Devin “TranquilChaos” Porter couldn’t fade the short stack torture he started with on Day 4 on the Main Event. Starting out with 52k with blinds at 2.5k-5k-500, Porter survived the first hour and a half of play before busting out in 360th place when he moved all-in for 70k from middle position with the AT but ran into AQ behind him.

Hunter “the_Hunt_D” Frey got the rest of his chips in on a AJ5 board with AJ against an opponent’s JJ. The turn and river brought th 8{and 7h} and Frey calmly left the Amazon Room with a prize of $28,950.

Cliff “JohnnyBax” Josephy also met his demise, and at the hands of a fellow pocketfiver. Josephy shoved his last 60K in late position with KJ and Dag Martin “dmmikkel”  Mikkelsen called with AK. Josephy’s hand didn’t improve and he was sent home after providing the P5s staff with plenty of entertaining moments during the Main Event.

Garrett “GBecks” Beckman has increased his 190k starting stack to over 300k. He needed a little luck to do so however. Beckman flatted his opponents under-the-gun raise after the action folded to him in the small blind with the AA. Beckman was a bit disappointed when the big blind didn’t squeeze but made the call. On a flop of 354, Beckman checked, the big blind bet 14k and the preflop raiser made it 200k, effectively putting the blinds all-in with smaller stacks. Beckman moved all-in for his last 135k and the big blind folded. Surprisingly, Beckman was trailing the under-the-gun preflop raiser, who flopped two pair with 53. Beckman immediately peeled off the A on the turn and more than doubled up.

After starting play today with a massive 873k in chips, Chris “panamatony” Barrille has slipped a little bit. In a hand right before the first break Chris and another player saw a flop of 996. The other player bet, Chris raised, and the other player went all in. The cards were tabled and Chris’ 77 wasn’t looking good against the other players 98. The turn was the 5 and the river the 5 to give the other player a full house and knock Chris’s stack down to around 690k.

At the end of the first level of the day, here’s a look at the chip counts of some notables still alive:

Owen “ocrowe” Crowe - 1.2 Million
Jon “PearlJammer” Turner - 1.1 Million
Paul “ComeOnPhis” Lieu - 750K
Keith “damurdera3″ Ferrera - 700K
Chris “panamatony” Barrille - 690K
David “raptor517″ Benefield - 690K
Jon Friedberg - 550K
Derek “arodss3″ Buanomo - 491K
Joe “LatestLines2″ Ward - 415K
Mark “AceSpades” Radoja - 370K
Jeremt “thechemist83″ Gaubert - 376K
Bruce “cornellxc11″ Hyde - 300K
Brent “Astrolux85″ Roberts - 285K
Jeff “jpapola” Papola - 200K
David “Bakes” Baker - 150K
Thayer Rasmussen - 100K

• July 11, 2008 -- Levy Cruising at Hellmuth’s Table
• July 11, 2008 -- Rasmussen Crippled, Tripled, Then Out
• July 11, 2008 -- Double Double (or Toil and Trouble)
• June 9, 2008 -- Redlin Busts Porter to Advance in Shootout

As hand-for-hand play continued well past the end of Level 14, players were either anxiously awaiting the money bubble or falling asleep at their tables. Play was frenetic as camera crews ran up and down the aisles, trying to capture players’ best and worst moments. However, cheers recently erupted in the Amazon room, signifying that 666 remain and everyone has made the money and are now guaranteed $21,230. Congratulations to all! As soon as hand-for-hand completes, players will take a 30-minute break to color up and take a breather.

Some players, like Senovio “DorsalFin” Ramirez (pictured at right) were trying to take advantage of the bubble to semi-bluff players off their chips and getting burned in the process. Senovio reported that he managed to lose 100K in chips over the last two levels, but spoke to his daughters for good luck once again at dinner and hopes it would charm his play going into the bubble.

Paul “comeonphish” Lieu decided to put his big stack to use bullying other players at the table while hand-for-hand play was underway. With the blinds at 1.5K/3K ante 400 it folded around to Lieu who raised to 10K from the hijack. The player on the button then reraised to 35K and Paul eyed his stack before making the call. The flop was A76 and Paul led for 20K. The other player thought for moment before making the call. As soon as the 2 hit on the turn, Lieu grabbed a stack of orange 5K chips large enough to put his opponent all-in. The other player thought briefly before announcing, “Well, you better get a camera over here.” Another player asked if he was calling and he paused before verbally announcing his call. The player then turned over AA while Lieu showed 28. Paul needed a diamond on the river, but instead he got the 6 and he paid off the other player’s remaining 64.4K.

Other players were making extremely solid moves and chipping up. Jeff “jpapola” Papola has been on a rush approaching the money bubble, doubling up twice. He went from 50K to 100K when his A-J held up against K-J and later went from 100k to 230k when his kings held up against A-Q. Thayer “THAY3R” Rasmussen also chipped up when he won a 400k pot off of Hunter “THE_HUNT_D” Frey (pictured at left) when his A-K beat Frey’s jacks in an all-in preflop hand. The hand left Rasmussen with 420k and Frey with 60k.

Other players were making strong plays and getting completely flattened. As we reported earlier, the table where Jeremiah Smith sits with Jon “PearlJammer” Turner was incredibly dangerous. Jeremiah built his stack up to more than 1.2M in the last level and was apparently still on his heater.

One of his latest victims is David “davidp18″ Peters (pictured at left), who has been struck by lightning. After Peters opened under-the-gun to 8k, tournament chip leader and former poker reporter Jeremiah Smith put him all-in for his last 160k after he stuck out two orange 100K stacks. Peters called with the QQ and was way ahead of Smith’s 96. Or at least he thought. Smith apologized in advance and jokingly referred to it as a standard race situation before the flop dropped. Smith’s optimism was understood when the flop came T87, flopping Smith a straight with a flush draw. Peter’s dire situation caught a ray of hope when the T peeled on the turn but the A on the river capped off what has been a Jamie Gold-like run of cards for Smith, who was awestruck in the aftermath of an incredible scene which captured in its entirety by the ESPN crew.

Here are some more unofficial chip counts at the bubble:

Keith “damurdera3″ Ferrera - 600K
Owen “ocrowe” Crowe - 530K
Andy “tufat23″ Teng - 500K
Adam “Roothlus” Levy - 485K
Matthew “Burton1080″ Jensen - 480K
Paul “comeonphish” Lieu - 480K
Cort “thecortster” Kibler-Melby - 440K
Thayer Rasmussen - 420K
Jamie “TheChronic420″ Rosen - 370K
Jonathan “therookieqq9″ Plens - 330K
Aaron “NDGrinder” Steury - 260K
Aditya “Intervention” Agarwal - 260K
Devin “TranquilChaos” Porter - 245K
Tracey “XtrACEy” Nguyen - 235K
Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier - 217K
Zelong “freeman” Dong - 193K
Leo “Superfluous Man” Wolpert - 160K
Garrett “GBecks” Beckman - 160K
Clayton “clayton27″ Newman - 145K
Hunter “THE_HUNT_D” Frey - 145K
Frank “Round42″ Rusnack - 140K
Cliff “JohnnyBax” - 110K
Jason Gray - 100K
Ben “astrolux85″ Roberts - 95K
Tim “tmay420″ West - 80K
Jan “Erdnase” Heitmann - 80K
Brian “Like7″ Lamanna - 80K
Darren “DABADESTCHIC” Nelson - 63K
Justin “truesyalose” Truesdell - 62K
Senovio “DorsalFin” Ramirez - 46K

• July 11, 2008 -- Olly Olly Oxen Free!
• July 11, 2008 -- Money Makin’, Super Tables Breakin’
• July 10, 2008 -- Levy’s Ruthless Pursuit of Chips
• July 10, 2008 -- Clements At Risk Early

First and foremost, we here would like to profusely apologize to Christian “Deckzor” Fockenberg (pictured at left).  Earlier today we reported that Christian had been eliminated during Level 7 of play.  Well, the details of Fockenberg’s demise have been greatly exaggerated and he is, in fact, alive and well with a hearty 79K.  With so many tables being broken and players being moved around sometimes the breaking order changes on us and mistakes are made.  Such was the case with Christian, so don’t worry friends and family of Fockenberg–he is just fine.

Now that we have reported on someone we lost, now it is time to tell you about someone we found amongst the 612 players remaining in the Day 2A field.  Hunter “The_Hunt_D” Frey, who is one of our chip leaders with 384K.  When we found Hunter, he kindly recalled the hand that launched him to the top of the leaderboard.  Frey was involved in an 8-way limped pot with the blinds at 400/800 ante 100 holding 2-3 when the flop came A-3-3 with two diamonds.  One of the other players led out for 6K and another player called before Hunter raised to 17.5K.  Both players made the call and the turn came Q.  The initial better then shoved all-in for his remaining 90K and the third player in the hand thought for some time before folding.  Frey told us he tanked on the decision before making the call.  The other player showed A-K, the river was no help to him, and Hunter shot up to 400K.

We have also lost our “Table of Doom” that featured Chris “SLOPPYKLOD” Klodnicki, Jamie “TheCronic420″ Rosen, Dani “Ansky451″ Stern, and Peter “number1pen” Neff.  Their table was recently broken, but not before Stern reraised one of the other players preflop inducing him to fold.  Before he threw his hand away he turned up K6 and joked, “I ought to show since the table is about to break.”

While that table may have disappeared, we may have another table of doom brewing over in the Blue section.  Mike “SirWatts” Watson had a fairly easy day when he played on Day 1B and seemed to flop sets at will during the early levels and he was hoping Day 2 would be in the same vein.  However, every time his table loses a player, they bring over yet another known pro to add to the already stacked table.  First it was the big stacked Jason Gray (pictured at right) and when we last checked on the table Brandon Adams, who started today 2nd in chips, was unpacking several racks of chips.  Mike also told us there are some other online players at the table as well.

Tim “tmay420″ West continued to sit at a table with Kevin “kice32″ Iacofano and remained steady throughout the last level, hovering around the 100K mark and taking relatively few risks.  When we caught up with Tim’s table, he was raising a min-betting opponent preflop to 6K more with 8K already in the pot.  After awhile in the tank, his opponent folded and he took the pot down to increase his stack to 105K.  Eric “jakz101″ Crain sat nearby, expressing frustration when his flopped straight flush draw bricked out and he lost a 100K pot.  Eric still has 210K in front of him and is confident he will reclaim his lost chips.

When PocketFives caught up to Bobby “gettindeep” Hodson (pictured at left), his strategy seemed to be similar - he reported that he got pocket kings twice in the last level and each time bet out to see what risks he faced.  In one situation, he said that he raised 5K under the gun with kings and was called by four other players preflop.  When the dealer spiked an ace, players checked around.  Hodson said he bet at the turn to see where he was, and was insta-raised by another player.  He folded and said though he’s gotten no value out of his kings, he minimized his loss and is happy with his 72K chipstack.  At a table full of recreational players, he said his strategy for the rest of the night was to play extremely tight through Level 9 and turn up the heat in the last level of the evening.

Here are some unofficial chip counts from midway through Level 9 of play:
Hunter “THE_HUNT_D” Frey - 384K
Eric “jakz101″ Crain - 210K
Chris “SLOPPYKLOD” Klodnicki - 200K
Jason Gray - 190K
Joe “LatestLines2″ Ward - 184K
Doug “resilient” Smith - 180K
Derek “arods33″ Buanomo - 172K
Jeff “YoungSupremacy” Hakim - 168K
Owen “ocrowe” Crowe - 160K
Jamie “TheCronic420″ Rosen - 155K
Paul “comeonphish” Lieu - 142.5K
Peter “number1pen” - 122K
Jan “Erdnase” Heitmann - 122K
Jeff “yellowsub” Williams - 118K
Jon “Pearljammer” Turner - 99K
Dani “Ansky451″ Stern - 90K
Tim “tmay420″ West - 90K
Mike “SirWatts” Watson - 87.5K
Christian “Deckzor” Fockenberg - 79K
Bobby “gettindeep” Hodson - 79K
Darrell “Gigabet” Dicken - 75K
Kevin “kice32″ Iacofano - 65K
Kevin “ImaLuckSac” Macphee - 49K
Justin “looshle” Pechie - 45K
Richard “Lee Nickel” Fohrenbach - 44K
Rami “arbianight” Boukai - 43K
Louis “MrBeeks” Werman - 42K
Mark “sideshowgil” Gilbert - 39K

Recent eliminations include Shaun Deeb, TJ “Doubles00ted” Slifka, Steve “McNallyville” McNally, and Barry Greenstein.

• July 8, 2008 -- Cox Loses Prop Bet, Then His Stack
• July 9, 2008 -- Hustle and Heartbreak
• July 9, 2008 -- Justin Time for a Double Up
• July 8, 2008 -- Bottom Set Not Eneff for Stern