WSOP 2008
Graham Slam
by Jessica on 06.20.08, 5:32 am
Matt “mattg1983″ Graham (pictured at right) has been on a tear in the $10K Omaha Hi/Lo Championship Event. Graham spent the first few levels hovering at or above his starting stack of 20K, but in the final level of play today, he hit several big hands that propelled him up the chip counts.
First, Matt flopped a boat on a 2-2-4 flop holding A-2-4-4. The turn and river came 7-7 and by the end he actually had several different full houses, which was good enough to scoop the pot. His good fortune continued a few hands later when he got involved in a multi-way pot that went down as follows:
With the blinds at 600/1200 Erick Lindgren raised in early position, Matt called on the button and both of the blinds called as well. The flop came down 8
5
4
and it checked around. When the 5 came on the turn the small blind checked, the big blind bet, Lindgren folded, and Graham and the small blind made the call. After the 2 hit on the river the small blind checked and the big blind bet once again. Matt made the call and the small blind folded. Graham then showed A-3-3-7 for the wheel and the other player mucked, giving the entire pot to Graham and increasing his chip stack to 40K.
Senovio “DorsalFin” Ramirez also hit a big hand on a flop of A-A-10, but his opponent folded on the flop after Ramirez raised the intial bet. Saddened not to get more action, he showed his pocket aces for a flopped set of quads. Despite the lack of action on that hand, Ramirez was sitting with a healthy 38K.
He later ran into a hand with Daniel Negreanu on a board of 5
96QK; Ramirez showed down pocket kings for a set, but Negreanu flipped over the A for the nut flush. Despite the loss, DorsalFin has chummed his way up to 47.5K. With a little bit of luck (and a lot of railing from P5s!), Ramirez will finally cash in this event. He relayed that he popped the bubble in the last event he played; his pocket kings were dominated by pocket aces and he went out in 100th place. His tight aggressive strategy in this tournament, however, seems to be working out quite well for him despite a tough table draw. Ramirez joked: “Have you been watching me fold all night? You’d think I worked at the Gap!”
Others still in the event include Chris “SKOAL” Falconer (29K), Brett “Gank” Jungblut (31K), and Stu “thedonator” Patterson (37K). Meanwhile Justin Bonomo, Scott “BigRiskky” Clements, and James “mig.com” Mackey were sent to the rail.
Almost sent to the rail as he blinded out, Chris “Jesus” Ferguson returned to 3,300 in chips in the $10K Omaha event after being eliminated in the heads-up finale of Event #33’s $5K Seven Card Stud Hi-Low World Championship. Sebastian Ruthenberg takes home his first WSOP bracelet and $328,756. Congratulations to Ruthenberg (and his huge European posse) on the huge win!