Scott “emptyseat88″ Fischman, who appeared to be in hiding for much of today with his jacket pulled up over his face, has officially been erased from the Main Event field after busting in the past level. Fischman (pictured left) got all of his chips in on a 972 board with 99 against an opponent’s T8. The 3 on the turn gave the other player a flush and Fischman was unable to fill up on the river.

Jeff “jeffboski” Sluzinski ran also into problems earlier, chasing a flush draw on the flop and hitting a running two pair on the turn and river, but paid off a higher two pair to cut his stack to 9K. He currently sits at 8.5K but still seems composed. We joked with Jeff earlier about getting 1-1 odds that he’d make the final table, to which he replied “You got screwed!”

Shortly after we wrote about Shaun Deeb and Tom “sbrounder” West’s table in the last update, it was broken and the friends were sent their separate ways. Deeb is far from alone at his new table though — both Steve “gboro780″ Gross and Theo “pitrounder” Tran were already seated there and now it has become one of the most stacked tables in play today.

Cardrunners’ Mike “Schneids” Schneider has been steadily building his chips since being moved to his new table. We spotted him raising to 600 with the blinds at 100/200. The player in the hijack called and they saw a flop of Q86. Schneider (pictured right) bet out 1K and his opponent quickly called. When the K hit on the turn Mike checked and the other bet out 2K. Schneider thought briefly, then made the call. Mike checked again after the 8 on the river and the other player fired out 7K. Schneider decided to call and his opponent turned over 99 and Mike revealed K-10 to scoop the pot with top pair. After that, he was up to 38K.

When PocketFives caught up with Stu “thedonator” Paterson midway through Level 2, he was raking in a pot with pocket jacks to get back his starting stack of 20K. He joked with his opponent, “Finally, now we can play again. We’re even.” Presumably, he’s been head-to-head with his tablemate before and his spirits were high. He finished the level with 26K in chips.

Meanwhile, Stuart “zpaceman” Taylor bet out a few tables over with 32K behind. After a flop of 976, his one remaining opponent checked to him and he fired out 850 into the pot. His opponent folded and he increased his stack to 35K. Stuart reported that the last level has been slow but comfortable.

Players have just left the Amazon Room to take their second break of the day and blinds will increase to 150/300 when they return at 4:58 PT. Here’s a look at some current chip counts:

Mike “SirWatts” Watson - 58K
Todd “DanDruff” Witteles - 38.5K
Marco “KILL-BILL” Liesy - 38K
Todd “nsxt2″ Arnold - 37K
Mike “Schneids” Schneider - 36K
Jason Young - 35.5K
Paul “ComeOnPhish” Lieu - 31K
Jeff “YoungSupremacy” Hakim - 30.5K
Mark “sideshowgil” Gilbert - 29.5K
Blair Rodman - 24K
Theo “pitrounder” Tran - 21.5K
Peter “Nordberg” Feldman - 21K
Shaun Deeb - 18K
Steve “gboro780″ Gross - 14K
Nick “gbmantis” Niergarth - 11.5K
Matt “SamENole” Smith - 11.5K
Brian “Wing-n-prayer” Reingold -11.5K
Matt “SamENole” Smith - 11.5K
Tim “EightLarge” Vansant - 9K

Eliminated this hour: Micah “mordan” Hendrix

• July 4, 2008 -- Zpaceman Lifts Off
• July 5, 2008 -- Beep, Beep: Who’s Got The Keys for the Deeb?
• July 5, 2008 -- SirWatts’ Tourney Future Bright
• July 4, 2008 -- ‘MrTim’ Remains Calm