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.
He Might Be a Little Sore-l After a Beat Like That
by Crystal on 06.14.08, 1:06 am
In the Brazillia room Sorel “Imper1um” Mizzi just took a painful beat in event #24, the $2.5k PL HE/O tournament. A short stacked player limped preflop during an Omaha rotation and Mizzi, on the button, raised. After both blinds folded the limper committed a good portion of his chips by calling the raise and they saw the flop come T53. The limper pushed the rest of his chips into the pot and Mizzi quickly made the call showing the T876 for top pair, a gutshot straight draw, and a backdoor flush draw which was ahead of the other players 8765 for middle pair with the same straight draw and a different backdoor flush draw. While Mizzi should win or split the pot almost 90% of the time, the poker gods dealt the cruel 5 on the turn putting his opponent way ahead and the J on the river was no help and Mizzi doubled the short stack up.
Back in the Amazon room the 3rd round of the $10k Heads Up NLHE World Championship tournament is just beginning. Notable players who are looking to move on to tomorrow’s round 4 include: Justin “ZeeJustin” Bonomo, Gavin Griffin, Alex Jacob, Anna “VietCutie” Wroblewski, Isaac Haxton, Theo Tran, and Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond. The action is sure to be exciting in this 3rd round and we’ll keep you updated as players advance to round 4.