WSOP 2008
An Evening of Studs
by Jill on 06.19.08, 12:22 am
The Event #33 $5K Seven Card Stud Hi-Low Championship tournament marched on with an ante and bring-in of 500, now at 2K/4K limits. PocketFives caught up with Barry Greenstein looking for a spot to make a move, as his 18K chip stack sat well below the average of 51K.
Playing extremely tight, Greenstein finally found a hand he could close in on: showing 5
4
6, he was running against one opponent who showed A
QJ
. Greenstein completed on third street and was raised, which Barry quickly called. Fourth street met a check from his opponent, a bet from Barry, and a subsequent call. Action continued the same way on fifth street but induced a fold from his opponent; Barry increased his stack to 27K and was looking a bit healthier by comparison.
One table over, Alex Jacob was also low, his stack at 44K. But Thayer “Thay3r” Rasmussen (pictured at right) was in the worst trouble of all, his 28K stack paltry in comparison to the shark-filled table at which he sat. Seated to the right of David Benyamine, his 8-handed table was stacked with Allen Cunningham, Howard Lederer, and Jason Lester.
Meanwhile, in Event #35, the $1.5K Seven Card Stud tournament, most of the notable players have not fared well. Recent eliminations include David Williams, Anna Wroblewski, and John Juanda. PocketFives caught up with Justin Bonomo as he was also on life support, sporting a stack of 2.5K with 288 players left in the original field of 382. He still found time to get a massage.
Day 2 of the $1.5K No-Limit Hold’em tournament paused for dinner break and will resume at 10PM PST. The average stack is 220K and players are guaranteed $11,951. Notable chip stacks include the following:
Scott “ssitron” Sitron - 240K
Ray Henson - 230K
Court Harrington - 227K
Froehlich and Parker Leading in LHE
by Crystal on 06.16.08, 10:34 pm
In the Brazillia room, the $3k NLHE tournament isn’t the only event running right now. Day 2 of the $10k World Championship of LHE (event #30) is also taking place there today and while yesterday’s action seemed rather slow because of the large starting stacks and fixed limit structure, the play today has sped up immensely with only 42 of the original 218 remaining.
Eric “EFro” Froehlich is sitting pretty at the top of the chip counts after some big hands. Howard Lederer put in a raise preflop and both Froehlich (pictured right) and another player called to see the flop come AK5. Action checked to Lederer who bet and both Froehlich and the other player called. When the J dropped on the turn action checked to Lederer who again bet but this time Froehlich raised. The player in the middle and Lederer both made the call and the Q fell on the river. Froehlich bet out, the player in the middle folded and Lederer reluctantly called to see Froehlich’s QT that had turned a broadway straight. Lederer mucked and Froehlich won a large pot. Froehlich is currently the chip leader with 350k.
Brock “t_soprano” Parker has also been doing well in this tournament today, despite being at the same table as “EFro’s” massive stack. Preflop Parker (pictured left) made it 2 bets to go, the player to his left upped it to 3 bets and the big blind capped it at 4 bets. All 3 players called to see the flop come J94. The big blind bet out and both Parker and the other player called. When the 3 came on the turn the big blind checked, Brock bet, and the other two players both smooth called. The river brought the 2, completing a possible flush draw and the big blind again checked it to Parker who bet. The player in the middle folded and after thinking for a long while the big blind eventually called and when Brock flipped up the QJ the big blind mucked his hand and Parker scooped a large pot.
Brock then finished off Howard Lederer by using his AQ to best Lederer’s KJ on a board of 6548A sending Lederer to the rail and increasing Brock’s stack to a healthy 190k. He has since chipped up to 230k and is in 2nd place behind Froehlich.
Other notable players still in the field of the LHE tourney include Justin Bonomo, Greg “FBT” Mueller, and Todd “DanDruff” Witteles while Matt “mattster24″ Sterling and Joe Sebok were recently eliminated.
Over at the ESPN Featured Table in the Amazon room, Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond is dominating the final table of the $5k PLO w/ Rebuys tournament. Johnny Chan lost a huge pot to David Benyamine to put Benyamine in 2nd place and drop Chan down to 3rd and then promptly lost another big hand to Galfond to extend Galfond’s lead and to make Chan the short stack.
Phil Hellmuth, Daniel Negreanu and John Juanda were eliminated in 8th, 7th, and 6th place and the chip counts for the 5 remaining players are:
Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond - 3,156,000
David Benyamine - 1,545,000
Kirill Gerasimov - 720,000
Adam Hourani - 615,000
Johnny Chan - 330,000
Schultz Surges, Negreanu Dominates
by Jill on 06.16.08, 5:48 am
Event #27’s $1.5K No-Limit Hold’em race for the bracelet has concluded for the evening with 18 players remaining in the field. Barry “BarryGS” Schultz sits near the top of the chip count with over 850K, now representing PocketFives in his logo t-shirt.
We caught up with Barry as he was raising preflop from the hijack to 48K with the blinds at 10K/20K. He took down the pot uncontested and did the same thing for the next two consecutive hands. He recounted a story from earlier in the tournament about a hand he played with Scott “SCTrojans” Freeman. Apparently, Barry made his move on the button by pushing all in to Scott’s preflop raise. Barry held 97. Scott, trying to edge out a Scandinavian player at the table, called the raise and flipped over A-J offsuit.
In the only hand Barry has played for his tournament life, he managed to hit a 9 on the river to save his stack and suck out. He recounted how tilted Scott got at the bad beat; apparently Scott raised all in for the next seven hands, despite being deep-stacked even after the beat. The field lost two more players after Barry told his story; play is now down to the final two tables and will resume tomorrow at 2PM PST while players compete for the bracelet and $628,290.
Daniel Negreanu (pictured at right) had much to smile about in the $5K Pot-Limit Omaha with Rebuys as his stack went from 100k to over 1M in twenty minutes. Play was down to the final two tables. Negreanu went over the one million mark when he busted David Williams’ 500k chip stack in the following hand:
On a flop of 732, Williams bet out 40k and Negreanu called. The T dropped on the turn and Williams bet and got raised by Negreanu. Williams reraised all-in, prompting a snap call from Negreanu. Williams tabled the T987, drawing dead to Negreanu’s AT{7s]7 full house.
Negreanu jokingly said he’s hoping to get at least ninth place so he can break even from the 85k he’s invested in the tournament. Many big names remain in the final 14 including Johnny Chan, Chris Ferguson, Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond, Brian “tsarrast” Rast, Phil Hellmuth, John Juanda, David Benyamine, and Alexander Kostritsyn.
How the West Was Won
by Jill on 06.08.08, 12:49 am
In one corner of the Amazon room, the guns were a-blazing between Tim “tmay420″ West (pictured at right) and John Juanda. As PocketFivesLive reported earlier, West was outchipped by Juanda 8:1 but managed to slowly build his stack. When we met up again with the heads-up match that determines the final seat of tomorrow’s shootout table, West was bullying Juanda through plenty of steals and re-raises. After three hours of heads-up play, the tournament director announced that they would be coloring up and taking a twenty-minute break. On the final hand before the break, West called a preflop bet by Juanda and the board flopped TJK. Juanda bet again and met a call from West. The turn card came the 9. Juanda checked to West, who bet 40K. Juanda folded and his stack slipped to 320K, while West increased his stack to 280K.
After the break, the blinds increased to 5K/10K with an ante of 1K. Only a few hands into the new level, Juanda raised to 25K from the small blind. West went all-in and Juanda called, showing A9. West flipped over the AT and the flop brought him two tens and he became a huge favorite. The turn was 5 and the river the A, improving his hand to a full house. The next hand was a coinflip all-in for Juanda and West flopped a pair of queens to win him the table. Plenty of PocketFivers were spotted railing West’s big win, including Adam “Roothlus” Levy, who is rumored to have more than a friendly interest in his West’s play. The tournament will continue tomorrow at 2PM PST, when West takes on Sirous Jamshidi, Greg “FBT” Mueller, Thomas Roupe, Phil Tom, and Leo “Superfluous Man” Wolpert.
Event #10’s $2.5K Omaha/Seven Card Stud Hi-Low 8 or Better challenge came to a close this evening when Farzad Rouhani won in a heads-up match against Tom Chambers. Rouhani takes home the bracelet, $232,911, and major bragging rights.
There are still notable online players as far as the eye can see in the Event #13 $2.5K NLHE field. This far-from-comprehensive list of chip counts gives you some idea of the players remaining in the field:
Scott “SCTrojans” Freeman - 50K
Brent “bhanks11″ Hanks - 40K
Court Harrington - 35K
Jared “TheWacoKidd” Hamby - 32.5K
Thayer Rasmussen - 30K
Craig “MrCasino” Gray - 28K
Phil “USCPhildo” Collins - 26K
Chad “lilholdem954″ Batista - 23K
Matt “Mattster24″ Sterling - 22K
Richard “Lee Nickel” Forhenbach - 21K
Bryan Micon - 16K
Jason Gray - 14K
Jason “jp osu” Potter - 14K
Carl “colson10″ Olson was recently eliminated when he was short stacked and moved all in under the gun with 66. He was called by the player in the small blind who held KK, the board was no help, and he was eliminated midway through Level 8.
Meanwhile, in Event #14, the $10K stud championship, Jordan “Octavian_C” Rich and Justin Bonomo are holding their own against some stiff competition. Bonomo and his fellow Bodog teammate, David Williams, are seated on either side of the dealer at their table, while Rich is playing with Daniel Negreanu, Phil Hellmuth, David Grey, and Ming Ly. Jordan’s headphones have come in particularly handy for the event.