Tuesday marks the third day of play in the World Poker Tour’s (WPT) Doyle Brunson Five Diamond World Poker Classic. At 12:00 Noon Pacific Time, 139 players will take to the felts at the Bellagio, with the top 100 finishing in the money. Leading the very talented field on hand for the tournament is Justin Young, one of only two players to crack the 500,000 chip mark.
Young is a World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet winner, having captured his coveted title by virtue of taking down a $1,500 No Limit Hold’em Shootout tournament during the 2008 WSOP for $335,000. He finished 444th out of 6,844 players in the 2008 Main Event, banking another $27,000 in the process. Young paces the Bellagio field with 552,900 chips, just edging out the 540,900 second place stack of Chuck Kelley, who finished as the runner up in the WPT’s Borgata Poker Classic in 2007 for $849,000. John Hennigan (also known as “The World”) bested Kelley in that event and pocketed $1.6 million.
Evan McNiff, who made a deep run in the 2008 WSOP Main Event and finished 373rd, holds the third largest chip stack at 485,300. WPT fans across the world recognize the name Tuan Le, who sits with the fourth biggest stack at the Five Diamond with 480,000, barely trailing McNiff’s arsenal. Le made waves during Season III of the WPT, taking down the Foxwoods World Poker Finals for $1.5 million and then following up that performance by claiming victory in the WPT Championship, held at the Bellagio, for $2.8 million. The latter tournament featured one of the toughest final tables ever on the WPT circuit and included Paul Maxfield, Hasan Habib, Full Tilt Poker pro Phil Ivey, John Phan (more commonly dubbed “The Razor”), and European Poker Tour Monte Carlo Grand Final winner Rob Hollink.
Fifth in chips with 445,000 is Kido Pham, who finished sixth in the World Championship of Pot Limit Omaha during the 2008 WSOP for $170,000. He landed in 41st in the 2008 WSOP Main Event for an additional $154,000. Pham won the Paris/Bally’s Las Vegas Circuit Event stop in 2005 for over $450,000 and finished as the runner up to Carlos Mortensen in the Doyle Brunson North American Poker Championship, a WPT event, during Season III for $496,000.
WPT coverage of the event on Monday noted that Clonie Gowen and Howard Lederer were seated at the same table. The significance is that Gowen is suing Full Tilt Poker alleging non-payment despite holding a percentage of ownership and Lederer, a Full Tilt pro, is named specifically in the case. However, as expected, no altercation took place. In fact, Gowen excelled during Day 2, finishing play with 430,000 chips, the sixth most in the room. Lederer holds the 108th largest chip stack at 77,200.
The seventh place stack at the Bellagio belongs to the most decorated man in poker: Ultimate Bet spokesperson Phil Hellmuth. “The Poker Brat,” as he is affectionately called by his peers, owns 412,800 chips. He’s an 11-time WSOP bracelet winner, the most ever, holding one more title than Doyle Brunson and Johnny Chan, who each have 10. Hellmuth’s record as being the youngest Main Event champion ever was recently overtaken by Peter Eastgate. Hellmuth was 24 when he won the 1989 Main Event; Eastgate was 22 in 2008.
Here are the top 10 chip stacks at the Bellagio entering Day 3:
1st: Justin Young, 552,900
2nd: Charles Kelley, 540,900
3rd: Evan Mcniff, 485,300
4th: Tuan Le, 480,000
5th: Kido Pham, 445,000
6th: Clonie Gowen, 430,000
7th: Phil Helmuth, 412,800
8th: Joseph McGowan, 346,800
9th: Scott Bohlman, 342,400
10th: Scott Dorin, 338,900
Other notables among the 139 players who remain include:
13th: David Beynamine, 313,600
14th: Barry Greenstein, 312,800
15th: Antonio Esfandiari, 309,000
17th: Dutch Boyd, 298,600
24th: Amit Makhija, 251,500
29th: Chino Rheem, 236,100
30th: Allen Cunningham, 231,800
34th: Robert Mizrachi, 224,100
40th: Hoyt Corkins, 209,800
47th: Nick Schulman, 195,000
52nd: Sorel Mizzi (Imper1um), 181,300
55th: Nam Le, 152,900
57th: Gabe Kaplan, 152,900
61st: Mike Matusow, 150,200
62nd: Humberto Brenes, 150,000
69th: Mike Sexton, 138,600
70th: Johnny Chan, 138,600
80th: Doyle Brunson, 118,000
81st: Roy Winston, 116,000
87th: Joe Hachem, 108,800
91st: Nenad Medic, 102,700
99th: Blair Hinkle, 88,900
103rd: Annie Duke, 85,200
108th: Howard Lederer, 77,200
110th: Michael Binger, 66,800
113th: Layne Flack, 63,900
114th: Andy Bloch, 60,900
115th: Liz Lieu, 60,800
121st: Kevin Saul (BeL0WaB0Ve), 50,700
127th: Tom Franklin, 42,700
129th: Scott Clements, 35,200
134th: David Sklansky, 29,400
137th: Eli Elezra, 27,100
139th: Marco Traniello, 17,100
Play resumes at 12:00pm local time on Tuesday. The average chip stack is 161,000 and the tournament will name a winner on Friday. We’ll have full updates for you from the Bellagio right here on Poker News Daily.
