WSOP 2008
Super Dario Powers Up!
by Jill on 06.19.08, 2:36 am
Event #31 came to a close when heads-up opponents Dario Minieri (pictured at right)and Seth “grtwhitehoop” Fischer both got it all in preflop after seeing nearly 200 hands at the final table. Fischer flipped K
T to Minieri’s QQ
and the board came AA5
23, which was no help to Fischer. Minieri won the bracelet, the bragging rights, and a cool $528,418. Fischer goes home with $330,519 - not bad for the 25-year-old Emory grad’s first year at the WSOP.
As the Event #32 $1.5K No-Limit Hold’em tournament reduced down to three tables, Scott “ssitron” Sitron sat with 175K and was aggressively playing position from the hijack. The next hand, Sitron raised 27K and took down a limped pot with no show. Shortly afterwards, Sitron raised 30K preflop under the gun, which was quickly called by the hijack and both of the players in the blinds. The flop came 629 and Sitron moved all in. The player in the hijack position called and both of the blinds folded. Sitron couldn’t conceal his disappointment when he showed KQ to his opponent’s pocket nines; when the turn and river came A8
, he was eliminated in 20th place. Sitron takes home $15,095 for his efforts.
PocketFivesLive’s own Court Harrington (pictured at left) remained in the bracelet running shortly after Sitron’s elimination; after two subsequent eliminations, players redrew for seats at the two final tables. With about 140K in chips and the blinds at 6K/12K, Harrington needs to make a move soon as the average stack is 460K. Good luck, Court!
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 QJ 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.
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.
Minieri Steamrolling on Final Table Bubble
by AdamJ on 06.18.08, 3:29 am
Nearly ten feet away from about a dozen fans watching his every move, Dario Minieri’s aggressiveness had the floor staff searching for chip racks.
With chips stacked six racks high and a colony of chips left on the felt in front of him, Minieri (pictured right) has seen his chip stack go from 300k to 1.8 million in the last two rounds of the 2.5k 6-max NL WSOP Event #31.
Minieri has been raising nearly every pot and his fearlessness has got him busting opponents with hands as weak as middle pair that were good.
Minieri’s aggressiveness has even made Scotty Nguyen merely an onlooker sitting to Minieri’s right. Despite not playing many hands, Nguyen’s mouth was as active as always, reporting to the players at the other table about Dario’s demolition derby.
“The young gun is taking em’ all down baby,” said Nguyen in his standard high pitch tone.
Play is down to one seven-handed table, breaking when one more opponent busts. Minieri has roughly a third of the chips in play.
Frank “Round42″ Rusnak busted out right before the consolidation when his 3-bet all-in preflop with AK was called by 88 and Rusnak failed to improve taking home 38k.
Rusnak’s stack had been on a nosedive prior to his elimination, going from 650 to 200k after he lost two preflop all-in hands with his pocket tens to pocket kings and his pocket jacks losing to Seth “grtwhitehoop” Fischer’s utg shove with pocket queens.
Justin “Fluffdog” Filtz (500k), Seth “grtwhitehoop” Fischer (320k), and Scotty Nguyen (400k) will also be battling Minieri’s stack to make the final table.
The $10K Limit Hold-em has come to an end and Rob Hollink of the Netherlands is the world champion. He defeated Jerrod Ankenman, co-author of the Mathematics of Poker, after a lengthy heads up match and will be taking home $496,931 in addition to the bracelet.
Shortly after Hollink was awarded his bracelet, John Phan was given a bracelet of his own for taking down the $3K No Limit Hold Em event. This was definitely the hot ticket tonight at the Rio as a crowd of people, including Joe Sebok and Jason “jp osu” Potter, gathered around Phan and his heads up opponent, Johnny Neckar.
The crowd reached its peak when it was announced by the tournament director that the two players had both agreed to move all-in dark on the next hand. The dealer then dealt out the flop, turn, and river and the two players took turns revealing their hole cards. This continued for a couple of hands, including one in which Phan doubled up when his 7 high was good against Neckar’s 2-4, before the two returned to a more conventional game of poker. Only a few minutes later the duo got it all in pre-flop with Phan holding A9 and Neckar holding QJ. An ace on the river sealed the deal for Phan and he was awarded the bracelet and first prize of $434,789.