The 2013 World Series of Poker enters its first weekend of action today and it will be a busy one. Two bracelets will be awarded this evening, with one event’s leader holding a dominating chip stack and the other with a long day of work ahead of it.
Event #2 – $5000 Eight Handed No Limit Hold’em – Day Three
The final table has been determined in the first big buy in event of this year’s WSOP, and it appears as though it is Trevor Pope’s tournament to lose as he has the final table dominated with his massive 3.42 million in chips.
28 players returned on Friday from the original starting field of 481 players with Rafal Michalowski at the head of the pack, followed by Markus Gonsalves and Pope. The action kicked up quickly with David ‘Doc’ Sands the instigator of the activities. He would knock off Garen Nichanian on one of the first hands of the day to move up over the 200K mark, then would turn around and hand some of those chips over to Keith Lehr to fall back around 150K. About an hour into the day’s play, Sands would fall victim to Michalowski in 25th place when his A-2 failed to catch up against Michalowski’s pocket nines.
Down to three tables, Michalowski was still in the lead but the players were lining up behind him to issue their challenges. Ismael Bojang would push out a five bet against Pope and Ben Yu to take a hand and move up to 550K, while David Vamplew and Jamie Armstrong would quietly mount a charge to about the same amount. Pope would also start on a rush at this point that he would ride until the end of the evening’s play.
Pope started off with knocking out Matthew Parry in 22nd place to move up to 860K in chips and the steamroller that Pope was riding continued onward. Pope would crack the one million mark in eliminating Mike DeGilio in 18th place when his pocket Jacks stood up to DeGilio’s pocket sixes, added some more chips with his elimination of Joe Serock in 17th place and closed in on the two million mark with his knockout of Bojang in 12th place.
The roll by Pope didn’t stop there as the remaining ten men tried to keep pace with him. After Armstrong dispatched Day One chip leader Tom Marchese from the tournament in tenth place, the remaining nine men came to the table to eliminate one more player before calling it a night. Pope would reach the two million chip mark in taking some chips off of David Peters and, in consecutive hands, reach 2.75 million in taking pots off of Brandon Meyers and Dan Kelly. On the final hand of the night, Pope’s day of domination would be completed.
After a bet from Michalowski to start the proceedings, Pope three bet the action and was immediately met with a 240K four bet from Michalowski. Undaunted, Pope pushed back with a five bet and Michalowski moved all in. Pope nearly beat Michalowski into the pot with his call, tabling a pocket pair of Aces in the ultimate cooler to Michalowski’s pocket Queens. Once the board ran out Jack high, the official final table was set and Pope’s heater of a day was over.
1. Trevor Pope, 3.42 million
2. David Vamplew, 629,000
(tied) Jared Hamby, 629,000
4. Dan Kelly, 625,000
5. Brandon Meyers, 595,000
6. Jamie Armstrong, 451,000
7. David Peters, 435,000
8. Darryll Fish, 432,000
You’re not reading those totals incorrectly; Pope has amassed over half of the chips in play and it appears that the rest of the field is playing for second place. There are some talented players behind Pope, however, in Vamplew, Hamby, Kelly and Fish (even on a short stack), so Pope will have to make sure he doesn’t try to be the “table sheriff” too often.
The men will play down to the champion this afternoon at 2PM (Pacific Time), with the winner walking off with a $553,906 bankroll boost and the WSOP bracelet.
Event #3 – $1000 No Limit Hold’em Re-Entry – Day Two
The frenetic pace that dominated Day One of the $1000 Re-Entry Event – where players who busted the 11AM flight of the tournament could come back for the second flight at 5PM – didn’t slow down at all for its Day Two play. Of the 3164 entries made on Thursday, 543 came back on Friday for what would prove to be another day of destruction.
After only two hours of play, the field had been reduced to the money bubble and, once that popped, the players could start exiting the Rio with a bit of cash in their hands. Kathy Liebert, Kevin MacPhee, Erick Lindgren, Tony Dunst, Bruce Buffer and defending champion Ashkan Razavi all were gone before 6PM (Razavi was ironically eliminated by the runner-up to him in last year’s tournament, Amanda Musumeci) while the players methodically worked their way through the Day Two carnage.
The power players for the day were Charles Sylvestre, who jumped out early to a nice 200K-plus stack and would ride that to the end of the night to finish in the top five. Ryan Olisar also had a nice day, but it was filled with excitement as he rammed and jammed his chips to see his stack move like an elevator. At the end, however, Olisar would join Sylvestre in the Top Five along with chip leader Seth Berger, who used a late night charge to finish atop the heap.
1. Seth Berger, 994,000
2. Ryan Olisar, 815,000
3. Charles Sylvestre, 787,000
4. Ping Liu, 475,000
5. Vladimir Geshkenbein, 400,000
6. James Matteucci, 383,000
7. Nam Le, 361,000
8. Travis Wiedower, 354,000
9. Jia Liu, 351,000
10. Garrick Lau, 346,000
While you might think it is time to celebrate for the 38 players who survived the Day Two fracas, guess again. The players will have a long Day Three to battle it out amongst themselves as a champion will be crowned early this morning. The eventual winner will be exhausted but he will also be $491,360 richer and a WSOP champion.
