Aaron “NDGrinder59″ Steury’s (pictured left) perch near the top of the chip throne was short lived as he got tangled up in a massive pot after the dinner break. Steury defended his blind in a raised pot and flopped trips on a baby board and check-raised his opponent, who called. The turn brought another small card that completed the flush draw on the flop and Steury’s turn bet got raised. Steury ended up having his opponent all-in on the turn but his opponent turned the flush and Steury didn’t improve to a boat, shipping over a 200k pot away from Steury, who still has over 100K after the carnage.

Senovio “DorsalFin” Ramirez pulled PocketFives aside to report on the hand which allowed him to double up to 120K in the last level. Ramirez said that a player in middle position raised 3K preflop and the hijack called, so he felt compelled to call with his 98. The board came 922 and the player in middle position fired out an 8.4K bet which was called down by the hijack. Taking advantage of his pot odds, Ramirez decided to push all in for his remaining 20K. The player in middle position tanked for quite awhile before folding and then the hijack called, showing 53 for the flush draw. The turn and river brought the 69 and Ramirez’ full house pulled down the entire 110K pot. When asked what he did to get so lucky on his dinner break, he replied, “I got to talk to my daughters! That’s what it was!”

Brian “Like7″ Lamanna (pictured right) was able to double up upon returning from dinner break when a player raised in the hijack and Brian flat called in the cut off. The other player checked in the dark before the flop came out 8-6-5 rainbow. Lamanna bet out 10K and his opponent reraised all-in for 30K more. Brian made the call with pocket tens and the other player showed A-5. The turn and river were no help to the other player and Brian doubled up to 90K.

Chris “cdbr3799″ Dowbrowski was sent to the rail after reshoving a raise from the button for his last 20K and running his A6 into TT. The board ran out Q65K3 and Chris was eliminated.

Here are a whole heap of chip counts heading into the last break of the day:

Garrett “GBecks” Beckman - 230K

Mike “RunScreamin” Herder - 191K

Tom “titantom32″ Braband - 183K

Cliff “JohnnyBax” Josephy - 170K

Brandon Schaefer - 162K

Allen “abari” Bari - 150K

Tony “tongni” Rivera - 150K

Steve “MrSmokey1″ Billirakis - 145K

Darren “DABADESTCHIC” Nelson - 145K

David “DavidP18″ Peters - 138K

Jon “pokertrip” Friedberg - 125K

David “Raptor517″ Benefield - 123K

Leo “SuperfluousMan” Wolpert -120K

Spencer “spankybabes” Lawrence - 120K

Senovio “DorsalFin” Ramirez - 120K

David “Bakes” Baker - 120K

Aditya “intervention” Agarwal - 104K

Brian “snagglepuss” Powell - 101K

Frank “Round42″ Rusnak - 100K

David “HosniMubarak” Tazbaz - 100K

Devin “TranquilChaos” Porter - 96K

Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier - 95K

Russell “rdcrsn” Carson - 93K

Aaron “NDGrinder59″ Steury - 90K

Brian “Like7″ Lamanna - 90K

Matt “mattg1983″ Graham - 89K

Thayer Rasmussen - 85K

“BodogAri” Engel - 80K

Daniel “voff” Deveau - 78K

Dag Martin Mikkelsen - 76K

Darren Elias - 75K

Michael “benvo123″ Benvenuti - 73K

Brett “Gank” Jungblut - 67K

Mohsin “chicagocards1″ Charania - 67K

Tracey “xtrACEy” Nguyen - 66K

Ryan “Daut44″ Daut - 65K

Nachman “thelandlord” Berlin - 60K

Chris “cmoney3″ Kline - 60K

Eric “basebaldy” Baldwin - 53K

Justin “truesyalose” Truesdell - 51K

Jason “Mkind16″ Laso - 47K

Scott “BigRiskky” Clements - 45K

Michael “martine23″ Martin - 40.5K

Adam “Roothlus” Levy - 33K

Brian “tsarrast” Rast - 21K

Carter “ckingusc” King - 20K

Recent eliminations include Matt “plattsburgh” Vengrin, Scott “mindwise” Pendergrast and Aaron “gotcha55″ Kanter.

• July 11, 2008 -- Olly Olly Oxen Free!
• July 10, 2008 -- Strasser vs. Nguyen
• July 10, 2008 -- Levy’s Ruthless Pursuit of Chips
• July 10, 2008 -- Beckman Moves Up Leaderboard

Day 2A has come to a close here at the Amazon Room; congratulations to the 465 who remain for Day 3! The last level of the evening brought both glory and heartbreak to PocketFivers as their run for the bracelet and the huge main event prize pool continued. Day 2B begins tomorrow at noon and PocketFives will be back to report on the action!

Tim “tmay420″ West (pictured at right) and Kevin “kice32″ Iacofano were moved this evening to the ESPN Featured Table in the poker arena and commentary about their hands could be heard throughout the Rio. The last hour of the day was a huge one for Tim, who turned on the heat and managed to double up through great aggressive play. In one hand, we saw Tim bet out 6.5K into the pot on a board that read K7847, enticing his opponent to play. He did in fact make the call and Tim showed down K9 to win the pot. Shortly afterwards, Tim raised to 3.2K preflop and got one caller. The flop came QAT and both players checked to see the T fall on the turn. His opponent bet out 5.5K and Tim called to see the 4 roll off on the river. His opponent checked, Tim bet 12.5K and he was reraised after a long tank to 27.5K more. Tim called him down and showed AK to best his opponent’s 96 busted flush draw. He raked in the pot and increased his stack to 188K.

Meanwhile, in the Green Section, there was exciting action all night at Eric “jakz101″ Crain and Derek “arods33″ Buanomo’s table. Eric joked to PocketFives about all the swinging; the table was loosest we witnessed all night. In one hand, both players went heads up: On a board that read J98KQ, Derek bet out 8.5K and Eric raised to 21.5K more. Derek easily made the call with his red pocket tens and Eric mucked his hole cards, shipping the big pot Derek’s way. Derek moved up to 165K, finishing the day just under that at 157.5K.

Eric (pictured at left) didn’t let the beat phase him, however, and in a subsequent hand, he called a raise on the button with 10K in the pot. He raised 5K after a flop of 66T and was called. The dealer laid the T on the turn and Eric bet out, inducing a fold. He slyly showed his hole cards to P5s and giggled: 25. After the hand, he was at 250K. At least he’s keeping it interesting for Mom at home. Eric finished the night with 315K and we can’t even begin to guess what happened to gain him the extra 65K in chips.

Jeff “yellowsub” Williams took a substantial hit to the stack he had spent all day building when one player raised, a player reraised behind, and Jeff put in a third raise to around 45K. The initial raiser folded, but the reraiser made the call with about 75K behind. The flop came ace high, the other player bet 25K and Williams raised enough to put him all-in. The other player made the call with A-Q while Williams held Q-Q. The turn and river were no help to him and Jeff was knocked back under 50K.

Brendan “moe86″ Mahoney (pictured at right) had been short-stacked for quite awhile and when the player second to act raised preflop, Brendan thought for a bit before making the call. The flop came T43. The other player checked to Brendan, who bet 5.8K, which represented more than one fourth of his stack. The other player then check-raised with a huge stack of orange 5K chips, more than enough to put Brendan all in. Brendan looked exasperated. He tanked for a bit and asked the other player “You got tens? Ace-king of diamonds?” Brendan shuffled his chips and said “I can’t fold… I call.” His opponent said “Nice call” as he flipped over his AK for ace high, which Brendan had beat with his KK. That is until the turn brought the A to put the bluffer in the lead. The 2 on the river couldn’t save Brendan and he was sent to the rail near the end of the day.

Here are some notable unofficial chip counts near the end of Day 2A:

Hunter “THE_HUNT_D” Frey - 400K
Eric “jakz101″ Crain - 315K
Owen “ocrowe” Crowe - 210K
Tim “tmay420″ West - 188K
Paul “comeonphish” Lieu - 187K
Chris “SLOPPYKLOD” Klodnicki - 180K
Jamie “TheCronic420″ Rosen - 175K
Doug “resilient” Smith - 168K
Jeff “YoungSupremacy” Hakim - 164K
Derek “arods33″ Buanomo - 157.5K
Darrell “Gigabet” Dicken - 140K
Michael “DblupM0j” Johnson - 140K
Todd “nsxt2″ Arnold - 66K
Peter “number1pen” Neff - 139K
Andy “BadgerPro” Schultz - 126K
Kush Patel - 120K
Mike “SirWatts” Watson - 119K
Jon “Pearljammer” Turner - 116K
Jan “Erdnase” Heitmann - 106K
Jason Gray - 100K
Joe “LatestLines2″ Ward - 98K
Josh “Squintngo” Goldstein - 92K
Dani “Ansky451″ Stern - 75K
Bobby “gettindeep” Hodson - 70K
Noah “Exclusive” Boeken - 64K
Christian “Deckzor” Fockenberg - 47.5K
Jeff “yellowsub” Williams - 45K
Louis “MrBeeks” Werman - 42K
Mark “sideshowgil” Gilbert - 40K
Rami “arbianight” Boukai - 35K
Kevin “ImaLuckSac” Macphee - 28K

• July 9, 2008 -- Lost & Found
• July 4, 2008 -- Short Stacked Shorr Looking to Chip Up
• July 9, 2008 -- Justin Time for a Double Up
• July 8, 2008 -- Jeff Hakim Reigns Supreme

Justin “looshle” Pechie (pictured at left) managed to double up shortly before the last break of the evening.  With the blinds at 500/1,000 ante 100 a player raised to 2.5K preflop and Pechie called on the button with pocket tens.  The flop came 322 and the initial raiser checked to Justin who bet 6K, which the initial raiser called.  After the J hit on the turn, Pechie’s opponent bet 7K and Justin raised to 16K total leaving 24K behind.  The other player then pushed all-in and Pechie thought for some time before making the call.  It turned out to be a great call as the other player held AT for just ace high.  The river was the K and Justin doubled up to 100K.

Eric “jakz101″ Crain had been one of the bigger stacks throughout the day, but got as low as 100K during Level 9 of play.  He told us he was able to steal enough chips to get back up to 150K and then he got involved in a big hand that put all of his chips at risk. 

A player raised to 3K under the gun and Eric made the call on the button.  Kido Pham reraised to 15K and both players made the call.  The flop came 10-7-6 with two hearts and Pham checked.  The initial raiser bet 28K and Crain raised to 82.3K total.  Kido folded and the other player shoved all-in for 30K more.  Crain made the call and showed A5 while the other player had pocket jacks.  The K came on the turn and the board paired on the river.  Pham appeared rather distraut after the hand and claimed he folded pocket kings, meaning he would have filled up on the river and scoop the massive pot.  Instead Crain took the hand down and now has 350K.

The Table of Doom we reported on in the earlier part of the day, but some of its players have been reunited in the Blue section.  Dani “Ansky451″ Stern and Chris “SLOPPYKLOD” Klodnicki (pictured at right) are playing at the same table once again and will likely not move before the end of the day.  Klodnicki was sitting with over 200K, but took a bit of a hit when, with the blinds at 600/1,200 ante 200 the player in the cut off open raised to 14K leaving just over 15K behind.  Klodnicki was on the button and reraised enough to put the other player all-in.  She quickly made the call with pocket kings, which had Chris’ A-K in bad shape.  A king on the flop left Klodnicki with very few outs and the turn and river failed to help him.  After the hand he was down to 187K.

Josh “Squintngo” Goldstein is now seated next to Jeff “yellowsub” Williams and they were chumming it up when we approached the table.  After Jeff took down a huge pot when he hit runner-runner for a king-high flush, he said he’s rather be lucky than good any day of the week.  Trying to keep up with his neighbor, Josh attempted to take down a pot preflop when he raised to 4,200 in early position.  It folded to the button who moved in for 20K more.  After thinking awhile, Josh folded and the button showed AK.  He said he made a good laydown and it wasn’t the right spot to gamble for his chips.

In other news, Joe “LatestLines2″ Ward managed to donate a large part of his stack to his tablemate this level.  When prodded for more information about what happened, Joe kindly requested that PocketFives report the following: “I got stupid.”  …we guess that’s just one of his latest lines.

Here are some of the most recent chip counts with around an hour left to play in Day 2A:
Eric “jakz101″ Crain - 355K
Chris “SLOPPYKLOD” Klodnicki - 185K
Jeff “yellowsub” Williams - 165K
Derek “arods33″ Buanomo - 140K
Jason Gray - 140K
Josh “Squintngo” Goldstein - 118K
Andy “BadgerPro” Schultz - 113K
Joe “LatestLines2″ Ward - 100K
Jeff “YoungSupremacy” Hakim - 165K
Owen “ocrowe” Crowe - 130K
Jeff “yellowsub” Williams - 165K
Jon “Pearljammer” Turner - 100K
Bobby “gettin deep” Hodson - 74K
Rami “arbianight” Boukai - 38K
Noah “Exclusive” Boeken - 45K
Mark “sideshowgil” Gilbert - 45K
Louis “MrBeeks” Werman - 39K

• July 8, 2008 -- Cox Loses Prop Bet, Then His Stack
• July 9, 2008 -- Lost & Found
• July 4, 2008 -- 2008 WSOP Main Event, Day 1A Concludes
• July 9, 2008 -- Hustle and Heartbreak

First and foremost, we here would like to profusely apologize to Christian “Deckzor” Fockenberg (pictured at left).  Earlier today we reported that Christian had been eliminated during Level 7 of play.  Well, the details of Fockenberg’s demise have been greatly exaggerated and he is, in fact, alive and well with a hearty 79K.  With so many tables being broken and players being moved around sometimes the breaking order changes on us and mistakes are made.  Such was the case with Christian, so don’t worry friends and family of Fockenberg–he is just fine.

Now that we have reported on someone we lost, now it is time to tell you about someone we found amongst the 612 players remaining in the Day 2A field.  Hunter “The_Hunt_D” Frey, who is one of our chip leaders with 384K.  When we found Hunter, he kindly recalled the hand that launched him to the top of the leaderboard.  Frey was involved in an 8-way limped pot with the blinds at 400/800 ante 100 holding 2-3 when the flop came A-3-3 with two diamonds.  One of the other players led out for 6K and another player called before Hunter raised to 17.5K.  Both players made the call and the turn came Q.  The initial better then shoved all-in for his remaining 90K and the third player in the hand thought for some time before folding.  Frey told us he tanked on the decision before making the call.  The other player showed A-K, the river was no help to him, and Hunter shot up to 400K.

We have also lost our “Table of Doom” that featured Chris “SLOPPYKLOD” Klodnicki, Jamie “TheCronic420″ Rosen, Dani “Ansky451″ Stern, and Peter “number1pen” Neff.  Their table was recently broken, but not before Stern reraised one of the other players preflop inducing him to fold.  Before he threw his hand away he turned up K6 and joked, “I ought to show since the table is about to break.”

While that table may have disappeared, we may have another table of doom brewing over in the Blue section.  Mike “SirWatts” Watson had a fairly easy day when he played on Day 1B and seemed to flop sets at will during the early levels and he was hoping Day 2 would be in the same vein.  However, every time his table loses a player, they bring over yet another known pro to add to the already stacked table.  First it was the big stacked Jason Gray (pictured at right) and when we last checked on the table Brandon Adams, who started today 2nd in chips, was unpacking several racks of chips.  Mike also told us there are some other online players at the table as well.

Tim “tmay420″ West continued to sit at a table with Kevin “kice32″ Iacofano and remained steady throughout the last level, hovering around the 100K mark and taking relatively few risks.  When we caught up with Tim’s table, he was raising a min-betting opponent preflop to 6K more with 8K already in the pot.  After awhile in the tank, his opponent folded and he took the pot down to increase his stack to 105K.  Eric “jakz101″ Crain sat nearby, expressing frustration when his flopped straight flush draw bricked out and he lost a 100K pot.  Eric still has 210K in front of him and is confident he will reclaim his lost chips.

When PocketFives caught up to Bobby “gettindeep” Hodson (pictured at left), his strategy seemed to be similar - he reported that he got pocket kings twice in the last level and each time bet out to see what risks he faced.  In one situation, he said that he raised 5K under the gun with kings and was called by four other players preflop.  When the dealer spiked an ace, players checked around.  Hodson said he bet at the turn to see where he was, and was insta-raised by another player.  He folded and said though he’s gotten no value out of his kings, he minimized his loss and is happy with his 72K chipstack.  At a table full of recreational players, he said his strategy for the rest of the night was to play extremely tight through Level 9 and turn up the heat in the last level of the evening.

Here are some unofficial chip counts from midway through Level 9 of play:
Hunter “THE_HUNT_D” Frey - 384K
Eric “jakz101″ Crain - 210K
Chris “SLOPPYKLOD” Klodnicki - 200K
Jason Gray - 190K
Joe “LatestLines2″ Ward - 184K
Doug “resilient” Smith - 180K
Derek “arods33″ Buanomo - 172K
Jeff “YoungSupremacy” Hakim - 168K
Owen “ocrowe” Crowe - 160K
Jamie “TheCronic420″ Rosen - 155K
Paul “comeonphish” Lieu - 142.5K
Peter “number1pen” - 122K
Jan “Erdnase” Heitmann - 122K
Jeff “yellowsub” Williams - 118K
Jon “Pearljammer” Turner - 99K
Dani “Ansky451″ Stern - 90K
Tim “tmay420″ West - 90K
Mike “SirWatts” Watson - 87.5K
Christian “Deckzor” Fockenberg - 79K
Bobby “gettindeep” Hodson - 79K
Darrell “Gigabet” Dicken - 75K
Kevin “kice32″ Iacofano - 65K
Kevin “ImaLuckSac” Macphee - 49K
Justin “looshle” Pechie - 45K
Richard “Lee Nickel” Fohrenbach - 44K
Rami “arbianight” Boukai - 43K
Louis “MrBeeks” Werman - 42K
Mark “sideshowgil” Gilbert - 39K

Recent eliminations include Shaun Deeb, TJ “Doubles00ted” Slifka, Steve “McNallyville” McNally, and Barry Greenstein.

• July 8, 2008 -- Cox Loses Prop Bet, Then His Stack
• July 9, 2008 -- Hustle and Heartbreak
• July 9, 2008 -- Justin Time for a Double Up
• July 8, 2008 -- Bottom Set Not Eneff for Stern

Jeff “YoungSupremacy” Hakim says he’s comfortable gambling with a big stack here on Day 2a. That became clear during a hand just before dinner break. On a flop of 852, a player in early position bet 6.4K and another player moved all in for 24.8K. Hakim (pictured right) made the call and the original bettor folded:

Hakim: JT
Opponent: AQ

Hakim’s fate looked bleak until the J fell on the turn and 2 on the river. Hakim increased his stack to 185.5K. Also at his table is Jon “PearlJammer” Turner, who is holding 100K.

Jeff “yellowsub” Williams’ hot streak continued when he and another player got it all-in on the turn for a 120K pot with the board reading 943 9 with Williams holding pocket queens to his opponent’s pocket threes. Jeff appeared to be on the way out the door, but a miracle Q on the river pushed the pot to Jeff and increased his chip stack to 20 times what he had two levels ago. Since then Jeff has taken a few hits and has 87.5K going into dinner break.

Doug “resilient” Smith took some time to fill PocketFives Live in on how he managed to double his already large stack. With the blinds at 400/800 ante 100 Doug (pictured left) raised in early position with A-K off suit and another big stack made the call. The flop came A-K-8 and Smith led out for 3.3K. His opponent made the minimum raise to 6.6K, and Doug reraised to 20K total. The other player then moved all-in and Smith made the call. His opponent held K-8 for a lesser two pair and the A on the turn left his opponent drawing dead. After the hand Doug was up to 168K and he has been building his stack even more since then. He has 185K as play ended before the dinner break.

Jan “Erdnase” Heitmann was sitting with close to 130K earlier in the day but has taken a hit in the past level. Heitmann and another player built a 30K pot preflop, with the other player all in holding TT to Heitmann’s 99. The pocket tens held as the board showed KJ3K6 and Heitmann’s stack dipped to 81K.

Right before the dinner break, the player in the hijack seat at Richard “Lee Nickel” Fohrenbach’s table raised to 2.5k and Richard made the call from the big blind. The flop came AJ5 and Richard checked over to the other player who bet 4k. Richard fiddled with his chips for a bit before raising to 10k. The other player called the raise and they saw the turn bring the T. Richard wasted no time in betting out with 15k and the other player gave up his hand which allowed Richard to add a few chips to his stack.

With the average stack at 96K, here’s a look at the unofficial chip counts as players went on their 90 minute dinner break:

Derek “arodss3″ Buanomo - 215K (pictured right)
Michael “DblupM0J” Johnson - 190K
Eric “jakz101″ Crain - 188K
Jeff “YoungSupremacy” Hakim - 185.5K
Doug “resilient” Smith - 185K
Jason Gray - 180K
Joe “JOEYTHEB” Brooks - 170K
Joe “LatestLines2″ Ward - 131K
Peter “number1pen” Neff - 123K
Kush Patel - 122K
Jamie “TheCronic420″ Rosen - 121K
Owen “ocrowe” Crowe - 118K
Paul “ComeOnPhish” Lieu - 110K
Tim “TMay420″ West - 106K
Chris “SLOPPYKLOD” Klodnicki - 101K
Jon “PearlJammer” Turner - 100K
Mike “SirWatts” Watson - 97K
Jeff “yellowsub” Williams - 87.5K
Dani “Anksy451″ Stern - 80K
Richard “Lee Nickel” Fohrenbach - 77K
Noah “Exclusive” Boeken - 71K
Rami “arbianight” Boukai - 70.8K
Bobby “gettindeep” Hodson - 63K
Brendan “moe86″ Mahoney - 58.5K
Mark “sideshowgil” Gilbert - 50K
Darrell “Gigabet” Dicken - 47K
Josh “squintngo” Goldstein - 45K
Louis “MrBeeks” Werman - 36K
Jordan Morgan - 31K
Justin “looshle” Pechie - 28.5K
TJ “Doubles00ted” Slifka - 22K
Barry Greenstein - 19.5K
Shaun Deeb - 18K
Kevin “kice32″ Iacofano - 17K

• July 4, 2008 -- 2008 WSOP Main Event, Day 1A Concludes
• July 9, 2008 -- Hustle and Heartbreak
• July 8, 2008 -- ‘Yellowsub’: Full Speed Ahead
• July 8, 2008 -- Bottom Set Not Eneff for Stern