Big names in the online game hit new major milestones at the start of 2019.

The PocketFives Milestone Report looks at the online poker players who are achieving career-best achievement or reaching new heights in the rankings.

It’s been a minute since we’ve checked in on the progress of some of the PocketFives community and, in the past month or so, there have been plenty of new major milestones to celebrate.

So, let’s dive in and take a look at some of the accomplishments of the online grinders who are putting in time on the felt and reaping the rewards.

Major Moves At $10M+

In the upper echelons of earnings, there are plenty of players who continue to climb the ranks at the start of 2019.

Johannes ‘Greenstone25’ Korsar Hits $12M

One such player is Sweden’s Johannes ‘Greenstone25’ Korsar who soared past the $12M lifetime earning mark. He’s had a remarkable start to the year with multiple five-figure scores in January. However, it was his runner-up finish in Event 57 of the PokerStars Winter Series ($2,100 No Limit Hold’em Main Event) for $260,391 that pushed him into third on the online All-Time Earnings list, right behind ‘lena900’ ($13.8M) and Chris ‘moorman1’ Moorman ($15.6M).

Korsar currently has $12.375M in total career earnings and sits as the #26-ranked player in the world.

Not far behind Korsar are a handful of pros that used the end of 2018 and start of 2019 to pull themselves up over the $11M mark.

Getting Crowded At $11M

Former #1-ranked player Chris ‘Getting Daize’ Oliver, a PocketFiver since 2007, is one of those pros. He recently finished as the runner-up in the partypoker Sunday High Roller Bounty Hunter for $16,907 but had been putting together five-figure scores for the better part of two months to push his lifetime total to over $11.2M.

Oliver has some elite company when it comes to newly minted $11M winners. Swedish superstars Andreas ‘r4ndomr4gs’ Berggren and ’Sheater’ just recently jumped over the milestone. As did Ukranian crusher Roman ‘Romeopro’ Romanovsky.

Romanovsky, currently the #4-ranked player in the world, has been putting in plenty of volume and connecting with big scores, especially on partypoker where he recently took fifth in the $1M GTD Big Game for $58,025.

Finally, another Swedish standout, the worldwide #20-ranked ‘inhoo’, joined the $10M club. He has racked up 15 podium finishes in the month of January, including a silver medal finish in Event 38 of the PokerStars Winter Series ($1,050 Pot Limit Omaha Six Max) for $27,983.

Top Ranked Players Hitting New Highs

Some of the biggest names in the online game have also started the year by eclipsing landmark milestones.

Brazil’s #1-ranked Joao ‘joaosimaobh’ Simao has been off to a fast start in 2019. The partypoker ambassador has surpassed the $8M mark online and used his first-place finish in a December partypoker Sunday High Roller Bounty Hunter to add over $53,000 to his career totals of nearly $8.2M.

Joining him at the $8M mark is longtime PocketFiver J.D. ‘jdpc27’ Wheeler, who now plays out of Mexico. He accomplished the task this week with a top 100 finish in the reduced buy-in $109 PokerStars Sunday Million for $1,538.

Connor ‘blanconegro’ Drinan was victorious in Event 28 of the PokerStars Winter Series ($2,100 No Limit Hold’em Eight Max PKO) for $69,830 to help him achieve $7M in lifetime earnings. Joining him in recently hitting that number are ‘breeth’ and former #1-ranked player Caio ‘pessagno’ Pessagno.

December and January were huge for both Sam ‘Pudge714’ Greenwood and Pim ‘joppiesaus’ De Goede. Greenwood not only had an amazing PCA $100K Super High Roller victory but he’s also been crushing the PokerStars High Roller Club online. De Goede chopped the historic $20M GTD MILLIONS Online for a historic $2.3M score. Thanks to their online success, both are now members of the $6M lifetime earnings club.

Top 10-Ranked, $5M Winners

A pair of players who have recently spent a considerable amount of time as top-10 ranked players are also newly-minted $5M men.

Worldwide #8-ranked ‘DamageAP’ from Latvia took fourth in the PokerStars High Roller Club $530 Daily Supersonic for $7,013 this month to hit the $5 million mark.

At the same time #10-ranked Argentian superstar Ramiro ‘Ramiro’ Petrone booked a runner-up result in Event 55 in the PokerStars Winter Series $1,050 Sunday Warm-Up for $78,433 to help him hit the new high.

Joining the pair at $5M lifetime is also Sweden’s ‘DeathbyQuads’, Troy ‘iamthedeck ftw’ Quenneville and Ireland’s #4-ranked Tomas ‘luckymo32’ Geleziunas.

Is Anatoly Filatov Ready For The Top 10?

It takes quite an effort to break through to the ranks of the PocketFives top 10 and partypoker ambassador Anatoly ‘nl_profit’ Filatov has been producing the results to put him in position. This week Filatov has, once again, reached a new career high ranking. This week he sits at #11 in the world and is on the doorstep of making his move into the elite rankings of the top 10. Next week may be his debut.

Only two other players have reached career-high rankings this week as Russia’s ‘Futti18’ climbed three spots to break into the top 25 at #25 and Bulgaria’s top-ranked pro ‘cskar4e1’ jumped one spot to #50.