Aaron Pinson Takes Home $150,000 in Bounties Along With the Title

Aaron Pinson turned a deep run at the Borgata into one of the most dramatic Mystery Bounty results of the series, winning the title and collecting $150,000 in bounties along the way. His total haul from Event #5, the $2,200 Big Big Borgata Mystery Bounty, reached $199,825 after a heads-up deal with Matt Glantz and one final $25,000 bounty pull.

The tournament guaranteed two $50,000 bounties and two $25,000 bounties inside a $500,000 prize-pool structure. What it could not guarantee was that one player would repeatedly find the largest slips. Pinson did exactly that. By the end of the day, his bounty total alone was larger than the standard first-place prize money from the tournament.

A heads-up chop leaves the bounty drama unresolved

Pinson and Glantz reached heads-up and agreed to split the remaining tournament prize money evenly. Each received $44,825 from the regular prize pool. They then flipped for the trophy rather than play out a traditional heads-up match, and Pinson won that flip to become the official champion.

The mystery bounties still had to be drawn. Glantz had saved six bounty pulls, while Pinson had just one remaining. On numbers alone, Glantz seemed more likely to find the final $25,000 prize. Pinson drew first and immediately hit it, taking his overall bounty total to $150,000.

That last envelope transformed an already strong result into an extraordinary one. The combination of $44,825 in tournament prize money and $150,000 in bounties brought Pinson’s overall take to $199,825.

Pinson admits the result exceeded anything he expected

Pinson said he had not imagined winning around $200,000 when the day began. He entered with a stack in the bottom third of the remaining field and described the run that followed as unusually fortunate. He also joked that the Mystery Bounty format was not normally his favourite, although the result had temporarily changed his opinion.

His comments captured the strange psychology of this tournament format. In a normal freezeout, the biggest financial rewards are tied directly to finishing position. In a Mystery Bounty event, a player can generate a very large return before the final table simply by eliminating opponents and drawing high-value bounty slips.

Pinson’s day combined both routes. He advanced all the way to the title while also finding the biggest prizes in the bounty pool. That is why his total return represented roughly 40% of the $500,000 figure referenced around the event, a share that would be extremely unusual in a traditional payout structure.

A decade-plus poker career gets a first Borgata win

The Maryland player has recorded live cashes for more than a decade and has over $2.4 million in recorded lifetime earnings. He has also cashed at Borgata many times, but this was his first victory at the property.

That history made the win feel less like a sudden breakthrough by an unknown player and more like a long-time tournament regular finally landing the right combination of deep run and bounty luck at a familiar venue. Pinson himself repeatedly acknowledged how much fortune was involved, saying he had run well and beaten players he considered better than himself.

His attitude after the win was unusually candid. Rather than presenting the result as a perfectly executed plan, he described a day where aggression, positive attitude and favourable cards all aligned.

The first $50,000 bounty arrives early

The bounty story began before the final table. Bartley Dowling was eliminated by Pinson in 20th place, and that knockout gave Pinson the first of his major draws. He pulled one of the $50,000 prizes, producing the first major swing in his eventual total.

Other recognisable players were also eliminated during the march toward the final table. Joe McKeehen finished 18th, Justin Liberto 15th, BetMGM ambassador Michael Lavin 14th and WPT champion Kharlin Sued 13th.

Richard Newman was the final player eliminated before the final table. His ace-queen lost on the river to Michael McNicholas’ jack-ten, leaving Newman in tenth for $4,950. McNicholas then pulled a $25,000 bounty just before the nine-player final table began.

Early final-table action creates a new chip leader

Justin Arnwine was the first player out at the final table. He limp-back-jammed pocket twos from the small blind and ran into Michael Wang’s pocket queens. The hand moved Wang above one-third of the chips in play with eight players remaining, while Arnwine collected $5,950 for ninth place.

Pashk Gjini followed in eighth. He entered the final table as the shortest stack and eventually moved in with king-queen. McNicholas called with jack-ten and made trip jacks, sending Gjini out for $7,125.

Paul Spitzberg then finished seventh after getting pocket kings in against McNicholas’ ace-queen. An ace-high flush developed for McNicholas, moving him into a strong position while Spitzberg collected $8,525.

Glantz begins to take control of eliminations

Victor Ramdin had started the day as chip leader but could not find momentum at the final table. His last chips went in with king-queen against Glantz’s ace-queen. Glantz flopped top two pair, leaving Ramdin drawing dead by the turn and sending him out in sixth for $10,325.

Glantz also eliminated Dylan Lemery. Lemery’s ten-nine was up against Glantz’s ace-king and McNicholas’ pocket fives in a multiway pot. An ace-high board gave the hand to Glantz, with Lemery finishing fifth after reaching his second final table of the week.

Pinson gathers momentum at exactly the right time

McNicholas was the next major stack to fall. On a rivered board containing two deuces, McNicholas held top trips with ace-deuce. He bet and then called when Pinson had improved to eights full, giving Pinson both the pot and another bounty.

McNicholas finished fourth for $17,225, leaving three players. The hand shifted more chips toward Pinson at the stage when every elimination carried increasing value.

The crucial three-handed confrontation came against Michael Wang. Wang held pocket tens, while Pinson had pocket sevens. A seven on the flop turned the race in Pinson’s favour and ended Wang’s tournament in third place for $25,500.

Two massive bounty pulls follow Wang’s prediction

As Wang left the table, he told Pinson that the bounty from his elimination would be the $50,000 one. Moments later, Pinson drew the slip and proved him right. It was his second $50,000 bounty of the day.

Pinson had earlier recalled another crucial moment from three-handed play in which his sevens cracked Wang’s tens, linking that hand directly to the enormous bounty. The combination of the elimination and the draw gave him a financial return that was already well beyond the normal payout for his finishing position.

By the time heads-up began, the tournament had become as much about the remaining envelopes as the chips. Pinson had been drawing bounties throughout the day. Glantz had deliberately saved his.

The final $25,000 slip goes to the champion

Pinson and Glantz decided not to play a long heads-up match. They chopped the remaining prize pool evenly and flipped for the trophy, with Pinson winning. The two then moved to the bounty draws.

Glantz held six pulls. Pinson had only one. Yet Pinson’s single remaining draw produced the last $25,000 bounty. Glantz still collected $30,000 from his own bounty pulls in addition to the $44,825 second-place prize, but the final large envelope belonged to Pinson.

Pinson’s bounty haul consisted of two $50,000 pulls, two $25,000 pulls across the day, a $10,000 bounty, a $5,000 bounty and four $2,500 prizes, producing the $150,000 total reported after the tournament.

Why Mystery Bounty events can create unusual payout stories

Pinson noted that he had only once before taken such a large percentage of a prize pool, in a progressive knockout event at his home casino. The Borgata result illustrates why Mystery Bounty formats have spread so quickly across tours and casinos: the payout narrative remains uncertain even after the tournament prize money has been settled.

A player can finish outside the top positions and still have a remarkable financial result if the right bounty is drawn. Conversely, a player can reach heads-up and miss the largest prizes. That extra layer of variance is exactly what produced the unusual ending between Pinson and Glantz.

Pinson may not call it his favourite format in principle, but on this occasion it delivered the biggest story of the event. He arrived with a bottom-third stack, survived a fast-moving Day 2, won critical flips, eliminated major opponents and repeatedly found the largest bounty slips.

Event #5 final table results

The standard tournament payouts were split evenly at the top after the heads-up deal. Pinson and Glantz each received $44,825, while Michael Wang took $25,500 for third. Michael McNicholas finished fourth for $17,225, Dylan Lemery fifth for $12,725, Victor Ramdin sixth for $10,325, Paul Spitzberg seventh for $8,525, Pashk Gjini eighth for $7,125 and Justin Arnwine ninth for $5,950.

Those figures do not include each player’s separate mystery bounty winnings. That distinction is essential in this format because the headline result for Pinson is driven primarily by the $150,000 he collected from bounty pulls, not the $44,825 first-place prize listed in the standard payout table.

After the victory, Pinson suggested he might still take a short break rather than immediately jump into the neighbouring $10,000 event. He mentioned the possibility of returning for the second flight of the $5,000 tournament or staying around for PLO, but his original plan had been to go home for a couple of days.

Whatever he chooses next, the Borgata result gives him a first win at the property and one of the most memorable payout combinations of the series. The title mattered, but the defining image of the tournament was the final bounty draw: one envelope for Pinson against six for Glantz, and the last $25,000 prize still ending up in the champion’s hand.