Defeating a difficult final table, Makarios Avramidis emerged as the victor of the first event at the 2015 World Series of Poker Europe, the €2000 Six Handed No Limit Hold’em tournament, on Saturday night.
Six men (hence the name of the tournament) returned on Saturday to determine the champion of this event with Paul Michaelis, who won a bracelet in Las Vegas earlier this year ($1500 Pot Limit Hold’em), heading the pack by a wide margin. Holding more than a third of the chips on the table, Michaelis (670K) would face challenges from Ricardo Alvarado (435K) and Stephen Chidwick (354K), while Frederic Schwarzer (242), Avramidis (179K) and a short-stacked Marvin Rettenmaier (90K) rounded out the contenders.
Rettenmaier was game fighting off the short stack, getting a key double up through Chidwick just prior to the price of poker going up (Level 20, 4K/8K blinds, 1K ante), but just as he started to make a charge he got coolered. After upping the action out of the cutoff, Rettenmaier saw Michaelis three-bet him out of the big blind. Rettenmaier put his newfound chips from Chidwick at risk by moving all in and couldn’t have been happy that Michaelis quickly made the call. It was Rettenmaier’s pocket nines against Michaelis’ pocket Aces and, after an Ace on the flop, Rettenmaier was basically drawing dead. A Jack on the turn officially had Rettenmaier drawing dead as he left the table in sixth place.
That would be the highlight for Michaelis as his 800K chip stack would never grow bigger. Just before jumping to Level 21, Michaelis doubled up Chidwick, giving a strong player a new lease on life. Chidwick would use those chips to go against Alvarado in what would be an intriguing hand, coming down with what looked to be an innocent board of 6♠ 5♣ 2♥ Q♠ 10♠. Chidwick would move all in on the river representing the flush, but Alvarado didn’t believe him in making the call with his Q♦ 2♦. Chidwick didn’t have the flush but he did have the goods, turning up a Q♥ 5♥ for a better two pair to take the lead and knock out Alvarado in fifth place.
Chidwick, now holding about half the chips in play with his 1.03 million stack, got more aggressive on the felt as the afternoon wore on. He picked chips out of the stack of virtually every other player on the felt on his way to building up a 1.4 million stack but, after another level up, he too would falter. Doubling up Michaelis once and Schwarzer twice, Chidwick saw his stack reduced to 753K in rapid fashion. Instead of taking some time to regroup, Chidwick would continue to charge with disastrous results.
Chidwick dropped to 450K in chips in doubling up Michaelis again and sent a smaller stack of chips to him on the very next hand. The twosome would square off again on a third consecutive hand, with Michaelis opening on the button and Chidwick moving all in from the big blind. Michaelis made the call and showed Big Slick to go up against Chidwick’s Big Chick (A-Q); after the resulting A-7-6-4-4 board, Michaelis’ hand had stood up and Chidwick’s rapid descent sent him out of the tournament in fourth place.
Michaelis’ return to the top of the ladder didn’t appear to bode well for his opponents. Both Schwarzer (430K) and Avramidis (400K) didn’t appear to be well-stacked to take on Michaelis (1.17 million), but all it would take was one double up to change the game. That occurred when Michaelis and Avramidis got their chips in pre-flop, with Michaelis showing pocket tens and Avramidis opening up pocket Jacks. The Q-J-9 flop brought something for both men, but the Ace on the turn and the four on the river didn’t bring Michaelis back to pass Avramidis for the victory. After the hand, Avramidis took over the lead as Michaelis dropped to the short-stack.
After doubling up Avramidis, the news didn’t get any better for Michaelis. He would open the betting up and Schwarzer immediately came back at him with a three-bet. Michaelis popped his stack in the center and, just as vociferously, Schwarzer did the same. It was a repeat of the hand with Avramidis as Michaelis held the pocket tens again and Schwarzer this time held the Jacks. For a second time the Jacks held up on the Q-3-3-3-K board and Michaelis was gone in third place.
Despite going to heads up play at a 2:1 disadvantage, Avramidis wasted little time in seizing control of the match. Within 10 minutes he had worked his way into the lead over Schwarzer and, after another hour of work, Avramidis would complete the win. On the last hand, Avramidis opened up the betting and, after Schwarzer pushed all in, called with his leading A-6. Schwarzer had two live cards with his K-6, but it was worthless after an Ace came on the flop. Once the board failed to connect with Schwarzer on the turn, he was drawing dead as Avramidis, a Greek who resides in Germany, took home the championship.
1. Makarios Avramidis, €105,00
2. Frederic Schwarzer, €64,930
3. Paul Michaelis, €45,860
4. Stephen Chidwick, €32,600
5. Ricardo Alvarado, €23,310
6. Marvin Rettenmaier, €16,740
