Yesterday it worked out that much of the coverage happened to follow Bryan “badbeatninja” Devonshire. Today the intention coming in was to focus on other players and get the coverage spread out a little bit. The first level of play on day 3 was all about Devo though. He lost the first hand, doubling up a player when his AQ ran into the short stacks AK. After that it was all uphill for Bryan.

He flopped a set of deuces against Rob Moore who ended up all in with his flush draw. Devo’s set held up and he picked up a chunk of chips in that hand. Then before long he had Dwyte Pilgrim all in preflop and in bad shape. Devo had pocket kings and was well ahead of Pilgrim’s AJ. A king on the flop put him further ahead in the hand and after the board ran out Pilgrim was officially eliminated and Devonshire had built his stack to 350k chips.

That wasn’t all he had in store for level one though. He went on to bust crowd favorite Daniel Negreanu when both players made a full house. Devonshire (left) had pocket fives on a 7-7-5 flop for a full house and Daniel hit a card on the turn to get him in trouble. The trey that came on the turn hit Daniel’s pocket threes giving him a full house as well and by the river all the chips were in the middle.

After that Devo picked up even more chips, check calling Michael Kamran on all three streets. On the KQT flop Devo check called 11,500, with the 3 turn he check called 24k and on the J river he check called 25k. Any ace would make a straight, but Devonshire’s K-Q for two pair was enough to make Kamran muck his hand face down.

By the end of the level Devonshire had amassed a tournament leading stack of 580k and knocked Begleiter out of the chip lead for the first time since Steve took over the top spot midway through day 1. Begleiter still has around 400k and is at the same table with Devonshire.

Carter “ckingusc” King was able to send Aron Motoyama to the rail when his pocket nines held up against Motoyama’s pocket sixes. After eliminating Aron the stack in front of King was up to 230k.

The field fell from the 74 players that started the day down to 54 during the first 90 minutes of play. Paul “uclabruinz” Smith (right), David “Bakes” Baker and Markus “LURPED” Gonsalves were among those eliminated. The action will continue today until the field reaches the money at 27 remaining players. The payout structure is available through the Blind and Payout Structures link in the left toolbar.

Still in With 54 Left:

• August 24, 2009 -- Legends of Poker 2009 Day 3 Gallery
• August 24, 2009 -- End of Day 2
• August 24, 2009 -- Take 15
• August 25, 2009 -- Turn of Fate