The 2015 World Series of Poker is headed into its second week of action with a host of bracelets on the line for its participants. In yesterday’s action, the highly controversial Heads Up World Championship reached its conclusion while a part-time player defeated several top professionals on his way to winning WSOP gold.
Event #10 – $10,000 Heads Up No Limit Hold’em World Championship
Breaking down perfectly for its format, 128 players (no first round byes!) came out to determine the World Champion in one of the more challenging disciplines that poker has to offer. The number was slightly up from the 122 players the event drew in 2014, but essentially the prize pool was the same ($1,344,200 for the 2015 version of the tournament). As the tournament progressed, however, another controversy emerged that drew the ire of players in the tournament and the poker community at large.
As play progressed through Day One, one of the contenders, Valeriu Coca, was mowing down an impressive list of players as the matches were played. According to statistics, Coca – who has a brief resume on the Hendon Mob database and nothing outside of the European continent prior to this WSOP – went through such players as Matt Marafioti, Pratyush Buddiga and Connor Drinan to reach the Sweet Sixteen of the Heads Up tournament. The problem was that each of those pros felt as though something didn’t make sense as Coca played “slow and passive in the beginning and then picked up the pace as the match went on as far as speed of paly and aggression,” according to Drinan on Two Plus Two.
Further investigation of Coca revealed that, in his native Czech Republic, he had been banned from all casinos for marking cards at the table. According to these reports, Coca would wear special sunglasses and, while covering his cards, would apply a special ink that could be seen only with the sunglasses. As detailed by Drinan, his style in the Czech case was quite similar to what occurred during his three Heads Up matches, a deliberate, slow style early on followed by rampantly aggressive (and knowledgeable) play after many hands had been dealt. Allegedly, by the latter points of the matches, Coca had gotten enough cards marked (and could see what those cards were through his markings) that he was able to defeat three difficult opponents.
WSOP officials investigated the matter and, after viewing videotape and talking to the dealers and players involved in matches against Coca, determined that there wasn’t any evidence that showed Coca was marking the cards. This is similar to the situation in the Czech Republic but, unlike the situation there, the WSOP couldn’t find any cards marked after the fact that were tied to Coca (in the Czech Republic, there were cards that revealed markings and those cards were Aces and Kings).
In his Day 2 play, Coca was a marked man (no pun intended) as the tournament played forward. The WSOP instituted more deck changes at his table, presumably in an attempt to thwart any marking that might be occurring, and kept a close eye on his match with Byron Kaverman. Although he would defeat Kaverman, Coca would eventually fall at the hands of Keith Lehr as the Final Four were determined.
In those Final Four matches, Paul Volpe made short work of Matthew Cooper and sat back to see who his opponent would be for the Heads Up bracelet. Lehr and Dee Tiller would fight tooth and nail for the final seat, with Tiller having Lehr on the ropes at several points, before Lehr would fight his way into the lead and, eventually, the victory. With that match finished, the Day 3 match between Volpe and Lehr would determine the champion.
The battle between Volpe and Lehr would last for all of 24 hands. Both men, in the hunt for their second bracelet, were ready to go as Volpe pulled out into the lead only six hands into play. Ten hands later, however, Lehr would sniff out a Volpe bluff on a J-4-2-8-6 board (his Q-J playing over Volpe’s A-5) to take down a massive pot that thrust him into the lead. Another eight hands later, the final hand came down in dramatic fashion.
After Volpe opened up with a raise and Lehr called, a 7-6-3 flop that looked innocent enticed great action. Lehr led out and Volpe raised the betting to 280K, but Lehr continued to fire with a bet of 540K. Volpe slowed down for a moment before making the call and the twosome saw a Queen on the turn. Lehr moved all in and, after a moment’s thought, Volpe made the call and tabled his 6-3 for a flopped two pair. Lehr’s Q-8 was behind, but he had outs to a seven, eight or Queen that would change his fortunes. The river card was a thunderbolt, the 8♣, saving Lehr by making a larger two pair than Volpe and earning Lehr the WSOP bracelet.
1. Keith Lehr, $334,430
2. Paul Volpe, $206,620
3. Dee Tiller, $111,525
(tie) Matthew Cooper, $111,525
5. Valeriu Coca, $54,545
(tie) J. C. Tran, $54,545
(tie) Timothy Adams, $54,545
(tie) Isidro Sifuentes, $54,545
The rest of the players who cashed were all pros: Kaverman ($26,490 for those defeated in the Round of 16), Olivier Busquet, Andy Philachack, Max Silver, Barry Hutter, Jake Schindler, reigning WSOP Player of the Year George Danzer and Simon Lam.
Event #11 – $1500 Limit Hold’em
With a field similar in size to 2014 (the 2015 field of 660 had exactly three more competitors than in 2014), the final day of the $1500 Limit Hold’em event might have lacked the controversy that surrounded the Heads Up event, but it was still a hugely competitive battle. 28 players returned on Thursday to continue the festivities with Kevin Song and his 450,000 in chips at the head of the line. Others such as Shannon Shorr, David Chiu and Alex Kostritsyn were all in position to take Song down should he stumble.
It would take a full six hours of action to work down to the final table, which was determined after Bryan Pimlott knocked off Jay Helfert in tenth place. Following the dinner break, the players returned and, only a few hands into the official final table play, saw Kostritsyn fall at the hands of Song in ninth place. Chip leader William Kakon only added to his edge when he took down Brandon Cantu in seventh to creep close to two million chips.
Song’s run at the title slipped through his fingers in the span of a few hands. He would lose a nice pot to Shorr to fall behind Shorr in the chip counts and, in another battle between the two men, one wouldn’t come out on the other side. Song would get his chips to the center against Shorr holding a suited Q-J, but Shorr’s A-Q off suit had the significant edge. The 6-J-3-7 flop and turn left Song looking for a Jack, but the Ace on the river sealed the hand for Shorr and eliminated Song in sixth place.
With the blinds eating into virtually every stack, every hand seemingly had a player at risk. Shorr was one of those caught by the blinds, losing a big pot to Kakon before being knocked off by Daniel Needleman in fifth place. Kakon would take down Pimlott in fourth place and Mike Lancaster in third to enter into heads up play with a slight edge over Needleman. The duo would battle over 70 hands before Kakon used a Q-J to defeat Needleman’s pocket tens on a 9-J-6-7-5 board to capture the title.
1. William Kakon, $196,055
2. Daniel Needleman, $121,051
3. Mike Lancaster, $78,693
4. Bryan Pimlott, $57,799
5. Shannon Shorr, $43,053
6. Kevin Song, $32,485
7. Brandon Cantu, $24,796
8. Hector Contreras, $19,138
9. Alexander Kostritsyn, $14,924
