WSOP 2008
Route 66 Leads to a Bracelet for Hinkle
by Crystal on 06.15.08, 1:00 am
Some say that “666″ is the number of the Devil himself, but for Blair “blur5f6″ Hinkle (pictured at right), it worked miracles at the final table of Event #23, the $2K No-Limit Hold’em tournament. When the players were 3-handed, Hinkle raised his button and Daniel O’Brien raised all in. Hinkle debated and then called but found out his 6
6
was dominated by O’Brien’s 88
. Hinkle’s throng of supporters yelled for another six and indeed when the flop was laid out, it read A6
5, prompting the crowd to go wild! The 5 came on the turn, leaving O’Brien with the two remaining eights as his only outs. The K fell on the river, sending O’Brien to the rail and putting Hinkle into heads up play as the chip leader.
A mere eight hands later, Hinkle raised on the button and Mark Brockington reraised only to have Hinkle push all in. Brockington made the call with his AK, only slightly behind Hinkle’s 66. Again the crowd called for a six to come and this time it was Brockington’s tournament life on the line. The dealer laid out the flop of the A62 and Hinkle flopped a set of sixes once again, leaving Brockington drawing only to runner runner outs. The crowd was in hysterics! The 8 on the turn sealed Brockington’s fate and gave Blair Hinkle $507,563 and his first WSOP Bracelet win a mere 10 days after his brother Grant captured WSOP gold in Event #2.
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 A6 against Black’s JT 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 AJ to the small blind’s AT. The board ran out 83255 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.
Niergarth Hits the Rail
by Crystal on 06.14.08, 5:02 am
Nick “gbmantis” Niergarth is out of event #23 the $2k NLHE in 11th place. As we reported earlier he lost a large amount of chips when he doubled up an opponent who held QQ to Niergarth’s AQ but since then Niergarth had been doing his best to claw his way back up the chip count with some well timed aggression.
In one hand, the chip leader Andrew Jeffreys raised to 40k preflop and Niergarth who was next to act immediately pushed all in. Everyone, including Jeffreys folded and Niergarth took down the pot.
Not long after that hand Nick limped under the gun and the player on the button raised to 55k. Action folded back around to Nick who stated he was all in and the button went into the tank claiming he knew that Niergarth held a big pair. The button eventually folded and Niergarth showed his QQ as he scooped the pot.
While his aggressive style was working well so far his next push didn’t have a pleasant outcome. Andrew Jeffreys raised preflop and as before Niergarth pushed all in but this time was insta-called by Jeffreys who held the AA which dominated the 87 of Niergarth. The flop came with the J22 lending no help to Niergarth’s hand. The T on the turn gave him a gutshot straight draw, but the 5 on the river sealed his fate and sent him home in 11th place worth $29,108.