As if handing out two bracelets on Sunday wasn’t enough, the 2013 World Series of Poker had three other events going on Sunday. The “Millionaire Maker” still had a massive field to contend with and two other tournaments, another $1000 No Limit event and the Eight Game Mixed event, started off on their journeys to a champion.
Event #6 – $1500 No Limit Hold’em “Millionaire Maker” – Day Two
1481 players came back from the largest non-Championship Event field of 6343 entries to whittle the field down to a more reasonable number on Sunday. Coming into the day’s action, Ryan Welch held the lead but was facing challenges from a plethora of pros and amateurs alike. With the money bubble a distance off (the top 648 players would take down a payday), the players settled in for a long slog through another long day.
There were a host of notable names that didn’t even make it to that money bubble. Phil Hellmuth, Phil Ivey, T. J. Cloutier, Humberto Brenes, Erick Lindgren, Darryll Fish and Gavin Griffin all would fall within the first three hours of play but, even then, there were still 729 runners left in the tournament.
After the unfortunate 649th place finisher was determined at 6PM, the raucous “Millionaire Maker” field could celebrate their money finish before getting back to business. Jake Cody, Victor Ramdin, Dennis Phillips, Randy Lew, Matt Stout, John Hennigan and Bryn Kenney would all depart over the next eight hours, but a few notable names could find their place in the upper reaches of the leaderboard heading to Day Three today.
1. Andy Hwang, 912,000
2. Gary Friedlander, 837,000
3. Chris Hunichen, 586,000
4. Ben Chen, 495,000
5. Pedro Rios, 461,000
6. Andrew Badecker, 431,000
7. Mike Del Vecchio, 411,000
8. Jonathan Aguiar, 375,000
9. Ryan Welch, 346,000
10. Kevin Kung, 345,000
Hovering just outside of the Top Ten are players such as John Monnette (340K), Dan Kelly (277K), John Eames (210K) and Joe Kuether (190K).
134 players survived the carnage on Sunday to come back for Day Three this afternoon, where the players will attempt to get down to the final table. Up for grabs is the $1,199,104 first place prize, but we’re still a distance from that as of yet.
Event #7 – $1000 No Limit Hold’em – Day One
By the time late registration ended for Event #7 on Sunday, a whopping 1837 players had come to the felt, impressive considering the “Millionaire Maker” and its take of players just the day before. The damage done to the field through Day One brought the players to the money roughly a half hour before the close of action (198 players would be paid) and, by the end of the night, the field had dropped to only 148 contenders remaining.
According to the WSOP website, professional Eric Baldwin is currently at the head of the pack with his 121,000 in chips. There’s a long way to go, though, with the field arranged behind him as such:
1. Eric Baldwin, 121,000
2. Adam Geyer, 118,200
3. Annette Obrestad, 98,000
4. Nick Abourisk, 87,000
5. Jeff Fielder, 77,000
6. Daniel Makowsky, 74,000
7. Kevin Ho, 72,500
8. Michael Shelton, 72,000
9. Jose Manuel Nadal, 67,500
10. Paul Wasicka, 65,400
Everyone in action today is guaranteed a $2033 payday, but all eyes are on the top prize of $305,952 and, of course, the WSOP bracelet.
Event #8 – $2500 Eight Game Mixed – Day One
For those with no interest in trying to fade the huge Event #7 field (or more interested in a diversity of games), Event #8’s Eight Game Mixed format was the tournament for them. 388 players eventually would come to the tables for the event, setting up a prize pool of slightly more than $882,700, of which 40 players will share.
The player of the day was Eric Crain, who constantly moved his stack upwards as the hour grew later on Day One. By the end of the festivities for Event #8, Crain would be sitting on an impressive 69,925 to be the chip leader over the 192 remaining players as the tournament enters Day Two:
1. Eric Crain, 69,925
2. Michael Malm, 61,800
3. Neal Friets, 50,425
4. Marco Johnson, 46,825
5. WeiKai Chang, 44,150
6. Zimnan Ziyard, 42,475
7. Chris Tryba, 37,000
8. Andy Bloch, 36,525
9. Kyle Bowker, 36,000
10. Scott Seiver, 35,275
Erick Lindgren, Amnon Filippi, Josh Arieh, Paul Volpe and Chad Brown sit among those in the remainder of the Top 20, while such players as Jennifer Harman, Mike Matusow, Daniel Negreanu, Barry Greenstein and defending champion David “ODB” Baker will not be back for play on Monday (at least in this tournament).
Starting Today – Event #9 – $3000 No Limit Hold’em Shootout and Event #10 – $1500 Limit Hold’em
With three tournaments on tap for Monday action, the WSOP staff will also kick off two more tournaments. Event #9, the Shootout event, has been capped at 2000 players and probably won’t come close to that mark. Event #10 on the schedule, even with its Limit format, should draw well with the smaller buy in.
Hard to believe that, less than a week into the 2013 WSOP, we already have action in one-sixth of the schedule. That grind won’t let up either as the best in the world and those newcomers looking for WSOP glory vie for bracelets in the greatest tournament schedule in the world.
