WSOP 2008
Rasmussen Crippled, Tripled, Then Out
by Crystal on 07.11.08, 8:11 pm
Thayer Rasmussen and another player got all the chips in preflop with Thayer holding the A
K
against the other players Q
Q. The flop was an incredibly dramatic A
KJ to give Thayer two pair and the lead while giving his opponent a gutshot straight draw. That gutshot filled when the turn came with the T putting the other player back in the lead. The 7 fell on the river and Thayer’s stack was knocked down to around 20k.
A few hands later Thayer (pictured left) pushed all in and both blinds called. The other players checked down the board of Q9668 and when Thayer tabled his AQ the other players mucked and Thayer tripled up to 58k.
Thayer then in a later hand moved all in from the small blind for around 46k and the big blind made the call with his TT only to find that he was way behind Thayer’s AA. The flop came J83 keeping Thayer in the lead. The 7 on the turn gave his opponent a gutshot straight draw and the 9 on the river completed it sending Thayer to the rail. Joining Thayer in the past level were Derek “arodss3″ Buanomo, Clayton “clayton_27″ Newman and Bruce “cornellxc11″ Hyde.
Chris “panamatony” Barrile is still staying active. A shorter stacked player pushed all in and Chris made the call with the 66. The other player held the AQ and would need some help to stay alive. The board ran out T43TJ and BChris’s sixes held to scoop up the pot. He currently is back up to almost 800k in chips.
Garrett “GBecks” Beckman continues to march up the board today. He recently doubled when he and another player got all of their chips in preflop, with Beckman (pictured right) holding AK and his opponent QQ. The J73 was gin for Beckman, but the Q on the turn added some excitement as the other player began shouting to his rail “Pair the board!” His request was denied as the T landed on the river and Beckman picked up a pot of close to 300K to increase his stack to 450K. He’s now at 415K.
The average stack is 450K with just over 300 players remaining. Here’s a look at some chip counts:
Owen “ocrowe” Crowe - 930K
Keith “damurdera3″ Ferrera - 900K
Peter “number1pen” Neff - 880K
Adam “Roothlus” Levy - 750K
Andy “tufat23″ Teng - 750K
Matt “Burton1080″ Jensen - 750K
Joe “LatestLines2″ Ward - 490K
Allen “AawwNutz” Carter - 450K
Chris “SLOPPYKLOD” Klodnicki - 440K
Jeremy “thechemist83″ Gaubert - 430K
Garrett “GBecks” Beckman - 415K
Brent “Astrolux85″ Roberts - 385K
Aditya “Intervention” Agarwal - 320K
David “Bakes” Baker - 250K
Jeff “jpapola” Papola - 215K
Tracey “xtrACEy” Nguyen - 140K
People Don’t You Know It’s About Time?
by Jill on 07.11.08, 2:38 am
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
Slaughbaugh Slaughtering 1.5k NL
by AdamJ on 06.30.08, 6:27 pm
Cody “thugmoneymkr” Slaubaugh (pictured at left) couldn’t keep the smile off his face when P5’s caught a glance at his chip stack in the 1.5k NL WSOP Event #52.
With nearly six times the average stack at 22.5k, Slaubaugh caught fire in Level 3.
Slaubaugh won an all-in pot on when his pocket aces dodged a 17-out draw on the turn. Later, it was Slaubaugh who snapped off aces when his opponent flatted his re-raise and check shoved all-in when he flopped a set of queens.
David “Davidp18″ Peters wasn’t nearly as lucky, busting out when his opponent put him all-in after Peters made it 525 on the button with 3k behind. Peters called with A8 but was sent to the rail when his opponents J-7 offsuit turned a jack.
Here’s some chip counts of notable players we spotted with the average stack at 3700.
Garrett “GBecks” Beckman - 7.5k
Vivek “psyduck” Rajkumar - 6.5k
Shaun “cougars4444″ Hendrickson - 3.5k
Adam “akat11″ Katz - 2.8k
Matt “All in At 420″ Stout - 300
Thayer “THAY3R” Rasmussen is one of a few P5er’s left in the 10k PLO WSOP Event #50. Rasmussen just doubled up to 190k thanks to wicked draw out when his opponent flopped gin.
With blinds at 1k-2k, Rasmussen re-raised his opponents 7k raise to 31k with about 60k behind. Rasmussen’s opponent called and put Rasmussen all-in on a QQ6 flop. Rasmussen called with AAT2 but was way behind his opponent’s 6675. The turn brought a miracle Q for Rasmussen, who doubled after the 9 peeled on the river.
Here’s a list of other notable players left with the average stack at 95k and less than 80 players left.
Shawn “buck21″ Buchanan - 240k
David “Raptor517″ Benefield - 100k
Noah “Exclusive” Boeken - 80k
Scott “BigRiskky” Clements - 25k
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 546, he was running against one opponent who showed AQJ. 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
Online Presence in 10k Mixed Tourney
by AdamJ on 06.04.08, 10:55 pm
Despite the 10k buy-in and an eight game spread in WSOP Event #8, a handful of online players were scattered throughout the 192 player field.
There was a predictable amount of live cash game pros in the field, a group accustomed to playing all eight games which included: triple draw 2-7, hold-em, omaha 8, razz, stud, stud 8, no-limit hold-em, PLO.
There were a handful of notable tables that featured prominent online players like the table with Scott “emptyseat88″ Fischman, James “mig.com” Mackey, Robert Williamson III, Chris “Genius28″ Lee (right), Chau Giang, and Tom Schneider. Another interesting table included Jon “PearlJammer” Turner, David “Raptor” Benefield, Phil Ivey and Rafi Amit.
Although this event was loaded with stacked tables none was probably filled with more recognizable names than the table with Barry Greenstein, Gavin Griffin, Andy Bloch, Ram Vaswani, Jeff Lisandro and Matt “Hoss_TBF” Hawrilenko, an ultra high stakes limit hold-em specialist.
According to Patrik Antonius, Hawrilenko is one of the top four limit hold-em players in the world along with David Benyamine, Phil Ivey, and Bryce “Freedom25″ Paradis.
Other notable online pros playing in this event were Steve “MrSmokey1″ Billirakis, Eric “E-Fro” Froelich, Thayer “THAY3R” Rasmussen, Cliff “JohnnyBax” Josephy, Dario Minieri, Tom “Durrrr” Dwan, and Scott “gunning4you” Seiver.
In the $1K rebuy, Craig “Mr. Casino” Gray took a massive hit to his 600K+ stack when he ran into the AA of Lyric Duveyoung. With the blinds at 2500/5,000, Duveyoung raised to 13K and a player in middle position raised to 45K. Gray then reraised to 105k from the button and Duveyoung moved all in for nearly 350K. Gray instantly called with AK and found out the bad news. The board ran out J6238 and Gray was left with 240K in his stack. Duveyoung is the new chip leader of Event #5.
Jon “apestyles” van Fleet took out Alex Jacob shorty after at a nearby table. Jacob shoved his last 53K from the big blind with A6 and van Fleet called from the button with A2. Van Fleet, though, spiked a 2 on the flop and eliminated the 2006 USPC winner in 31st place. Ape has close to 200K going into the dinner break.
Dan “Stainley88″ Adams (right) found a way to hit the 6-figure mark for the first time by doubling up with 78. He shoved from the button and was called by the big blind with JT. Adams made a full house on the board of 73357. He then eliminated fellow online star Anirudh “BKiCe” Seth when Seth pushed his short stack forward with T4 and Adams called with A3. The A on the turn left Seth drawing dead and Adams now has 190K.
The field of 28 is still loaded with recognizeable online players, including Jeff “yellowsub86″ Williams (360K), Steve “gboro780″ Gross (225K), Amit “amak316″ Makhija (180K), Adam “Roothlus” Levy (160K) and Randy “Randers” Haddox (115K).