Mike Takayama 🇵🇭

Born in 1988 and raised in the Philippines, Mike Takayama didn’t start his professional life at the poker table. He was actually a professional billiards player first, a sport that is incredibly popular in his home country. He says that the transition from pool to poker was natural because both games require a lot of strategy, patience, and the ability to handle pressure. He first got interested in poker around 2010 when he won a local tournament where the grand prize was a brand new BMW. After that win, he decided to take the game seriously. He spent years playing in the card rooms of Manila, like the Metro Card Club, before taking his game to the global circuit and becoming a national hero in the Filipino poker community.

Takayama is best known for his fearless and aggressive style of play. Because he has a background in billiards, he is very comfortable with the technical side of the game and isn’t afraid to take big risks to build a chip lead. In his WSOP bracelet win, observers noted that he used the “all in” move frequently, putting immense pressure on his opponents and forcing them to make tough decisions. While he can be very aggressive, he is also a very humble and polite person at the table. He prefers to let his playing do the talking and rarely gets caught up in trash talk or emotional outbursts. This “silent but deadly” approach makes him one of the most dangerous players to sit across from in any tournament.

According to The Hendon Mob, Mike Takayama has total earnings of nearly $4.1 million He currently sits at 3rd on the Philippines All Time Money List. His career reached a historic peak in 2018 when he won WSOP Event #59: $1,000 NLH Super Turbo Bounty for a career-best score of $198,568. Takayama is a prolific champion on the Asian Poker Tour (APT) , where he is a three-time APT Player of the Series winner. His major titles include the APT Championships Philippines 2017 Main Event for $105,530 and the APT Asian Series Manila Main Event for $93,000. In 2024, he continued his high-stakes dominance by winning the WPT Prime Cambodia Super High Roller for $158,587. His 2025 campaign has remained active with a victory in an APPT Manila side event for PHP 400,550 (∼$7,024) and a 3rd place finish in the WPT Prime Taiwan Super High Roller for NTD 748,000 (∼$24,982). Mike Takayama