WSOP 2008
Chips Moving Around Early at WSOPE
by Court on 09.27.08, 9:40 am
The action in the first level of many deep stacked, big buy in tournaments in slow. So far the World Series of Poker Europe, presented by Betfair, has not been a slow starting main event. There have been plenty of chips moving around and large pots, even a few bustouts.
Players start the tournament with 20k in chips and the first blind level is 50/100. In the very first few minutes of the tournament Peter “#1Pen” Neff (right) and Jonathan “FatalError” Aguiar both lost small pots. Amit “Amak316″ Makhija, Marco “CrazyMarco” Johnson, and Isaac “mr. menlo” Baron were all involved in larger pots.
Neff called a 300 raise from and under the gun Andy Bloch. On the A
76
flop both players checked and with the 2
on the turn Neff called a 300 bet from Bloch. The river was the 6
and Bloch led for 500. Neff called and Andy turned over his AT. Peter mucked his hand sending the 2k pot to Bloch in the first few minutes of action.
Aguiar is at a table with Isaac Haxton. For the first few minutes of play, Isaac, Jonathan and Barney Boatman were the only players at the table. As the late arrivers were coming in to fill the table Jonathan found himself in a pot with Boatman. On the river with a board of 7542K Aguiar led for 1k and Boatman raised to 2,600. Jonathan tossed his hand in surrendering the pot.
After flopping a set on a KJ6 board Makhija (left) was able to get action from his opponent to build up a nice pot. The other player check called a 1,600 bet on the T turn and then again check called for 4,500 on the 8 river. A calm Makhija raked in the 15,000 chip pot after showing his 66 to add to his stack early on and close in on the the 30k mark. At the table behind Makhija, Marco Johnson was able to pick up a small pot with a 1,050 chip bet on a K-7-6-2 board.
Isaac Baron decided to surrender his hand on the river of an A83T4 board when he was check raised. The pot had about 6k in it and Isaac bet 2,700 when it was checked to him. The other player then raised to 11k and after brief thought Isaac tossed his hand in.
Cutting the Competition
by Court on 08.25.08, 11:53 pm
The number of players in the room continues to drop, down to under 130 at last count. Amit “Amak316″ Makhija (left) was able to send one player home. Amit had opened for 3,200 and the other player raised to 11,600. Makhija asked how much he had behind and then put out enough to cover the other players raise and the 32,100 he had behind.
After a few minutes of thought the player called off the rest of his chips. “I don’t have a huge hand, just nines” Amit said. The nines were plenty big enough though, up against the pocket sevens of the other player. The bigger pair held up on the Q65JJ board and Amit added to his stack while reducing the number of remaining players.
Allen Kessler moved in over the top of an opening raise of 2,900 from Jonathan “FatalError” Aguiar for 11,700 more and after debating the call and figuring out his odds Aguiar decided to fold, leaving himself short stacked but still with a little room to maneuver.
Recent eliminations include Devin “TranquilChaos” Porter, Louis “MrBeeks” Werman, Alvin “alsmooth” Zeidenfeld, Jon “pokertrip” Friedberg and Bryan Devonshire.
Winding Down
by Court on 08.24.08, 1:36 am
Day 1A play at the Legends of Poker is winding down. The players have about half an hour left before they will be done for the night. Players from todays flight get tomorrow off while the day 2B group take to the tables and the field will then be combined with all surviving players coming back on Monday.
Jason “JCarver” Somerville jumped up to 70k chips early and has been hanging around that mark for the last few levels. He recently grabbed a few chips from Miami John Cernuto on a board of QQT6A. Jason led at the river for 6,500 and Cernuto folded, saying later he had a queen while Sommerville claimed a straight and flush draw that got there on the river. “I’m just glad he didn’t shove the river” Sommerville said after the hand, saying he would have had to reluctantly fold.
Sommerville wasn’t the only player to get out of the gates quickly only to see progress stall. Louis “Mr Beeks” Werman (left) finished the first level with 50k and is right at the same amount as play winds down for the night. Both he and Sommerville are more than happy to finish the day with solid stacks though.
Different players have different goals for day 1 play. Jonathan “FatalError” Aguiar mentioned he was just below the starting stack, and when jokingly asked if that was the goal for day 1 he replied that the trick is to lose half your starting stack and then get most of it back right near the end of the day so you feel like you are on a rush going into day 2.
Other chip counts:
Alvin “alsmooth” Zeidenfeld - 95k
Scott “r_a_y” Montgomery (right) - 75k
Jason “JCarver” Somerville - 68k
Marco “CrazyMarco” Johnson - 58k
Louis “MrBeeks” Werman - 50k
Tim “Tmay420″ West - 42k
Matt “All In At 420″ Stout - 39k
Devin “TranquilChaos” Porter - 38k
Alec Torelli - 33k
Isaac “mr menlo” Baron - 30k
Jonathan “FatalError” Aguiar - 28k
Jason Gray - 24k
Matt “Plattsburgh” Vengrin - 24k
Jon “pokertrip” Friedberg - 18k
Bryan Devonshire - 18k
Amit “Amak316″ Makhija - 16k
Stud Players in the Money
by Crystal on 06.27.08, 10:43 pm
The bubble burst in event #47, the $1.5k Stud h/l and the remaining players are all guaranteed at least $2,450. Brett “Gank” Jungblut and Craig “MrCasino” Gray have both survived the day so far. Brett currently has around 18k while Craig has been hovering around the 12k mark for a majority of the day. Phil Hellmuth has made his 66th WSOP cash in this event and Men “The Master” Nguyen has now cashed in 61 WSOP events.
Many notable players are still alive in the $5k NLHE six-handed event with the field down to 47. Steven “Cornell Fiji” Ware went on a killer run after the bubble burst. He started play after the bubble with 35k in chips and an hour later held over 350k. PocketFives asked Ware if he had proposed marriage to Frank (the dealer who dealt him all those monster hands) and Ware laughed and said he probably should have.
Players who have been knocked out recently include Glen “choron” Chorny (69th, $8,323), Mike “inissint” Glasser (66th, $9,080), Jason “tresfull21″ Mercier (51st, $10,972), and Jonathan “FatalError” Aguiar (49th, $10,972). Below are the unoffical chip counts of the remaining players.
Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier (pictured right)- 470k
Steven “Cornell Fiji” Ware - 370k
Jason Gray - 210k
Chris “cdbr3799″ Dombrowski - 200k
Ryan “Daut44″ Daut - 170k
Chris “cmoney3″ Kline - 150k
Shannon Shorr - 130k
Alex Jacob - 50k
A Player Makes a “FatalError”
by Crystal on 06.27.08, 8:17 pm
The bubble finally burst in event #46, the $5k NLHE six-handed event after over an hour of hand for hand play. Jonathan “FatalError” Aguiar (pictured right) called another players all in preflop with Jon holding the AJ against the all in players AK. While other player was ahead preflop, the board ran out JT9J9 giving Jon a full house and the bubble boy was sent to the rail.
All the players remaining are guaranteed at least $8,323 but they all seem to have their sights set on the $911,855 that the winner will receive.
During hand for hand play, Steven “Cornell Fiji” Ware’s stack took a big hit when he called another player’s all in with top pair and the nut flush draw versus the all in player’s set of nines. When the set held, Ware’s stack was knocked down to around 35k and had to wait out the rest of the bubble without much action. Since the bubble burst though, Ware has been on a tear, catching pocket aces, pocket queens, and pocket kings… twice. The second time Ware held kings it seemed his luck had run out as his opponent held pocket aces, but the turn brought a third king and Ware’s stack shot up to 276k. Ware is now right near the top of the chip counts along with Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier (270k).
Also notable as a result of the bubble bursting is that player Nikolay Evdakov has now cashed eight times in this years WSOP which ties the all time record held by Michael Binger (2007), Chad Brown (2007), Phil Hellmuth (2006), Richard Tatalovich (2006), and Humberto Brenes (2006).
Event #47, the $1.5k Stud h/l event is progressing and Craig “MrCasino” Gray and Brett “Gank” Jungblut are still fighting to build their chip stacks.
Brett (pictured left) started the day short stacked and got into a big hand earlier. With 3 players in, there was heavy action, betting and raising, until 5th street when one player folded and Brett ended up all in against the other player. Brett showed down (84)48T against the other players (A3)363, Brett’s two pair behind the other players trip threes. Both players were dealt a jack on 6th street, changing nothing, and on 7th the other player peeled the 7 while Brett slowly peeled the 8 to make his full house complete and to more than double his stack.
Barry Greenstein is currently 2nd in chips in the $50k HORSE event, with Phil Ivey right behind him in 3rd. James “mig.com” Mackey and Justin Bonomo have been having a good day and has built their stacks up to more than 300k while Tom “durrrr” Dwan (120k) and Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond (54k) have lost some ground and will need to get their stacks moving in the right direction if they want to make day 4 tomorrow.