"The Nuts" is a monthly feature that takes a look at the best poker players in the world. This feature aims to produce a list of the best players of the moment. Our panel includes ESPN.com's trio of poker contributors (Gary Wise, Bernard Lee and myself), ESPNDeportes.com poker editor Nahuel Ponce, Bluff magazine editor-in-chief Lance Bradley and senior writer Jessica Welman, PokerNews editor-in-chief Matthew Parvis and tournament reporter Don Peters, PokerNewsDaily's Dan Cypra and Poker Road's Court Harrington.

What a month it has been! The poker industry's yearly trip to Europe has finally concluded and some familiar faces became even richer in the biggest events around. WSOP Europe crowned five new bracelet winners including Phil Laak, Jeffrey Lisandro and Gus Hansen. Immediately afterward, EPT London kicked off and provided an atmosphere for the very highest stakes action and David Vamplew denied John Juanda his first major title of the year. The virtual felt witnessed another Jason Mercier victory at the World Championship of Online Poker and in the cash games, more profit headed into the pockets of Tom Dwan and Patrik Antonius.

An amazing finish to the summer left our panel reflecting on all those results, plus a ton more, with hopes of accurately ranking the world's best players. The deliberation started in the No. 2 spot as even though we didn't mention Phil Ivey as a big winner above, of course he remained at the top of the list, notching three cashes, two at WSOP Europe, for nearly $100,000. Mercier was able to re-take the second spot on the list from Michael Mizrachi primarily due to his WCOOP win, but the fact that Mizrachi lacked a European cash probably contributed to the panel's decision. It didn't seem like anyone held anything against Mizrachi who will be playing for his place in poker history in a month and could potentially be the first to overthrow Ivey at Number 1.

In fourth we finally get what we've expected for a while now: the rise of Juanda. For years now, Juanda has simply been all business. He's not a brat like Hellmuth or talkative like Matusow, but merely does his job. He's accumulated over $11 million in career earnings and this latest score at EPT London merely reminded everyone of why he should be on this list. In September he was 10th, but he received the appropriate recognition with a boost in the rankings this month.

All 10 players in August retained their spots in September, but that wouldn't be the case in October. Daniel Alaei dropped from the middle of the pack to become unranked this month, but one small score should bring him back at any time. Also falling out is Sorel Mizzi, despite finishing fifth in the High Roller Turbo at EPT London. Taking their spots are two new stars: Dwyte Pilgrim and Tom Marchese. Both have proved over the year that they have what it takes and their recent success put them over the top and placed them into the bottom two spots.

Looking ahead, November's rankings will include the results of two World Poker Tour stops in Foxwoods and Bellagio, plus the WSOP main event's and Partouche Poker Tour's final tables. Here's a look at October's top 10. Of course, feel free to leave your feedback and reactions in the comments section below.

"The Nuts": Poker's best in October 2010

PLAYER (NO. 1 VOTES)		RANK (LAST)	RECENT SUCCESS	COMMENT
	Phil Ivey (9)	1 (1)	Three cashes in London which included a 19th place finish in the WSOPE main event. Total winnings: $96,317	The best in the world came close to a second WSOP bracelet this year, but ran into tough opponents and even tougher cards at WSOP Europe. Now it's time to wait until 2011 for a chance to see a ninth bracelet for the game's top player. (Feldman)
	Jason Mercier	2 (3)	Mercier earned $435,862 with a victory in WCOOP Event 42, then made the final table of the eight-game championship at EPT London.	He had a good week on "The Big Game" and won a massive WCOOP event in September. Add online MTTs and cash games to the list of things the kid can conquer. (Welman)
	Michael Mizrachi (1)	3 (2)	Dominated the cash games while traveling in Israel. We're serious.	If he wins the main event, Mizrachi should shoot to the top of every voter's list. (Cypra)
	John Juanda	4 (10)	Runner-up in the EPT London main event for $852,868 and now is fifth on the all-time money list.	Despite falling short to David Vamplew, the quiet assassin did it again. Juanda's results speak for themselves. He is an unbelievable player and is finally getting the placement he deserves on this list. (Feldman)
	Tom Dwan	5 (4)	Dwan made up some ground in the latest Durrrr challenge and pocketed over half a million in the last 30 days.	A couple million won online here, a couple million lost there, but where is the big live win? He needs one of these or he'll just keep slipping in my book. (Peters)
	Alexander Kostritsyn	6 (6)	A couple smaller WCOOP scores after his WCOOP Event 9 win	The high stakes cash gamer likes to stay out of the spotlight, but that might be possible after the year he's had. (Feldman)
	Eric Baldwin	7 (7)	Cashed in the EPT London main event, finished fourth in a side event there and then final tabled a preliminary event during Festa Al Lago in Las Vegas.	Baldwin had a few smaller sized cashes this month. Two final tables in the past two weeks might be evidence that Basebaldy's due for another win soon. (Bradley)
	Patrik Antonius	8 (8)	Simply more of the same for Antonius this month. Play high stakes cash games and win high stakes cash games.	In the last month he's made just shy of $700,000 playing online cash games which brings him out of the red for 2010. (Bradley)
	Dwyte Pilgrim	9 (NR)	Welcome to the list Mr. World Poker Tour Borgata champion ($733,802).	The poster child for the WSOP Circuit seemded doomed to always be considered the best AAA player on the planet, but with a World Poker Tour win at Borgata he's announced his arrival with the big boys. (Bradley)
	Tom Marchese	10 (NR)	Seventh at the EPT London main event followed up by a fifth-place result in Las Vegas. Another 30 days, another $171,081 in earnings.	He's back on the list! It's going to be a great player of the year race between him and Pilgrim (Peters).

On the bubble:

The bubble spot this month is owned by Jeffrey Lisandro. The 2009 WSOP Player of the Year notched his fifth WSOP bracelet in Event 2 at the 2010 WSOP Europe and earned $245,287. This was his first non-stud bracelet (event was pot-limit Omaha) and he simply just couldn't rally the support for a top-10 spot. … Vanessa Selbst also finished just out of the rankings. Selbst made the final table of the Partouche Poker Tour and will get her chance to win the 1.3 million euro top-prize in November. … To the dismay of the ESPNDeportes poker editor Nahuel Ponce, Jose "Nacho" Barbero also fell short. After winning the EPT London High Roller event for $870,082, hopes were high for Barbero, but he'll have to wait another month to see if he can find his place above. … Others earning significant consideration include Jake Cody, Daniel Alaei, Ryan D'Angelo, Sorel Mizzi and JP Kelly.

Final thoughts: Bradley: No surprise at the top with Mercier's WCOOP win and Ivey being, well, Phil Ivey. The real pleasant surprise is to seeing Juanda rated that high. He's the definition of a professional poker player with his lack of showmanship and trash talk. He just gets results.

With Lisandro and Cates pushing for a spot on this list we'll see if Pilgrim can maintain his spot or if he just got some votes for winning a World Poker Tour event.

Feldman: I left this spot last month with a final thought on Phil Laak. One of the most entertaining players in the game, Laak finally broke through and won his first WSOP bracelet in Event 1 at the 2010 WSOP Europe. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough to convince the panel that Laak deserved a spot. In any case, I think Laak should've had a little more consideration than he did and if he's able to secure another solid performance in the next month, we'll see him in November.

I was also slightly disappointed not to see Jeffrey Lisandro make the list. The five-time WSOP bracelet winner fell onto the bubble and I believe that he easily could've taken over both Pilgrim's and Marchese's spot.

The next month's rankings will also finally include the WSOP main event final table and we may see Michael Mizrachi at the top if he's able to pull through. Before then, however, we have numerous events around the world and each of these 10 players will have to prove that they belong … well, not Ivey … if they'll want to keep their spots next time.