- Highlights of the action from today’s WSOP.
Event #61: $10,000 Seven Card Stud
The Seven Card Stud championship event produced another experienced final table—although Dr Steven Landfish provided one amateur representative, and Henry Orenstein, despite being a member of the Poker Hall of Fame, could be considered a second.
Phil Hellmuth put himself in position to take a shot at the bracelet, but faded in 6th place, and the battle for first came down to Matt Grapenthien and Todd Brunson.
Todd’s father Doyle Brunson supported from the rail in hopes his son would win a second WSOP bracelet.
The heads up session lasted almost four hours and saw the chip lead switch six times, before Grapenthien finally closed out the tournament, taking his first bracelet and $268k for first place.
Brunson tweeted his congratulations via Bill Chen.
Event #60: $1,500 No-Limit Hold’em
A long—and at times tentative—heads up battle remains in progress to decide the bracelet and first prize money of $614k in Event #60.
The 2,563 starters produced a final pairing of Salman Jaddi and Brandon Hall. After three and a half hours, the two were offered the option of another hour’s play to see if a winner could be determined, but both agreed to get some rest before resuming play for Day 4 of this three day event.
Jaddi has the chip led with 6.8 million ships, but Hall is not far behind with 4.8 million.
Brandon Hall has the most big game experience, with his largest cash being $750k for winning the 2009 UltimateBet Aruba Poker Classic. He has also posted five cashes so far in this year’s WSOP.
Jaddi has two previous WSOP cashes, but has achieved most of his tournament success locally in Florida.
Cherish Andrews came close to giving the ladies another WSOP bracelet, with a fifth place finish, her second final table in two years at the $1.5k No Limit Hold’em bracelet events.
Zachary Gruneberg’s third place finish puts his winnings for the 2014 WSOP over the half million mark after four cashes, three of which were top ten finishes.
Event #62: $1,111,111 The Little One for One Drop
The second entry flight of the charity event, The Little One for One Drop, raised the number of entries to just shy of 4,500—down 250 from last year. $499,056 of the entry fees is going to the One Drop charity.
Re-buys and re-entries meant that the field consisted of 2,181 players in total. 887 remain to go into Day 2.
The chip leader from the second flight is Austrian Gerald Karlic, an experienced player on the European circuit, but he has yet to cash in a WSOP event.
Antonio Esfandiari, Allen Kessler, Chino Rheem, Annette Obrestad and Jennifer Tilly have all gone through to Day 2 with large stacks.
The prize pool has now gone firm at a little under $2 million. First place will pay $637k with 468 places paid in total.
Event #63: $1,500 10-Game Mix Six Handed
The 10-Game Mix event is down to the final nine players after a late night saw players of the quality of Allen Cunningham bite the dust in the closing stages.
New Zealander Jan Suchanek takes the chip lead going into the final day, but Bryn Kenney is in second place, poised to make his third final table of the 2014 WSOP.
Kenney has made many close runs at a bracelet, but as yet, the prize has eluded him. Randy Ohel—fourth in chips—won a bracelet in the 2012 WSOP and he also has a second place finish in this year’s $10k H.O.R.S.E Event#22.
Brandon Shack-Harris managed another cash, finishing in 21st place—just enough to put him at the top of this year’s WSOP Player of the Year leaderboard.
Event #64: $10,000 Pot-Limit Omaha
The $10k Omaha event has almost $4 million of prize money on offer after 418 players paid the entry fee.
The field is jam packed with every big name not actually still playing an earlier event. Daniel Negreanu continues his bracelet hunt, and although Phil Hellmuth had a similar plan, it didn’t work out too well.
The event was the last of the day to finish play, leaving 118 players still holding chips for the start of Day 2.
Dykshteyn Ruslan is top of the chip leaderboard after Day 1, with many solid players still in the field.
JC Tran, David Williams, Alex Kravchenko, and Sam Trickett all have good size stacks and the skill and will to survive through to the final table.
