WSOP 2008
Ship It Mike’s Way
by Brett on 06.14.08, 7:28 pm
Mike “shipitthisway” McNeil defeated Andy Black in Round 4 of the $10,000 NLHE Heads Up Championship to advance to the round of 16. McNeil (pictured left) chipped away at Black before finally getting it in with A
6 against Black’s J
T and rivered a flush to pick up the win. We’re still awaiting the announcement of his next opponent, as two matches are still in progress, but McNeill doesn’t seem concerned. The high-stakes heads up cash player is one of the favorites of those still remaining to win the $539,056 jackpot.
Other notable players moving on to Round 5 were Vanessa Selbst, David Williams, Gavin Griffin, Robert Mizrachi and Emil “whitelime” Patel, who took second place in Full Tilt Poker’s inagural $25K Heads Up event at the end of last month. Patel lost to David Singer in the championship match and earned $320,000.
The $2,000 No-Limit Hold’em final table is down to its final six players. Blair “blur5f6″ Hinkle has climbed up to 1.2 million chips, second to David Steicke’s 2.07 million. Blair is trying to match his brother Grant’s achievement of winning a bracelet in this year’s World Series.
Jonathan “HoosierAlum” Depa is vying for a bracelet of his own in the $2,500 Pot-Limit Hold’em/Omaha Event. Depa is 3/7 in chips with nearly 400K, trailing Kyle Kloeckner and Allen Cunningham.
A Blair Affair
by Brett on 06.14.08, 3:24 pm
Blair “blur5f6″ Hinkle will enter today’s $2,000 No-Limit Hold’em final table second in chips and attempt to pick up his first-ever WSOP bracelet. Hinkle (1.03 million, pictured right) trails only Andrew Jeffreys (1.05 million) and will be seated to Jeffreys’ left when play begins at 2:00 PM PT. Blair’s brother Grant has already won the hardware this year by taking down Event #2 ($1,500 NLHE).
Jonathan “HoosierAlum” Depa will also be seeking his first bracelet when the $2,500 Pot-Limit Hold’em/Omaha final table begins at 3:00 PT. Depa will have to make his way through a tough group of players including Max Pescatori, Minh Ly and Allen Cunningham. A prize of $246,471 will be awarded to the winner.
Events resuming play today will be the $10,000 NLHE Heads Up and $1,500 Razz. Barry Greenstein is the chip leader of the Razz event, which will start at 3:00 PT. Also among the 100 players still left are Brett “gank” Jungblut, Kevin “BeL0WaB0Ve” Saul and Mike “SirWatts” Wattel. Thirty-two of the original 256 players are alive in the $10K Heads Up Event. Here are the matchups of the the remaining P5ers in Round 4:
Emil Patel vs. Michael “worldsgrtest” Banducci
Andy Black vs. Michael “shipitthisway” McNeil
Daniel “Ansky” Stern vs. David Williams
Matt “hazards21″ Giannetti vs. Michael Mizrachi
The $1,500 No-Limit Hold’em Event (#27) has just begun and over 2,600 entrants have made their way into the Amazon Room with more expected. Phil Hellmuth is the defending champion and will certainly be making that fact known to his table –and surrounding tables.
The $5,000 Pot-Limit Omaha w/ Rebuys will get underway at 5:00 PM. Stay tuned to PocketFivesLive for coverage on all of the events in what will be a very busy and entertaining day at the Rio!
HoosierAlum Hysteria!
by Jill on 06.14.08, 6:04 am
Event #22’s $3K HORSE tournament has finally ended and Jens Voertmann is the winner. Voertmann takes home $182,822 and a bracelet for his victory. On the final hand, all the money was in on 3rd street of a Stud high/low hand and although Doug Ganger made two pair, eights and nines on 4th street, Voertmann caught a pair of jacks on 6th and 7th to go with his fives in the hole to make a better two pair. Although Voertmann held the chip lead going into heads-up play, second-place finisher Ganger played agressively and stole the lead away at one point. Voertmann grinded his stack back up during the Stud and Stud high/low rounds to take out Ganger and secure his first major tournament win.
The $2K No-Limit Hold’em challenge has reached the final table and completed play for the evening. Nine players return tomorrow to compete for the $507,563 grand prize and bracelet. Meanwhile, the $2.5K Pot-Limit Hold’em/Omaha game has twelve players remaining in competition for the bracelet; Jonathan “HoosierAlum” Depa remains healthy in the slow-moving game as the hours grow longer and more yawns contagiously spread throughout the room. Depa recently knocked out one of the short stacks remaining in the tourney. The action went as follows: Depa raised preflop to 17K, the small blind pushed all-in for a total of 22K and Depa easily called the additional 5K. When they flipped over their cards, Depa held A
J to the small blind’s AT. The board ran out 8325
5 and Depa managed to add chips to his growing stack. Allen Cunningham dominated the top of the chip counts in the event, guarding more than twice the chips of the next biggest stack. Depa will have plenty of catching up to do as they grind the end of this tournament!
Table match-ups have been set for Day 2 of the $10K Heads Up No-Limit Hold’em event; plenty of online players advanced to the next round. A sample of the exciting head-to-head action lineups tomorrow:
Emil Patel vs. Michael “worldsgrtest” Banducci
Andy Black vs. Michael “shipitthisway” McNeil (pictured at left)
Alex Jacob vs. Jonathan Jaffe
Scott Montgomery vs. Isaac Haxton
Matt “hazards21″ Giannetti vs. Michael Mizrachi
Play for Event #26, the $1.5K Razz tournament, has come to a close this evening, with 106 players remaining of the original field of 453. One of the last hands of the evening came to a dramatic close, as Barry Greenstein knocked out both short-stacked Kenna James and Jordan “Octavian_C” Rich in one hand. Greenstein’s 3-K-A-2-8-9-6 held, and his 31K chip stack placed him amongst the leaders going into Day 2. Other players coming back tomorrow include Brett “Gank” Jungblut, Kevin “BeL0WaB0Ve” Saul, and Lacey Jones.
OMGClayAiken Sings Final Song
by Jill on 06.14.08, 4:00 am
In Event #25, the heads-up field continued to decrease as Alex Jacob (pictured at right) defeated his opponent with an ace kicker after some serious chipswings. Anna Wroblewski, however, managed to donate her previously huge chipstack to Scott Montgomery; she was finally eliminated when Montgomery caught two pair on the turn to advance to the next round. Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond met a similar fate when his pocket nines couldn’t beat Jonas Entin’s pocket tens. Justin Bonomo also had to cash out when Jason Rosenkrantz’ ace-high hand held up against Bonomo’s KJ. Only two matches remain in play this evening; the event will resume tomorrow afternoon.
In Event #24, the $2.5K Pot-Limit Hold’em/Omaha tournament, the field has been reduced to two tables. When PocketFives caught up with the play, Jonathan “HoosierAlum” Depa remained in the middle of the pack with 110K in chips; play continued in the Brazillia room next to the $2K No Limit Hold’em event where Nick “gbmantis” Niergarth tried to defend his chipstack. Updates to continue on these two exciting tournaments as they play deeper into the money.
In other (exhausting) news, $3K HORSE tournament just entered its fourth hour of three-handed play between Marcel Luske, Doug Ganger, and Jens Voertmann.
Lots Of Action
by Court on 04.21.08, 4:39 pm
After a really slow pair of day ones, day 2 play has been pretty fast. Large chunks of chips are moving around the room and vacant seats are popping up and quickly being filled as tables break. Jordan “iMsoLucky0″ Morgan (left) is pushing towards the top of the chip counts and emptying seats in the process.
Morgan’s most recent victim was Johan Storakers. After back and forth preflop betting Johan was finally all in for the last of his almost 40k stack and after a brief pause Jordan made the call and turned over his pocket queens. Storakers showed AK and made his exit after the board came ten high with no help for his hand. After adding Johan’s chips to his stack Morgan looked to be right at the 200k mark.
David “Nutstr84444″ Redlin (right) also sent a player to the sidelines and built his stack up to around 80k. On a Q-T-5 board Redlin quickly called a 5,400 chip bet from his opponent and just as quickly called the players 11,700 all in on the seven that hit the turn. Redlin had the AQ and his top pair was good enough to win the pot and eliminate the other player.
Joe Sebok was one of the players that came into the day short stacked, but after doubling up twice he is now up to 55k. Both of his double up came with pocket kings.
Kings weren’t so kind to Jonathan “HoosierAlum” Depa (left)today. Depa was around 70k when he lost a 100k pot to John Murphy. Both players flopped a straight on a draw heavy Q-J-T board and Depa’s 98 had ran into Murphy’s AK for the flopped nuts.
After that it wasn’t long before Depa was all in preflop for the rest of his chips, about 13k. He had moved in over the top with pocket kings and was called by a player with AQ. Another player had exposed an ace as he folded, but one of the two aces left in the deck hit the board, sending Depa out of the Fontana Room and on his way back to Chicago.
Shannon Shorr took a hit in the early going today too. With about 13k in the pot Shannon raised an additional 6,800 preflop (pictured right). His opponent thought for a while before finally calling. On the Q92 flop both players checked and again tapped the table on the 7 turn. With the K river the other player led out for 11,700 and Shorr ended up making the call. He then quickly mucked his hand upon seeing the QQ he was up against for a flopped set. After losing the pot Shannon was down to 22k.
And always active Jordan “Octavian_C” Rich was able to pick up a 20k pot with a 15k bet on the river against Steve “MrSmokey1″ Billirakis. The board read 942AA and Billirakis seemed like he wanted to make the call but ultimately tossed his hand away. Shane “Shaniac” Schleger picked up a small pot as well, after raised to 9k after a player had put out 4k. He was called but then took the pot with a continuation bet on the Q76 flop.