Coming into the home stretch of the 2017 Borgata Winter Poker Open Main Event in Atlantic City, NJ, Charles Coates has been able to build a nice lead over the 34 players remaining. When one of those players is Olivier Busquet – who won this tournament in 2009 for his largest non-“High Roller” payday ever – and three other former WPT champions are in the mix, that spot on the top can potentially be an uncomfortable one, however.
168 players came back on Wednesday with the dreams of getting down to the final three tables (27 players) but likely facing the reality that they wouldn’t get close to that mark. Of importance for the remaining field, though, was in bursting the money bubble (at 130 players) before considering a deeper run. Jack Duong, sitting astride a 727,500-chip stack, was the man looking good at this point in the tournament, but there was still quite a bit of poker left to be played.
Popular East Coast pro Matt Glantz was one who came out of the gates quickly. On a 10-8-6-2-Q rainbow board, Glantz was able to get Chris Odle to pay him off on each street, including a river all-in. When Glantz turned up pocket tens for the flopped set, Odle mucked his cards (leaving many wondering just what he held and what he thought Glantz was playing). While the double-up of 435,000 chips was pushed in front of Glantz, Shaun Deeb took out a player by applying a cooler – Deeb’s pocket Kings over his opponent’s pocket Queens – and reached 635,000 in chips.
It would take about three hours of play to reach a money bubble that was quickly popped. With Mark Scacewater all in, Farhad Jamasi made the call from the big blind with Scacewater in the lead with his A-J over Jamasi’s 5-4. That all changed on the 6-6-4 flop, pushing Jamasi into the lead and leaving Scacewater looking for one of his two overs. A seven on the turn and a nine on the river did nothing to change the scenario, giving Jamasi the hand and sending Scacewater to the rail with nothing to show for his efforts.
With everyone in the room safe in the fact they were getting the min-cash of $6678, the cash out cage went to work. Lily Kiletto and former WPT champion Eric Afriat were a part of that parade and, following dinner, Seth Berger, Amanda Musumeci, Aaron Massey, Matt Stout, Kevin Eyster, Loni Harwood, John Racener and Glantz were part of the carnage. As the clock passed the midnight hour, Mike Dentale found the rail with 39 players left.
In one of the final hands of the night, a new contender emerged from the pack. After Kunal Patel raised from middle position, Blake Bohn called his small blind and Eugene Fouksman his big to see a 9-5-4 two-diamond flop. The two blinds checked over the Patel, who fired out a bet, and Bohn called. Fouksman wanted more, however, as he put his final chips in the center (about 250K). Patel made the call and Bohn, with a bounteous stack of chips in the center, moved all in over Patel. Patel pondered it for a moment, then made the call.
Patel might have thought it was a bluff, but he was wrong:
Bohn: pocket Queens
Patel: K-9 (pair of nines)
Fouksman: flush draw
Fouksman would catch a diamond on the river to triple up, but the monstrous side pot that was built between Patel and Bohn went to Bohn. That 3.3 million stack rocketed Bohn into first place while Patel lamented on Twitter:
Just busted the borgata main in 35th in a dumb hand in a 110 bb pot where I got it in pretty terribly. Gl to friends still in
— Kunal Patel (@Kunal_K_Patel) February 2, 2017
Bohn would attempt to add to his massive stack, but it would cost him the chip lead. Going against Charles Coates on a K-J-4-6-J board, both players checked the river of an almost 500K pot. After Coates showed pocket Queens, Bohn surprisingly mucked his hand (a smaller pair?) and sent the chip lead over to Coates to start the Day 4 proceedings:
1. Charles Coates, 3.371 million
2. Blake Bohn, 3.024 million
3. Nathan Bjerno, 2.892 million
4. Jia Liu, 2.561 million
5. Adnan Mohammad, 2.325 million
6. Richard Foster, 2.1 million
7. Casey Yontz, 1.776 million
8. Tony Ruberto, 1.528 million
9. Bart Dowling, 1.4 million
10. Ji Qiang Tong, 1.365 million
Lurking under the Top Ten is Busquet (14th place, one million chips), who won this tournament in 2009 and is looking to become only the third person to win two WPT championships at the same casino. There are three other WPT champions still in the mix led by Ruberto, with Anthony Gregg (635K) and Asher Conniff (406K) having some work to do to get into contention.
The tournament will restart at noon (Eastern Time) at the Borgata and play down to the six handed WPT final table. Everyone who finishes higher than eighth will be guaranteed a six-figure payday, with the eventual champion walking off with a $892,433 payday.
