WSOP 2008
Let the Belittling Begin
by Brett on 06.18.08, 8:36 pm
Fabrice Soulier, Morgan Machina and Phil Hellmuth have all been moved to Scott “ssitron” Sitron’s table in the $1,500 No-Limit Hold’em event — all of whom made the final table of the same event last year. Hellmuth (pictured left) is the defending champion and earned $637,254; Machina took fourth for $161,425 and Soulier seventh for $64,570. The table banter picked up right as soon as Phil sat down:
Hellmuth: “Me, Fabrice and Morgan are all back here again and you know why? Because we play good.”
Ray Henson (also seated at the table): “Why am I here, Phil?”
Hellmuth: “You probably sucked out.”
Sitron has remained quiet, picking up a few small pots here and there and is now sitting with 215K with the average stack at around 90K. He recently knocked Lisa Rosenbloom out of the tournament when she moved in for her last 14K with Q
J
and was unable to improve against Sitron’s AK
. Michael “worldsgrtest” Banducci and Court Harrington are seated side-by-side at a nearby table. Banducci has 100K and Harrington is still hovering around 60K with 75 players still in fighting for the first place prize of $573,734.
The antics continued at Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond’s table after players returned from the most recent break in the $1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha w/Rebuys. The table still includes Galfond, Jared “TheWacoKidd” Hamby, Scott “BigRiskky” Clements, and Jamie Gold. Gold and Galfond recently tangled in a hand. Both players checked the flop of 5-5-3 with two clubs and checked again then the T came on the turn. After the 2 came on the river, Galfond checked and Gold made a pot sized bet of 4,050. He then became unusually engrossed in his Card Player magazine while Galfond contemplated his options. At one point Gold even turned to his right and started showing one of the articles to Clements and the two hovered over the magazine together.
Galfond eventually made the call and showed the king high flush and Jamie quickly mucked. He then began to mock Galfond for taking so long to make the call with the second nut flush. He added “I know we haven’t played together a lot, but it is me. I mean, come on, that is a pretty easy call.” Gold was left with less than 2K in chips.
Here are some other unofficial chip counts from the event:
Tim “tmay420″ West - 48K
Brock “t_soprano” Parker - 35K
Jimmy “gobboboy” Fricke - 28K
Dan “Stainley88″ Adams - 20K
Scott “BigRiskky” Clements - 19K
Jared “TheWacoKidd” Hamby - 19K
Eric “Rizen” Lynch - 16.5K
Jamie “TheNew” Robbins - 15K
In the $2.5K 6-handed NLHE event, the final table has been cut in half and Dario Minieri, Scott “grtwhitehoop” Fischer and Justin “fluffdog” Filtz remain. Minieri is still the chip leader, but Filtz made up some ground recently after Dario doubled him up.
Slow Day
by Jessica on 06.18.08, 3:05 pm
Today is a decidedly non-hold em kind of day here at the WSOP. Neither of the two new events kicking off this afternoon involve No Limit Hold Em and we will also see Day 2 of the $5K Stud Hi/Lo event starting at 3pm.
Event #34, a $1.5K PLO w/ rebuys, was the first event to get going today when it kicked off just a few ago minutes at 12pm. Players we spotted filing in with their rebuy chips (pictured at left) in tow include Kevin “BeL0WaB0Ve Saul, Eric “Rizen” Lynch, Jamie “TheNew” Robbins and Matt “mattg1983″ Graham. The other new event for today is Event #35, a $1.5K Stud will get underway at 5pm.
Those of you hankering for a hold em fix, never fear. The final table of the $2.5K 6-handed, which features Dario Minieri, Justin “fluffdog” Flitz, and Seth “grtwhitehoop” Fischer will be underway at 2pm today. Plus, the remaining 166 from yesterday’s $1.5K No Limit Hold Em event will return today at 2pm as well. Michael “wrldsgrtst” Banducci, Scott “ssitron” Sitron, and Court Harrington are among some the chip leaders vying to make the final table tonight.
Sitron’s Good With the Ladies
by Jessica on 06.18.08, 4:57 am
The last time we talked at length about Scott “ssitron” Sitron he had just folded pocket queens after four players moved all in ahead of him only to find out they were way the best hand. Scott may not have cashed in that event, but in today’s $1.5K No Limit Hold Em event he soared past the money bubble and appears to be in great shape going into Day 2.
Scott’s day got off to a quick start when he eliminated a player early in the day after his pocket queens held against his opponent’s A-K. Sitron saw the hand as a good omen and told Pocket Fives, “there is no folding pocket queens this time”. Ever since then, Sitron has been steadily building his stack and as play was winding down he ran into yet another altercation with the ladies.
With the blinds at 600/1200 with a 100 ante, Clayton “Clayton_27″ Newman raised to 3.2K in middle position and Sitron then re-raised to 8.3K total. The big blind shoved for around 11K, Newman folded, and Sitron quickly called with his AA
and the big blind showed…pocket queens. The ladies were kind to Sitron once again and his aces held, sending his stack up over the 100K mark. Scott will start Day 2 with 115K while the average chip stack is 41.5K.
Though Clayton Newman may have conceded that hand with Scott Sitron, the architectural battle between he and Court Harrington (pictured at left) continued. As Court continued to build his chip stack to 94K, he elected to simply add depth and breadth to his tower of chips while Newman earned points for effort and creativity as he completely rearranged his chip stack approximately every fifteen minutes. Unfortunately for Newman, he has dropped a bit since we last checked in with him and has around 60K in chips to put to use tomorrow.
After dropping as low as 11K after the dinner break Shawn “sbuck21″ Buchanan has rebounded quite nicely and now sits at 75K. Andrew “tiltedjacks” Lee managed to nurse his small 10K stack past the money bubble, but busted quickly after the bubble burst when his 44 failed to crack his opponent’s KK.
Right as play was wrapping up in the $1.5K event, the $2.5K 6-handed set its final table when Scotty Nguyen (pictured at left) was eliminated by Seth “grtwhitehoop” Fischer in 7th place. It folded around to Fischer in the small blind who then raised enough to put a short-stacked Nguyen all in for his remaining 160K with the blinds at 5K/10K and a 2K ante. Scotty made the call with TT and Fischer showed 79. The flop came Q65. The J on the turn was no help to Fischer, but the 4 on the river made his flush and sent Scotty on his way.
Tomorrow, Fischer and Justin “fluffdog” Flitz and will join chip leader Dario Minieri at the final table where they will play down to a champion.
The Sowers Taste of Defeat
by Jessica on 06.18.08, 2:18 am
It looked to be a showdown of the North Carolinians when Mike “SowersUNCC” Sowers (pictured at left) was moved to Court Harrington’s table after the dinner break. Before the two could tangle, Sowers got involved with another player at the table when he raised to 2,050 in late position with the blinds at 400/800 and a 100 ante and the player in the big blind called. The flop came out A87 and both players checked. When the A came on the turn, the big blind bet out 1,200 and Sowers raised to 3K total. The other player then put in a third raise to 6,200 total. Sowers thought briefly before flat calling, leaving 14K behind. When the 4 came on the river, his opponent bet 12K and Mike didn’t hesitate long before making the call. The player showed A8 for a full house and Sowers mucked.
The very next hand Sowers shoved for his remaining 4,725 with J8 and ran into the pocket kings of the player on the button. A king on the flop pretty much sealed Mike’s fate and he was sent to the rail right before the final break of the evening. Others joining him on the rail include Cal Spears and Stu “thedonator” Patterson.
Though Court will no longer be able to compete with Sowers, he has gotten involved in a chip stacking competition with another big stack at a nearby table. Clayton “clayton_27″ Newman came over to Harrington’s table and challenged him to a creative chip stacking war. Both boast some impressive chip stacks. Newman has 75K and Harrington is not too far behind with 65K. Clayton has opted for the tall and skinny method of chip stacking while Court’s chips have been arranged into a multi-tiered pyramid. We’ll keep you posted if they get any more creative in these last two levels. In the meantime, here are some updated chip counts:
Michael “worldsgrtest” Banducci - 50K
Scott “ssitron” Sitron - 35K
Phillip Yeh - 27K
Shawn “buck21″ Buchanan - 25K
JC “PrtyPSux” Alvarado - 22K
Andrew “tiltyjokers” Lee - 19K
Over in the Brasilia room, Bruno Fitoussi took a big hit to his stack minutes after players returned from the break in the 2.5k 6-max NL WSOP Event #31 with eleven players left.
Fitoussi raised preflop and John O’Shea from the blind called. The player led into Fitoussi for 35k on a K63, and Fitoussi raised him to 115k only to be faced with a re-raise all-in back at him. Fitoussi called with K6 for top two pair but was trumped when his opponent tabled a set with 33.
The hand left Fitoussi with 120k, losing 360k in the pot.
Joining Fitoussi are P5ers Frank “Round42″ Rusnak and Seth “grtwhitehoop” Fischer. Rusnak has chipped up a lot in the past hour and has 500k. Fischer is the short stack with 183k.
Justin “Fluffdog” Filtz is also at the table staying steady with his stack at 497k.
The other table includes Dario Minieri and Scotty Nguyen. Minieri has 300k and Nguyen has 380k.
Gray Clouds Subside for Jason
by Brett on 06.15.08, 9:04 pm
Jason Gray began today’s $1,500 No-Limit Hold’em Day 2 with close to 30K chips — a below-average stack with a lot of room to make up on the chip leaders. That work has come quite easy to the Final Table Team member, as he’s chipped all the way up to 200K in only three levels to take over as one of the tournament’s chip leaders. Gray (pictured right) picked up a couple big pots early on with pocket nines — the second of which he called a short-stack’s all in blind and flopped top set.
Fellow P5ers haven’t had the same fortune thus far. Danny “THE_D_RY” Ryan, who began the day with almost 70K, was just eliminated when he got his last 23K in preflop with K2 but couldn’t oudraw AK on a board of KKQJ9.
Court Harrington and Felipe “Improved” Montenegro have also made recent exits as the field has thinned to 89 players. Montenegro’s K-K was unable to hold against A-4 all-in preflop for a 150K pot. With the average stack at 92K, here are the unoffical chip counts of remaining P5ers in Event #27:
Barry “BarryGS” Schultz - 140K
Justin “looshle” Pechie - 110K
Taylor “tdomeski” Douglas - 70K
Jeff “YoungSupremacy” Hakim - 60K
Keven “stammdogg” Stammen - 60K
Brandon “BrandonPL” Leeds has been eliminated in 5th place of the $1,500 Razz event. Leeds earned $33,081 for his efforts. With three players remaining, Barry Greenstein is second in chips with 350K. Chip leader Chris Viox, who knocked Leeds out, has almost half the chips in play.