WSOP- Main Event

[JasonEvans]

Ahhhh, who needs that H.OR.S.E thread when we've got the real thing happening right now!

Among the pros playing today: Barry Greenstein, Devilfish Ulliot, Eli Elezra, Josh Arieh, Dewey Tomko, John D'Agostino, Alex Jacob, The Grinder, Mike Sexton, Huck Seed, Marco Traniello, MArcel Luske, Dyole Brunson, Joe Sebok (Greenstein's son), and Johnny Chan.

Among the celebs spotted in the field today: Montell Williams, Janet Jones Gretzky, and Tobey McGuire.

The first bust-out took ten minutes. Some guy had his pocket aces cracked by suited AK which turned into a flush. Ah well, $10k gone in ten minutes.

-Jason "me love me some poker!!" Evans

[JasonEvans]

Found a website with some odds posted--

Odds to win the whole thing:
Phil Ivey 178-1
Daniel Negreanu 225-1
Phil Helmuth 333-1
Chris Ferguson 333-1
Allan Cunningham 410-1
Mike Mizrahi 415-1
Scotty Nguyen 495-1
and so on... I think these seem a bit long. It is through a gambling website called Pinnacle.com.

They've also got some odds on players reaching the final table:
Ivey 20-1
Negreanu 25-1
Helmuth 37-1
Mizrahi 46-1
Cunningham 49-1
Gus Hansen 45-1
Raymer 63-1
Greenstein 70-1
Matusow 75-1
Hachem 100-1
Jamie Gold 250-1 (talk about giving your money away-- not a chance this happens)

Here's an interesting bet-- you can get 2-1 odds on picking any ten pros and if any of them make the final table, you win. Similarly, there is a bet where you can win even money betting on the "field" to make the final table and none of 20 top pros making it. I am not sure who the 20 are, but you can bet Ivey, Cunningham, Hellmuth, Greenstein, Mizrahi, and Negreanu are among them.

-Jason "the WSOP, it is about so much more than the cards ;) " Evans

[A-Tex Devil]

Janet Jones Gretzky

Shouldn't she be listed with the professional gamblers and not the celebrities?

I keed, I keed.

[toughbuff1]

I saw these stats on pokernews.com for anyone interested.

2007 WSOP Main Event Players: 6,358
Prizepool: $59,784,954
# Paid: 621 (9.77% of the field)
Minimum Prize: $20,320
# of Millionaires: 5
First Prize: $8,250,000

After the first round, a bunch of big names are gone, including Phil Ivey, Phil Helllmuth, Doyle Brunson, Greg Raymer, Jamie Gold, and my pick, "the Grinder". There will be two day twos, and then everyone who's left merges on Thursday.

[JasonEvans]

An interesting and sad story from yesterday's action.

Vinnie Vinh, one of the best tournament players in the world with well over $2 million in career winnings and a World Series Circuit event win under his belt, had an interesting day. He showed up and was playing great, more than doubling his stack through the first few hours of play. Then, after a break, he suddenly disappeared and his stack was slowly blinded away. He had over $40k in chips but he missed hours and hours of play and by the end of the night "his chair" was down to about $2000 in chips. If he bothers to show up for day 2 of the Series, that is what he will start with.

This is not a new thing for Vinnie. He is known for erratic behavior and is probably alcoholic or addicted to something even worse. Earlier in this series, he was 2nd in chips in the $2500 buy-in No-Limit Hold'em event after day one of the three day event. This is an event with a first prize of well over half a million dollars and he was 2nd in chips after the first day. On the second day, he just did not show up. His stack was slowly blinded away until he finished in 20th place. If he had merely shown up and stolen some blinds, he almost certainly would have made the final table. So sad.

Anyway, here is an article that talks more about his situation. It tells an interesting story about an Omaha tournament he was in and the somewhat sleazy way he tried to win it. Check it out:
http://www.pokernews.com/news/2007/6/where-world-vinnie-vinh.htm

-Jason "this is a troubled guy" Evans

[JasonEvans]

Some of the biggest names are out after all of the "day ones" of the Main Event. But, some top pros are still in and in pretty good chip position:

Ted Forrest 150k
Scotty Nguyen 135k
David "The Dragon" Pham 130k
JC Tran 126k
Lee Watkinson 126k
Chip Jett 123k
Chad Brown 120k
Johnny "World" Hennigan 98k
Michael Binger 94k
Barry Greenstein 91k
Brad Garrett (the comedy actor) 87k
Carlos Mortensen 85k
Gus Hansen 65k
Gavin Smith 58k
Allen Cunningham 58k
Lane Flack 49k
Dan Harrington 48k
Joe Sebok 48k
Huck Seed 45k
Chris "Jesus" Ferguson 45k
Daniel Negreanu 43k
Steve Dannemann 42k
Jason Alexander ("George") 34k
Joe Hachem 24k
Phil Gordon 22k
Todd Brunson 18k

Those guys plus about 2000 additional players are all that is left from the original field of 6300. The top 621 players make the money and we are probably still 3 or 4 days away from that.

Today and tomorrow it is still a divided field. Play begins again in less than an hour. Hachem is playing today. It will be interesting to see if he can double up and beccome a force.

-Jason "Raymer and Jamie Gold both busted on day one. I think Moneymaker did too" Evans

[acdevil]

Jason,

Any chance we can get another update? Unfortunately, my office firewall blocks all wsop sites.

[Peterson]

I second that motion...or as a another thought, what sites are good for checking updates on WSOP action? I'm a relatively recent poker convert, and I'm not sure where the best places to look are. It seems that the official WSOP site is not very user friendly...all I can find is video updates, and I'd prefer some text stories if they're out there...

[toughbuff1]

Gus Hansen is one of the chipleaders, and Chris Ferguson, Robert Varkonyi, Ted Forrest, Carlos Mortenson, J.C. Tran, John Murphy (the young kid who overslept the one day the year Raymer won), Gavin Smith, Leif Force (the hippie kid from F.S.U. who came in 11th last year), Amnon Filippi, Todd Brunson, Tony Hachem (Joe's brother), and Chad Brown are still in the mix from day 2b. I don't remember exactly who is in from day 2a, but I know todd Phillips (the director of Old School and Road Trip) is one of the chip leaders. There are about 800 people left, and 621 cash, so sometime this afternoon we'll be in the money. My favorite blog as I've mentioned once before is at taopoker.blogspot.com, and pokernews.com is a great site for updates. Also, this link will give you pretty much the same updates.

http://www.worldseriesofpoker.com/tourney/updates_pn.asp?tourneyID=3482&groupid=309

Hope this helps!!!

[murpho]

Cardplayer.com also does a great job on updates if you can access them from work.

[JasonEvans]

So sorry-- I had sensed some resistance to poker posts so I stopped. Here is the latest:

Virtually all of the big names who made it through day one of the WSOP were busted out on day two. Negreanu, who at one point had a very nice stack, went out late yesterday. Joe Hachem never really got it going and he too was busted on day two. But, a few big names remain in good position including one who is among the chip leaders.

Gus Hansen, aka: The Great Dane, has more than half a million in chips and is 4th in chips I think. Gus is an amazing big-stack, aggressive player who is capable of playing any two cards. He has won mutiple times on the World Poker Tour and is in fabulous shape to really make some noise in the Main Event.

Chris "Jesus" Ferguson is still around with 150k in chips. He's a former champion. Several other former Main Event champions are still alive and in pretty good shape. Huck Seed has about 280k in chips and Carlos Mortensen has 260k. I believe the average chip stack in around 150k at this point so they are doing nicely. Also, Robert Varkyoni who won the Main Event a few years ago and has never done ANYTHING since is at 150k in chips. Robert is sorta a geeky version of Chris Moneymaker. I don't think he is all that much of a player but he has never played a ton of tournaments since winning the main event. Scotty Nguyen is also still around but he has just under 75k in chips and it will be tough for him to really make a move.

Both of Doyle Brunson's poker playing children are still alive even though Doyle is not. Todd Brunson has around 100k in chips and his sister Pam has 125k.

The always popular and funny Humberrto Brenes, who made a fairly deep run last year has just a little less than 100k in chips. He is in ok shape but needs to make a move.

Among the other notable folks still around:

Chad Brown - 320k (the actor turned poker player)
Todd Philipps - 310k (better known as a movie director (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0680846/))
Chip Jett - 260k
Ted Forrest - 250k (He and Gus are the two best players left in the field)
JC Tran - 210k
Lee Watkinson - 160k
Gavin Smith - 150k
Tobey McGuire - 150k (Spiderman! you can bet the ESPN cameras will be all over him today)
Tony Hachem - 75k (Joe's brother)

Now, what is really intersting is that they had a ton more folks bust out on the 2 Day 2s than they expected. In fact, they had to cut play short on both days to ensure they would not make the money until the field had merged (I can explain why this is such a big problem in another post if anyone cares).

Anyway, they are down to 818 players left at this point with the field merging this afternoon. The top 621 players make the money so we are pretty close to the money. This year, the money pays more than 20-grand, a 2-to-1 return on your intial 10k buy-in. I am betting you will see a lot of the non-pros, the folks who care about the prestige and cash of making the money, really tighten up today as they attempt to just last a couple more hours and make the money. This could give aggressive players like Hansen a real advantage as it will be easier to steal pots. I won't be at all surprised to see some of the pros really increase their chip stack rapidly as we approach the money.

I'd love to see a couple of these guys make it far in the tournament. I like to see excellence be rewarded over luck (yes, Jamie Gold, I am talking to you!). There are enough top pros still around so that we could have a few of them really make waves. Today will be a big day. Everyone will play tight until we get to the money and then everyone will play crazy loose. You'll probably see no more than 25 or so bust-outs in the final hour before the money and then in the 30-minutes after the money you'll see 100+ players busted. It will be fun.

-Jason "I am going to sell shares in myself next year to raise money to play in some Series events ;) "Evans

[tombrady]

blocked from work so can't check the update sites, but what about Strasser and the Duke kid that went to the final table last year -- are they playing this year/still in at all?

[toughbuff1]

I'm not sure about Strasser, but I know Doug Kim busted out yesterday.

[Peterson]

I appreciate the update...and the links...

[JasonEvans]

Play has started for today and I gotta tell you, I cannot wait to see the ESPN featured table for the day. After about an hour of play a table came together that ESPN jumped on as the featured table.

It includes:

Gus Hansen at 622,000 chips
Carlos Mortensen at 280,000 chips
and Gavin Smith at 88,000 chips

-Jason "I feel for the other folks at this table-- 3 of the best pros in the business and 2 of them have very large chipstacks" Evans

[JasonEvans]

By the way, Gus Hansen is now the tournament chip leader. There are still 780 or so players left, a ridiculous sized field, but you have to like his position. Problem is, he is so aggressive, he may bluff a healthy percentage of it off at any time.

Huck Seed is up to about 360k in chips and is now among the top 20 in chips. For some reason he is not nearly as well known as the other top pros but this guy has 4 bracelets and won the main event back in 1996. He always, I mean always, does very well at the National Heads-Up Championship. He'll certainly be one to watch.

--Jason "of course, so much of this is random-- A-A loses 10% of the time to an unsuited 7-2" Evans

[mr. synellinden]

--Jason "of course, so much of this is random-- A-A loses 10% of the time to an unsuited 7-2" Evans

And Chris Moneymaker won the WS in 2003 beating Sammy Farha, one of the best players in the world, heads up. Winning a tournament involving 8000 players is 95% luck - in many ways it's like winning a coin flip 50 times in a row. With that many players, someone is going to go on that kind of lucky streak. However, with only 800 players left and a massive amount of chips, I really like Gus Hansen's chances of making a very deep run - top 30 at least. He is among the top 10 players in the world in my opinion. Huck Seed is definitely no slouch either. I'd really like to see a top pro win it this year.

[toughbuff1]

Jesus Ferguson was just eliminated. Short stacked down to $60,000, he was all-in pre-flop with A-5 suited vs. pocket queens, and the queens held up.

[mr. synellinden]

Play has started for today and I gotta tell you, I cannot wait to see the ESPN featured table for the day. After about an hour of play a table came together that ESPN jumped on as the featured table.

It includes:

Gus Hansen at 622,000 chips
Carlos Mortensen at 280,000 chips
and Gavin Smith at 88,000 chips

-Jason "I feel for the other folks at this table-- 3 of the best pros in the business and 2 of them have very large chipstacks" Evans

WOW - what a table - I'd love to see that as well. Where are you getting this close to real time info/updates on table assigments and chip counts?

[JasonEvans]

WOW - what a table - I'd love to see that as well. Where are you getting this close to real time info/updates on table assigments and chip counts?

http://www.pokernews.com/live-reporting/2007-wsop/event-55-world-championship-no-limit-holdem/day3/

[mr. synellinden]

http://www.pokernews.com/live-reporting/2007-wsop/event-55-world-championship-no-limit-holdem/day3/

Awesome site - thank you. I just noticed Daniel Alaei relatively high up on the chip count list. Watch out for him. He is a really good no limit player with great instincts.

[Clipsfan]

By the way, Gus Hansen is now the tournament chip leader. There are still 780 or so players left, a ridiculous sized field, but you have to like his position. Problem is, he is so aggressive, he may bluff a healthy percentage of it off at any time.

Huck Seed is up to about 360k in chips and is now among the top 20 in chips. For some reason he is not nearly as well known as the other top pros but this guy has 4 bracelets and won the main event back in 1996. He always, I mean always, does very well at the National Heads-Up Championship. He'll certainly be one to watch.

--Jason "of course, so much of this is random-- A-A loses 10% of the time to an unsuited 7-2" Evans

I've read that some of the top players consider Huck Seed to be one of the very best players out there, not only a very good player. I thought it might have been Brunson who said that, but I can't remember. Doesn't he always play (and tend to win) in the Big Game?

[toughbuff1]

Huck Seed is a very good player, but I think the guy you're thinking of is Chip Reese.

[JasonEvans]

There are a few more than 300 players left as we enter day 4. The money has been reached and the focus now turns to making the final tables.

Plenty of big name players busted yesterday but a lot still remain and several are in big chip position.

I may be wrong, but I believe the average stack is around 300k at this point. The chip leader is a hyper-aggressive on-line player from Italy named Dario Minieri. He has almost 2.4 million in chips. 2nd place in chips is at 1.5 million, so Minieri has a big lead.

Among the very notable pros and celebs still alive:

Gus Hansen - 1.04 million (11th in chips overall)
Kirk Morrison - 772k (Kirk is a great story, more on him in a moment)
Lee Watkinson - 737k
Sorel Mizzi - 603k (considered by some to be the best on-line player in the world)
Huck Seed - 544k (former Main Event winner)
Chad Brown - 454k
Jason Lester - 434k
Robert Varkyoni - 424k (former Main Event winner, his first cash since winning main event in 2002)
Scotty Nguyen - 321k (former Main Event winner)
Carlos Mortensen - 284k (former Main Event winner)
David Levi - 262k
Humberto Brenes - 210k (ESPN looooves him)
Mimi Tran - 144k (Barry Greenstein's protege)
Tobey McGuire - 131k (probably the best celebrity player around)
Hasan Habib - 127k

The blinds are currently at 3000/6000 so technically you are not short-stacked if you have more than 60k in chips but with an 1000 ante and the average stack around 300k, you probably need to be at 150k or so to not feel chip pressure.

They play for about 10 hours today and then play down to the final 3 tables (27 players) on Saturday. On Sunday, they play to the final 9, the Final Table. Monday is an off day and then on Tuesday we get a champion. It seems amazing that these folks have outlasted 6000 other players and yet they are still 3 days away from even making the final table of the tournament, but that is how big this field is. Whew!!

-Jason "4 previous winners are still alive... stunning" Evans

[JasonEvans]

Kirk Morrison - 772k (Kirk is a great story, more on him in a moment)


Oh, I forgot to mention more about Kirk. He was one of the young guns of poker back in the late 1990s. He and Daniel Negreanu, Allen Cunningham, and John Juanda all were buddies who hung out together and played poker together and were starting to take the poker world by storm when Kirk just decided he didn't want that life anymore and he dropped out. He fled to New Zealand and hung out on the beach for several years.

Around 2005 he started playing poker again a little bit and he ran into Daniel at a tournament in Australia and Daniel convinced him to come back to the U.S. Kirk did not even know how big poker had gotten until he returned.

Since coming back, Kirk has become one of the most successful tournament players around. He made more than $2million playing in the World Poker Tour Championship a few months ago and cashed in 4 consecutive WPT events (which ties Daniel for the record for most consecutive cashes). He has now cashed in 5 events here at the World Series and I won't be at all surprised if he really makes a run today.

-Jason "he's a real party dude-- he and Scotty Nguyen were supposedly drunk at their Main Event table 2 night ago-- Kirk admits he does not even remember an hour or so of play when he doubled his chip stack" Evans

[toughbuff1]

Jason,

Don't forget about Berry Johnston, who won the whole thing back in 1986. He's still in the mix with a little over 200k. Also, Sully from Godsmack may rival Spiderman in the celebrity poker category, as this is his second straight main event cash. I tend to think of Sully as the Raymer and Spidey as the Hachem of celebrity players ;-)

[Clipsfan]

Huck Seed is a very good player, but I think the guy you're thinking of is Chip Reese.

Quite a few people have said that Reese is the best player out there, and maybe I was thinking about that, although I thought someone had said something similar about Huck too. Wasn't Huck the youngest guy to win the Main Event as the WSOP until Phil came along? I'm sketchy on my WSOP history.

Chip Reese is supposed to be the best cash game player out there, if I remember what I've read/heard.

[JasonEvans]

We are now down to about 120 players left in the tournament and it is insanely close. By this point last year Jamie Gold's dumb luck was making him a dominant chipstack and sucked much of the drama out of the series. It does not look like that will happen this time around as the chip lead rotated among at least 4 or 5 different guys yesterday and no one is separating themsevles from the field.

The current chip leader is some guy named Dag Martin Mikkelsen. He started yesterday at 1.4 million in chips and finished with 3.7 million. He has about a million chip lead on 2nd place, but this has been such an up-and-down tournament you hesitate to even call him the leader. For example, the guy in second place in chips, Charis Anastasiou, was down to 500k after a couple hours of play yesterday but he went on a real rush in the final hour of play and went from 1-million to 2.67 million. In fact, none of the chipleaders today entered yesterday as one of the top-20 stacks and there are several rags to riches stories. Some guy named Ryan Elson was the short-stack at his table early yesterday with just 150k in chips. By the end of the day he had 2.1 million.

As for the big-name pros, Gus Hansen had a so-so day and was almost eliminated at one point (he was all-in for about 900k with pocket 10s against pocket Qs but he flopped a set) but is sitting pretty good right now. Humberto Brenes and Scotty Nguyen both had strong finishes to the day and are each in very good chip position. The average chipstack is just under 1-million. Here is how the "names" stand:

Lee Watkinson - 1.86 million (12th in chips)
Gus Hansen - 1.60 million (25th in chips)
Huck Seed - 1.55 million (30th in chips)
Kirk Morrison - 1.39 million (37th in chips)
Scotty Nguyen - 1.18 million (44th in chips)
Humberto Brenes - 1.14 million (48th in chips)
Chad Brown - 860k

Scotty and Huck are the 2 former champions still alive. ESPN has to be in heaven with Scotty and Humberto still around as both those guys are great TV. Kirk and Gus are also fun to watch at the tables.

I heard an amusing story that Huck Seed is telling everyone he needs to finish in at least 54th place ($190k in winnings) to break even at this year's Series. He has entered a lot of events and not cashed once! When you consider that he entered the $50k H.O.R.S.E. tournament and several $5000 events that included rebuys you can see how he might be in a hole ;)

They play down to 27, 3 tables of players, today.

-Jason "the money is starting to get really serious" Evans

[JasonEvans]

A couple other minor notes:

The guy who finished 2nd to Robert Varkyoni at the series in 2002, Julian Gardner, is at almost 1.8 million in chips. He has about a dozen cashes in Series events so he is pretty experienced, even if he is not a known pro.

Cory Carroll, 1.4 million in chips, won one of the Series Circuit events earlier this year at Caesar's Palace taking home $500,000 for first place. He outlasted David "The Dragon" Pham and Chad Brown at the final table so he probably knows what he is doing.

Daneil Alaei, who has 14 career World Series cashes and owns a bracelet (in 2-7 lowball last year) is at almost 1.3 million in chips. He cashed in the main event in both 2004 and 2005. Being well into the money this year, that gives him 3 cashes in 4 years. Pretty darn impressive!!

By the way, the short stack is Andreas Krause with 95,000 in chips. The blinds are at 8000/16000 with a 2000 ante. He's going to be all-in very quickly today. The first 20 or so people who bust out will make $58,570 in prize money. If you can last until to top 50 or so players, you'll be making at least $200-grand.

-Jason "aside from these guys, there are a ton of nobodies left in the field who have never cashed in any Series event EVER" Evans

[JasonEvans]

One key thing at this stage is the table you are at. For example, a guy named David Wells (not the pitcher) who has a respectible 684k in chips is in huuuuge trouble today because he is so short-stacked compared to the other guys at his table. Every single other person at his table is over a million in chips and 3 of the 9 guys have more than 2.3 million. That is a loaded table and he is going to have trouble pushing just about anyone out of a pot. Now, if he plays aggressive and someone double him up then he can be a force, but he will almost certainly have to risk his entire stack... perhaps multiple times... early in the day.

By contast, Gus Hansen's 1.6 million stack is in fairly good shape. Only one other player at his table has over a million in chips (Tuan Lam at 1.9 mill). Gus may be able to push folks at his table around a bit early on and steal some blinds.

Humberto Brenes has a tough table. His 1.14 million stack is 6th at his table. His table includes the tournament chip leader (3.74 million) as well as a player at 2.2 million and 2 others at 1.8 million. I also bet that his table is the ESPN featured table at the start of play today, which can be bad for the pros. Having the cameras around often entices guys to do crazy stuff in an effort to get on TV. Humberto will get called/raised by unpredictible hands a bit more often and players will try to make moves on him that they might not otherwise consider. It could give Humberto opportunities, but it also makes play less predictible and the pros hate that.

Obviously, this only applies to the first hour or so of play as guys will get moved around as players are elminated and new seats open up-- but, it can make a difference.

-Jason "Scotty and Huck are in ok shape at thier tables, Watkinson is his table's chip leader, which is great position to be in" Evans

[JasonEvans]

It was a disasterous day for almost all the top pros and the chip leaders going into yesterday. Poker can be random at times and it seems everyone is on an up and down roller coaster.

All 5 of the chip leaders from yesterday busted and failed to make it through one more day. Charis Anastasiou, who entered the day with 2.67 million in chips-- the second biggest stack around-- busted fairly early in 92nd place. The only member of yesterday's top ten to remain in the top ten in chips today is some guy named Hevad Khan.

Gus Hansen never really got it going. He stuck around for a while but busted in 61st place. Humberto Brenes weent out in 83rd. Huck Seed didn't make it high enough to break even for the Series leaving in 73rd place (he needed to make the top 50). Kirk Morrison departed in 56th.

But, Scotty Nguyen is still around and in OK shape. With 36 players left he is 27th in chips with 1.96 million. He had been up over 3 million at one point. Still, he has enough to make some noise if he catches some cards.

There are a few other notable pros also around. Lee Watkinson is 12th in chips with 3.5 million. Daniel Alaei is 26th with 1.99 million. The amazing story is Bill Edler, who has been a pro for several years but has been on a real tournament run lately (he won his first bracelet a few weeks ago). He wass down to less than 200k in chips at one point early yesterday but he doubled up a couple times in a row and just started running ragged over his table. He ended the day with 2.68 million in chips, good for 15th place.

Here is how crazy the day was-- the three chip leaders now were in 42nd, 43rd, and 51st place in chips at the start of the day. David Tran is guy who made the biggest move, taking his 1.18 million chip stack and turning it into a pile of 10.2 million chips. He is a mere 70k chips ahead of Philip Hilm. Obviously, it is still very much anyone's tournament and even forecasting anyone for the final table would be folly at this point.

That's the report-- they play from 36 down to the final 9 today.

-Jason "average chipstack is around 3.5 million right now" Evans

[Oriole Way]

Hey guys... just wanted to let you know that one of my fraternity brothers from Duke, John Armbrust (Class of '04), made it to the top 27 and will be playing for the final table today.

The bare minimum he will cash is $285,000 - not a bad payday!

Check out John's blog here (http://texdukepoker.blogspot.com/).

I wrote a little bit about John on my blog (http://aletterneversent.blogspot.com/2007/07/2007-world-series-of-poker.html).

Root for your fellow Dukie, hopefully we will get to see a good deal of John on TV. Having played with him and knowing him, John is a great player and a great representative of the university. Best of luck to John to rest of the way.

[tombrady]

what fraternity?

[Oriole Way]

what fraternity?

Kappa Alpha.

[JasonEvans]

Hey guys... just wanted to let you know that one of my fraternity brothers from Duke, John Armbrust (Class of '04), made it to the top 27 and will be playing for the final table today.

The bare minimum he will cash is $285,000 - not a bad payday!

Check out John's blog here (http://texdukepoker.blogspot.com/).

I wrote a little bit about John on my blog (http://aletterneversent.blogspot.com/2007/07/2007-world-series-of-poker.html).

Root for your fellow Dukie, hopefully we will get to see a good deal of John on TV. Having played with him and knowing him, John is a great player and a great representative of the university. Best of luck to John to rest of the way.


WOW!! Amazing!

John stands an excellent chance of being on TV a lot during his play today. He is at one of the two tables that ESPN will likely spend most of their time watching. He is at table #5 which includes Scotty Nguyen, far and away the biggest personality left in the competition. Bill Edler is also there and there are 2 guys with more than 7 million in chips. Tough table, for sure!

The other table that might be featured is table #2 with noted pro Lee Watkinson. It includes chip leader David Tran (10.2 million) and the guys who are 2nd and 3rd in chips. How is that fair?!?! The top 3 chip leaders at the same table!! Compare that to table #3 that includes 7 of the 10 lowest chipstacks. Sheesh!!

--Jason "John is from Atlanta too-- BONUS!! I'll certainly be rooting for him!" Evans

[Brian12215]

John's Kings ran into another player's Aces preflop and he lost about 2 mil. on the hand. Not the best way to start the day. Maybe he will go on a rush and get it back. I'm rooting for Scott Freeman. I've watched him play online a ton and he can DOMINATE. He plays under the sn SCTrojans. I also like "rainkhan."

[Brian12215]

Now it says John is up to about 5 mil. Maybe he did hit that rush.

[Brian12215]

John eliminated SCTrojans. He is up to over 10 million. Maybe he will take this thing down.

[JasonEvans]

John Armbrust just busted in 18th place-- a truly amazing showing and stunning result. He earned $381,302 for his week of work... not too shabby.

What really stinks is that John got his chips in with a huge advantage. He was suited AK against an unsuited AQ. Sadly, the unsuited A was a club and the board came with 4 clubs to give Lee Childs a flush. A horrible way to go out-- not least of all beacuse John would have been the tournament chip leader had his opponent not sucked out like that. Arrgggh!!

-Jason "Scotty Nguyen and Lee Watkinson are both doing great -- Lee is 2nd in chips and Scotty is about 11th" Evans

[JasonEvans]

http://www.pokernews.com/files_en/reporting/blog/469ad567c5fe5.jpg
John Armbrust- 18th place, $381,302

[JasonEvans]

Well, Scotty Nguyen busted out in 11th place and just a short time ago they lost player #10 so they are done and we have a final table. The chipstacks are extremely close and I think everyone got very cautious as the prospect of making the final table approached. Also, while the money has been very nice up until now, it is getting up into life-changing kinda figures and I suspect many of the players are playing it safe to make sure they don't bluff away their chance at more than a million bucks.

Philip Hilm is the chip leader at 23-million
Tuan Lam and John Klamar are next at 20-million each
Raymond Rahme, a retired 62-year-old dude, is at 16-million
Lee Childs, who eliminated John Armbrust, is 5th at 13.3-million
Lee Watkinson, the biggest pro left in the field, stands just under 10-million
"Rain" Khan is at 9.2-million
Jerry Yang is at 8.5-million
And Alex Kravchenko is the "short stack" at 6.5-million

If those amounts seem outrageous, it is worth noting that they are playing 100,000/200,000 blinds with a 30,000 chip ante. That means that before the hand starts, there are $570,000 worth of chips in the pot.

They take a break today (Monday) and then return Tuesday afternoon and they play until there is a winner. It is waaay too close to predict anything and I bet the play is fairly tight, at least in the early going. The next bust-out gets $525,000 but if you stick around a little bit longer, you get almost a million dollars for finishing 6th and it just goes up in crazy numbers from that point on. When outlasting one more player starts to mean $200,000 or more, you tend to play really tight.

-Jason "I am really bummed that Scotty did not make the final table" Evans

[toughbuff1]

The final table started about an hour and a half ago, and already Hilm, who was the chip leader going in, has busted out in 9th place. Jerry Yang, the guy who took him out, has a huge chip lead right now. There is a link to watch the final table about halfway down the page at www.channelsurfing.net

[toughbuff1]

Ok Yang just went up further eliminating Lee Watkinson with a real sick call. Yang has been raising almost every pot, and is playing very loose. In the small blind he raised to a million. Watkinson who hadn't played a hand raised all-in for another 8.3 million or so. Yang called with only A-9, but actually was in the lead with Watkinson having A-7. Yang's hand held up, and he has probably $55 million in chips, with the next closest being about $20 million or so.

[mr. synellinden]

Just watched that after your heads up on channel surfing.net. That was a sick call. Although Yang's impassioned prayers to Jesus seemed a little strange to me.

[toughbuff1]

Yeah, I'm not sure God is a big fan of poker. If he is, though, I guess this is the event he'd be watching.

[toughbuff1]

Yang is one lucky guy. He made a move in the big blind, coming all-in over the top of Lee Childs, who had raised to $720,000. Childs made a great call, having K-J against Yang's J-8 suited, but Yang spiked an 8 on the turn to eliminate Childs and go up to $62 million in chips.

[JasonEvans]

Yang continues to make sick calls and is busting people out left and right. He is up to $77 million in chips, a little less than half of the chips in play.

As an aside, how on Earth is that website broadcasting the Final Table for free? I thought you had to pay like $20 to watch the final table on pay-per-view. This is awesome getting to watch it for free!!

--Jason "is this broadcast on delay? It can't be live, can it?" Evans

[toughbuff1]

I'm pretty sure its live, but I have no idea how that web site is broadcasting it for free.

[tombrady]

I'm pretty sure its live, but I have no idea how that web site is broadcasting it for free.

its P2P -- its like SopCast.

it skirts the law for now.

[JasonEvans]

So I watched several hours of the final table and it was funny to hear Phil Gordon talk about what a bad player Jerry Yang was and how unpredictible his play was. I know luck plays a huge, huge, huge role in determining a champion in an evvent like this, but I hate to see the worst player at the table win it all. Yang made several horrid calls and it seemed like he got away with it almost every time. When he called an $8.5 million raise pre-flop with unsuited A-5... that was sick.

Still, I was frustrated that no one at the table seemed willing to stand up to him. Everyone played nervous or too cautious and allowed Yang to step all over there. No one was willing to fire multiple bullets at the pot. It was like if they got called once by Yang they got scared and refused to fire again. Alex Kravchenko in particular disappointed me. Gordon was convinced that he was going to walk all over Yang at one point and Kravchenko just played nervous the whole time.

Ah well. Sad to say that the Series is done for the year. Always an exciting time. I am off to Atlantic City next week and will probably play in a couple tournaments. Nothing like playing in the Series, but still great fun!

-Jason "Yang is a great guy and says he will donate 10% of his $8.5m first prize to charity-- so mad props for that!" Evans

[toughbuff1]

You know, I wouldn't take a whole lot of stock in Phil Gordon's commentary... I mean Yang has more bracelets than Gordon does. Yang made a lot of questionable calls, but they all seemed to work out for him. Rhame made a big mistake in his all-in hand against Yang. Once the Ace hit, he should have mucked his kings. He should have known from watching Yang's all-ins against Lee Watkinson and Phil Hilm that Yang could not be bluffed, and he had to put him on an ace. And I give Yang a lot of credit...despite a couple questionable calls, he played with no fear. He sensed from the get-go that he could push the table around, and he used that to his advantage. He didn't let up all night.

The one hand I am very curious about is what Yang had when Lee Childs folded the pocket queens. Based on what we know now about his play, I'd be willing to bet that maybe Yang had AK or something similar, and Childs layed down the better hand. If Childs called, and the queens did wind up winning, that would have changed everything.

[JasonEvans]

You know, I wouldn't take a whole lot of stock in Phil Gordon's commentary... I mean Yang has more bracelets than Gordon does. Yang made a lot of questionable calls, but they all seemed to work out for him. Rhame made a big mistake in his all-in hand against Yang. Once the Ace hit, he should have mucked his kings. He should have known from watching Yang's all-ins against Lee Watkinson and Phil Hilm that Yang could not be bluffed, and he had to put him on an ace. And I give Yang a lot of credit...despite a couple questionable calls, he played with no fear. He sensed from the get-go that he could push the table around, and he used that to his advantage. He didn't let up all night.

The one hand I am very curious about is what Yang had when Lee Childs folded the pocket queens. Based on what we know now about his play, I'd be willing to bet that maybe Yang had AK or something similar, and Childs layed down the better hand. If Childs called, and the queens did wind up winning, that would have changed everything.

I agree about Rhame pushing with kings when the ace hit on the flop. It is a classic panic push where you only get called if you are beaten badly. Rhame still had a ton of chips if he mucks when the ace comes on the flop. That is one of those situations where you have to be willing to give up a bunch of chips so you do not gamble off all of your chips.

And I think the Childs fold was really bad. Yang wass playing loose and everyone could tell that. No way I put Yang on pocket Aces or Kings and I even think AK was not all that likely. Yang could have easily had just one overcard on the queens which would have made the queens a HUGE favorite. Now, knowing Yang's luck he could easily have sucked out but I think Childs folded because he was worried about moving up in the money.

-Jason "Yang seemed to not care about moving up in the money-- which is why he moved up all the way to #1" Evans

[Highlander]

Hey JasonEvans - thought you might be interested in this...

I saw today on a separate message board that poker legend Phil Hellmuth is going to be on "The Surreal Life 7" along with Randy "Macho Man" Savage, Carrot Top, and a few others. The cast hasn't been announced, but apparently Phil broke poker face and announced who his castmates were.

A poker game with those 3 would be amusing to say the least...

[toughbuff1]

Poker related Survivor Spoiler:
(hopefully this works and you have to highlight to read it. If not, I apologize)


I'm pretty sure I read that Jean-Robert Bellande was csat to be on the next installment of Survivor. Should be interesting, especially if he is as obnoxious in real life as he is at the poker table.