the Rio’s Penn &Teller Theater to play for the estimated $8 million first-place prize. Sweden’s Martin Jacobson is the defending champion.

Mercier was a three-sport standout in high school and attended Florida Atlantic University, where he was introduced to online poker in 2004. Mercier transferred to Broward Community College after one year at FAU, and by 2007 he dropped out to pursue poker full time.

“I knew that I was better than my friends,” Mercier said. “And then when I started playing online, I knew that I was better than most of the people I was playing against on there, and everything kind of progressed.”

At age 21, Mercier won the European Poker Tour’s €5,000 buy-in No-limit Hold ’em Main Event at Casino Sanremo in Italy for more than $1.3 million and has been one of the most successful tournament players in the world the past seven years.

Mercier was No. 1 when the Global Poker Index debuted in 2011, and he never dropped below No. 9 during the first two years of the player rankings. Mercier has more than $15.2 million in live tournament earnings and ranks No. 11 on the all-time money list, according to GPI’s Hendon Mob Poker Database.

“It’s been kind of crazy over the last five or six years,” Mercier said. “It’s cool to be recognized as one of the best players. I like to think of myself as an ambassador for the game and try to represent myself and my sponsorships to the best of my ability.”

Mercier entered the WSOP on a hot streak after winning three events during PokerStars’ Spring Championship of Online Poker, but he found himself down about $600,000 after failing to cash in his first nine WSOP events and taking a beating at the cash-game tables. He also lost a six-figure prop bet when poker pro Brian Hastings captured a bracelet June 11.

But Mercier won the $5,000 buy-in No-limit Hold ’em Six-Handed event June 15 for $633,357 and also had six-figure cashes when he finished second in the $10,000 buy-in Pot-limit Omaha Championship and seventh in the $50,000 buy-in Poker Players Championship.

In all, Mercier has earned more than $1.35 million at this year’s WSOP.

“I think I would have been confident coming into the Main Event either way. There’s no pressure on me,” Mercier said. “If I was down like maybe a million dollars, I might be feeling a little pressure that I need to have a good run here. But I don’t feel any pressure. I feel like I’m playing well and just hoping for a deep run.”

Contact reporter David Schoen at dschoen@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-5203. Follow him on Twitter: @DavidSchoenLVRJ.