WSOP 2008
Crain Event
by Jessica on 06.30.08, 5:32 am
After a marathon day of hold ‘em yesterday, Eric “jakz101″ Crain (pictured below) played another grueling day of cards today in the $1.5K HORSE event. Eric promised Pocket Fives he was either going to end the day as the chip leader or out. Looks like it is going to be the latter. After playing virtually every hand for the last level of play, Eric got the last of his chips in the middle during a 3 way Razz hand showing Q-3-3. After 7th was dealt out, Crain showed A-2-3-4-10, but his opponent had him bested with A-5-6-7-8. Eric was in high spirits though and left with a smile on his face and informing us he will be taking a much deserved day off tomorrow.
As play was wrapping up, we spotted the following unofficial chip counts of a few players:
Michael Binger - 18K
Doug “Resilient” Smith - 13K
Alex Jacob - 12K
“Bodog” Ari Engel - 9K
Bart Hansen - 7K
Allen Cunningham - 6K
Brett “Gank” Jungblut - 5K
Shannon Shorr - 4K
Bryan “badbeatninja” Devonshire - 1K
The other HORSE Event, the $50K World Championship, continued 3-handed play. Michael DeMichele currently maintains his chip lead with 7 million chips, but Erick Lindgren has worked his way back from the short stack and is now second in chips with 4.6 million. Scotty Nguyen is the shortest stack with 3.4 million.
Clements Holding Steady in 10k PLO
by AdamJ on 06.30.08, 2:54 am
Scott “BigRiskky” Clements (pictured left) continues to yield an above average stack in the 10k PLO WSOP Event #50. Clements currently sits at 115k and recently just scooped a nice pot that has left John D’Agostino’s head spinning.
D’Agostino raised to 3,600 and Clements called on the button. Both players checked a T
3
9
flop, and the action picked up on the 7 turn. D’Agostino bet 5k and Clements raised to 13k and D’Agostino called. D’Agostino checked the 8 and Clements bet 25k, sending D’Agostino into over a few minutes of deliberation. D’Agostino, who had about 60k behind, eventually found a fold and was visibly unnerved by the sequence of events following the hand.
Eric “Rizen” Lynch has somehow found a way to maintain around a ten big blind stack in a game known for huge swings during the past three hours.
Lynch currently sits at his apex during that stretch at 24k. Lynch got as low as 9k in the previous level.
“I finally got my starting stack back,” he said. ”It only took me nine hours!”
Shawn “buck21″ Buchanan has remained a healthy stack over 140k the past few hours although the arrival of overwhelming chip leader Josh Arieh to his table may drastically change that trend.
Arieh currently sits with 380k with blinds at 800-1600 with the average stack at 70k.
Here’s some other notable chip counts
David “Raptor517″ Benefield - 150k
Noah “Exclusive” Boeken - 135k
Rolf Slotboom - 45k
Tom “durrrr” Dwan - 28k
The $1.5K has already lost over half of its 803 person field, but 360 players still remain with a couple of hours left in Day One. One such player is Doug “Resilient” Smith (pictured right), who recently picked up some chips when he eliminated another player in a razz showdown.
Barry Greenstein brought the hand in for 75 with a K up and the player to his left completed the bet to 300 with the 8
showing. Smith then raised to 600 with his A up, and his opponent thought momentarily before 3-betting. Doug capped the betting and the other player called. Doug picked up the 4 on 4th while his opponent showed a K. Doug bet and his opponent called. When both players picked up Qs on 5th street Smith bet again, which was enough to put his opponent all-in. As the other player made the call and they turned their cards face up, Doug informed the other player he wasn’t in that bad of shape against Smith, as Doug had paired his four. The players showed the following hands:
Smith (5)(4)A4Q
Opponent: (6)(4)8KQ
On 6th Doug improved to the better low with the 2 while his opponent was dealt the 9. The 3 on the river sealed the deal for Smith by giving him the wheel, as well as the nearly 5K pot. He was up to 9K at the conclusion of the hand.
While some players, like John “jdawg0913″ O’Brien, Jimmy “gobboboy” Fricke, and David “seal” Eisenstein have been eliminated, several others remain. Here are some unofficial chip counts:
Brett “gank” Jungblut - 11K
Eric “jakz101″ Crain - 11K
Alex Jacob - 8.5K
Bryan “badbeatninja” Devonshire - 5K
Shannon Shorr - 4K
Barry Greenstein - 3.5K
Bryan Micon - 2.5K
“Bodog” Ari Engel - 2K
Jon “pokertrip” Friedberg was eliminated in 28th place in the $1.5K No Limit Hold Em event when his pocket eights failed to hold against another player’s A-K. He will earn $13,727 for the finish. Andy Black and Men “The Master” Nguyen were also sent to the rail recently. 21 players remain, including David Tran, Tommy Vu, “Jumpin” Joe Pelton, and JC Tran.
The $50K HORSE event is nearing closer to a champion as only three players remain at the final table. Michael De Michele is the current chip leader with over 7 million, but Scotty Nguyen is within striking distance with 5.3 million. Erick Lindgren is the short stack of the trio; he is just shy of the 2 million chip marker.
Gomes, Johnson Go 1 and 2 in $2K Event
by Jessica on 06.30.08, 12:24 am
Marco “CrazyMarco” Johnson’s (pictured at left) tournament run also came to an end when he finished 2nd in the $2K No Limit Hold Em event. Johnson and fellow Pocket Fiver Alexandre “allingomes” Gomes battled back and forth in their heads up match before Gomes gained the upper hand when he cracked Johnson’s pocket aces with AT after the board ran out KT3TJ.
A few hands later, Marco moved in for the remainder of his chips with QJ and Alexandre quickly made the call with AK. After a flop of 432 and an ace on the turn, Johnson was drawing dead to a 5 for a chop. When the river came 4, Gomes scooped the pot and the victory, sending his large Brasilian contingent into a roar of applause. Gomes earned $770,540 for his finish and Johnson took home $491,273 for 2nd.
Gerry “TheGatherer” Kane’s run in the $1.5K No Limit Hold Em event has come to an end. Gerry was in the big blind when he and another player got it all-in on a board of 543K. Kane flopped two pair with his 34, but he needed to fill up in order to best the other player’s 67 for a flopped straight. The 2 on the river was no help to Kane and he was eliminated in 45th place, earning $10,759. Taylor “tdomeski” Douglas was also eliminated recently. He finished in 72nd place, good enough for $7,420.
The $50K HORSE event lost a couple of players before pausing the tournament to take a dinner break. Huck Seed was eliminated in 7th place and Barry Greenstein was out shortly afterwards in 6th when his pair of aces in Stud 8 were no match for Scotty Nguyen’s full house. Shortly after pocketing his $355,200 prize, Barry registered for his third tournament of the day and is now playing in the $1.5K HORSE event.
A handful of P5er’s are left in the 10k PLO WSOP Event #50. With a small 381 player field, not many tables featured players that were known from either live or online poker. However, Tim “TMay420″ West had a below average stack of 23k at a table full of live pro’s with Tony Cousineau, Tony G, Dan Shak, and Joe “The Elegance” Beevers from the Hendon Mob.
Jason “JP OSU” Potter just bricked out on a massive multiway 90k pot when his freeroll with pocket aces and a nut flush draw didn’t come to fruition. Potter’s 34k stack is below the 48k average. Ryan “Daut44″ Daut also just lost a big pot when his opponent rivered a nut flush and Daut led for 8k on the river and called another 12k more when he got raised. Daut had 44k earlier in the level and currently has 14k.
Eric “Rizen” Lynch is nursing an extreme short stack at 13k with blinds at 400-800 but remains optimistic at a table that includes Noah “Exclusive” Boeken’s massive 105k stack and Chris Moneymaker.
“It can change in a hurry,” Lynch said. “It will in one way or another shortly.”
Here’s a list of other notable chip stacks left:
Shawn “buck21″ Buchanon - 120k
David “Raptor57″ Benefield - 110k
Scott “BigRiskky” Clements - 64k
Thayer “THAY3R” Rasmussen - 55k
Dario Minieri - 43k
Sorel “Imper1um” Mizzi - 19k
Mueller Makes a Massive Call
by Crystal on 06.29.08, 8:42 pm
It seems everywhere you turn some player is making a bad call to put their tournament life at stake. This definitely wasn’t the case for Greg “FBT” Mueller (pictured at left). We caught up with the action on the flop with the board reading T72. A short stacked player was already all in and Greg and another player were tangled up in a side pot. Both players on the side had large stacks that were similar in size and when the other player pushed all in Greg went into the tank.
He talked out his entire thought process over a period of time that lasted nearly ten minutes. “You must have aces or kings” he said… followed by “Would you make that move with nines or eights? You could be on a flush draw.” Jon Friedberg got up from the table and whispered to a PocketFives reporter that he was sure Greg had the best hand and the other player probably had A-K or maybe the flush draw. Greg apologized to the table for taking so long to make a decision, but no one seemed upset. Eventually Greg said “I really think I have the best hand. I call.” His opponent said “Nice call” as he flipped over the 99 for a pair of nines and Greg proudly flipped over his KT for a pair of tens. The all in player showed KQ and Greg was set to win the entire pot. The turn came with the 5 and the river was the Q which gave the short stacked all in player the main pot of around 40k, but Greg’s tens took the side pot which totaled nearly 250k.
Gerry “TheGatherer” Kane has also been accumulating chips. He busted a player with his pocket queens and then on a hand not long afterwards the cutoff raised to 9k and Gerry re-raised to 23k from the small blind. The cutoff made the call and the flop came 532. Gerry pushed all in and his opponent folded and Gerry’s stack grew to around 115k.
With 90 players remaining Jon Friedberg has around 180k, Vivek “psyduck” Rajkumar has almost 100k, and Hevad “RainKhan” Khan has a little less than 50k.
The $1.5k HORSE event #51 got started at 5 pm tonight and with the smaller buy-in we’re sure we’ll see a large number of online players dipping their toes into this mixed game event even if they aren’t as experienced at all of the games. This is sure to make for some exciting action and we’ll keep you posted as the tournament progresses.
The $50k HORSE final table is still progressing. Barry Greenstein is currently the short stack with 1.3 million while Scotty Nguyen is the current chip leader with 4.4 million.