The World Poker Tour was back in action Sunday with the first of two starting flights of the WPT Borgata Poker Open Main Event in Atlantic City. This $3,300 + $200 No-Limit Hold’em tournament has a $3 million guaranteed prize pool and will pay down to 120 places if its field reaches the same size as last year’s. Taking the lead after Day 1A is Shannon Shorr with 189,000 chips.
Now, if the WPT Borgata Poker Open is to hit the marks of last year, it is going to take a huge Day 1B on Monday. The 2014 WPT Borgata Poker Open attracted 1,226 entrants and with just 292 signing up on Sunday, Day 1B is going to have to be about a thousand strong to reach last year’s level.
Shannon Shorr is not a name that casual poker fans likely know, but they should. In live tournaments alone, he was won nearly $6 million, according to TheHendonMob.com. He is coming off a summer in which he cashed eight times at the World Series of Poker, including one final table. Interestingly, despite all of his live tourney success, he has never won a WSOP bracelet or a WPT title. That’s not to say he hasn’t come close, though. He finished as a runner-up in a WSOP event in 2008, third in 2012, and has a number of other final tables at both the WSOP and on the World Poker Tour (included a runner-up finish). Shorr’s biggest cash in his career was for nearly $1 million when he won the $10,000 Bellagio Cup II in 2006.
The WPT has been hyping this tournament online, as well. This is one of the few that can reasonably take advantage of online poker to increase interest and player counts. As the Borgata is in New Jersey, its online poker room, BorgataParty.com, has been running satellites for players to gain entry into the Main Event. On Sunday, it held two super satellites that awarded one in every ten players a seat into Day 1B. Even for those who missed out, though, there are still satellites for the final events of the Borgata Poker Open and it looks like they won’t be heavily populated, so they could be good opportunities to win a seat on the cheap.
Today’s Day 1B is already underway, likely to the dismay of night-owl poker players. It is not every day you see a tournament begin at 11:00am. Fortunately for the day’s survivors (there were 126 from Day 1A), subsequent days don’t start until noon at the earliest.
2015 World Poker Tour Borgata Poker Open Main Event – Day 1A Chip Leaders
1. Shannon Shorr – 189,000
2. Cong Pham – 172,800
3. Maurice Hawkins – 172,200
4. Paul Volpe – 171,900
5. Yong Feng – 170,600
6. Mike Linster – 152,800
7. Iverson Snuffer – 152,700
8. Blake Bohn – 149,900
9. Alexander Turgansky — 145,900
10. Olivier Busquet — 142,000
