WSOP 2008
Foxwoods World Poker Finals Day 2
by Court on 11.07.08, 1:43 pm
The first few minutes of play on day 2 have been filled with all in moves and more than a few bustouts. A couple tables have broken in the first few minutes of play as the shortstacks from the day 1s waste no time getting their chips in the middle.
Don “dbase22″ Yucius has had his stack in the middle a few times, resulting in a chopped pot once and him picking up the 2,100 in blinds and antes the next time. 
The 2,100 was a boost to his stack, putting him up around 8k and right around 10 big blinds since the first level of play today is at the 400 / 800 blind level with 100 chip antes.
While Don is hanging on, Adam “A_Junglen” Junglen and Boris “fratboy247″ Kravets (left) have both been eliminated. Junglen was all in on a jack high flop with pocket queens for a pot of around 80k, but was up against a flopped set. Kravets started the day at the same table as chip leader Phil Ivey, but while Ivey continues to gain ground Boris saw his stack fall to zero.
Patience Pays
by Court on 09.29.08, 8:27 pm
After battling all day with a short stack, there has been an upturn for Tim “Tmay420″ West. Coming out of the last break of the day with around 16k it took Tim less than half an hour to run his stack up to 65k. It took a come from behind win with his A-8 all in against the A-Q of Peter Gould to get started, but after that double up the next one came with his pocket kings against pocket sixes.
“It was nice to look down and see kings,” Tim said. “It had been a while.” The kings hand was not all in preflop, but what didn’t go in pre got in on the flop where Tim’s overpair to the board held up against pocket sixes.
Former tablemate Jonathan “FatalError” Aguiar ran pocket jacks into Chris Williamsson’s pocket aces and has been eliminated from the tournament. Williamsson has been on a tear, picking up aces and kings, and then more aces, and more aces. In Aguiar’s last hand the two went back and forth raising and reraising till all the chips went in, but by the time Aguiar got a bad feeling he had to much in the pot and too little left to let it go.
Ben Grundy (right) was not far behind Aguiar. After losing a pot to Negreanu, Ben moved in the next hand from the button for 17,400. Daniel thought from the small blind for a minute before saying “I just found these [chips] so I guess I’ll call.” Then before Daniel had his hands off the stack of 17,400 chips the player in the big blind said all in, prompting a “No” from Daniel as he jokingly acted like he was going to take his 17k back.
Once the joking was over Daniel went into math class to make his decision. The other player’s all in represented 36k on top of the 17,400 the three players already had in the pot. He decided he was getting 3 to 1 on his money and pointed out that he had to beat both players. “I can’t be in that good of shape,” Daniel said before somewhat reluctantly folding. Ben then showed the A
3
while his opponent had the AK
. Daniel said he was dominated and on the Q726Q board the AK held up to eliminate Grundy. Daniel said he would also have lost to the AK.
Daniel’s relatively new training site has had a lot of success, but one of the key instructors at the site saw his WSOPE event end late in day 2. Adam “A_Junglen” Junglen (left) and his PokerVT patch have both made their exit from the tourney.
Chippers
by Court on 09.29.08, 2:03 pm
The World Series of Poker Europe, presented by Betfair, ended up with a total of 362 entrants. Of that number only a few over 100 remain and the number is falling like prices at Wal-Mart. The folks over at ESPN couldn’t be happier so far, with Daniel Negreanu finishing as the day 1 chip leader and them quickly zooming up to 300k today to take a sizeable chip lead.
Well, maybe ESPN could dream for a better scenario, with big names like Doyle Brunson and Barry Greenstein being eliminated today, and defending champion Annette “Annette_15″ Obrestad falling out yesterday, but all in all if Daniel makes the final table the ratings will soar no matter who else is there with him.
Phil Hellmuth is still hanging on with around 10k, demanding constant attention from the cameras. At one point a short stacked Phil decided to miss his blinds to go visit Daniel at the feature table, just in case there was a camera in the building not focused on Hellmuth’s antics. His ongoing conversation across the room with Mike Matusow has a few of the other players a bit on edge, but most everyone seems to be ignoring him, while David “DevilFish” Ulliot makes regular witty remarks about the attention loving star. Phil has mentioned no less than 6 times in the last hour how many bracelets he has won.
Still battling with the short stack, Tim “Tmay420″ West (right) commented that “10 big blinds is all I need.” Jonathan “FatalError” Aguiar is at the same table with Tim, and though not nearly as short he would also like to add chips to get to a more comfortable level. With about 43k in front of him Aguiar moved all in after a player had opened for 2,800 and another player had raised to 7,500. His all in moment added over 11k to his stack and put him around 55k.
Aguiar (left) was also part of a mild controversy that was more a discussion of rules than a complaint. Sitting in the 9 seat Aguiar had not acted on his hand when the 1, 2, and 3 seats all folded out of turn, leaving Aguiar with a hand and only the blinds remaining. Jonathan put in a raise to 2,100 and picked up the blinds, showing the 65. Another player at the table mentioned after the hand that after more than 2 players act out of turn that a player in Aguiars situation should have his hand ruled dead for not stopping the action.
Many of the European players at the table seemed to agree this was a rule, and it may well be but in three years of covering and playing in major live tournaments I have never seen a hand ruled dead because other players acted out of turn. The question is, should the burden be on the player to stop the out of turn action or should it fall on each player to know when it is and is not his or her turn and on the dealer to catch any out of turn action?
Here is a quick update around the room of how some of the boys are doing. Blinds are 400 / 800 with a 100 ante to give a frame of reference.
Daniel Negreanu (right) - 300k
Justin “Boosted J” Smith - 160k
Scott “R_A_Y” Montgomery - 150k
Brian “sbrugby” Townsend - 130k
Scott “emptyseat88″ Fischman - 122k
Peter “#1Pen” Neff - 111k
Chris “Moorman1″ Moorman - 110k
Jamie Rosen - 55k
Stephen “Stevie444″ Chidwick - 47k
Jonathan “FatalError” Aguiar - 55k
Adam “A_Junglen” Junglen - 40k
Tim “Tmay420″ West - 13k
Midday Rush
by Court on 09.29.08, 12:09 pm
Other than the 130 or so remaining players left in the World Series of Poker Europe Main Event, it seems the rest of the population of London has decided that Monday afternoon is the time to get on the wireless internet at the Empire Casino and make major uploads or downloads. The internet connection went from decent, to spotty, to all but non-existent within an hour of play starting. We seem to be back up and running now so hopefully more regular updates will be flowing out of the media room.
While we were offline the field has been reduced by around 50 players. Daniel Negreanu has added to his chip lead and is well over 200k. Justin “Boosted J” Smith hasn’t made a huge move in either direction and is still sitting comfortably near the top of the chip counts.
Peter “#1Pen” Neff (left) added some chips to his stack early and had around 70k at last check. He spent much of day 1 well below the starting stack before coming on strong late in the day to chip up and finish with 27k. His upward trend has continued into day 2 play and as the field drops off Neff continues to chip up.
Short stacks to start the day, both Tim “Tmay420″ West and Stephen “Stevie444″ Chidwick have been able to survive the first few hours of play. Chidwick looks to have doubled to around 25k while Tim is still holding on in the low teens looking for a good spot to get his chips in.
“I wish I had more chips,” Adam Junglen said after folding his hand to an all in raise. With 12k in the pot preflop the board came 875 and Junglen bet 7,200 when the 4-way pot was checked to him. Alekhim Stanislav then moved in for an additional 23,425 on top of Junglen’s bet. Adam thought for a long time before quietly saying “I fold” and pushing his cards in to the middle. He was left with 45k after surrendering his hand.
Tom “Durrrr” Dwan (right) was an early casualty, getting his stack in with a flush draw against Scott “R_A_Y” Montgomery and his pocket aces. Dwan put pressure on Scott after the flop, but even a 50k bet wasn’t enough to convince Scott to fold his aces on a draw heavy board. A draw it was for Dwan with his 43 needing to his another spade to make a flush. Montgomery’s AA
held up though and Dwan was sidelined.
Isaac “mr. menlo” Baron has also been eliminated from the tournament. The bust outs were not quite as quick at the start of the day as is usual for day 2 play, but it didn’t take longs for things to catch up. The slow structure of this tournament is allowing for more play and taking some of the pressure off the short stacks.