Brock “t_soprano” Parker accomplished a seemingly unachievable goal Wednesday evening by winning the $2,500 Six-Handed No Limit Hold’em event at the World Series of Poker (WSOP) and picking up his second bracelet in just four days.
Parker bested a field of 1,068 players to win his first ever No Limit Hold’em event at the WSOP. He overcame a chip deficit to defeat Joe “floes” Serock heads up and take home another massive payday of $552,745. With the victory Parker has now staked his claim as the king of the short-handed events, as on June 8th he defeated PokerStars Team Pro Daniel Negreanu heads up to win the $2,500 Six-handed Limit event.
“I like to play more hands”, said Parker about his short-handed success. “Playing nine-handed is pretty boring. I guess Six-Handed gets me more motivated because I get to play in a lot of pots. It’s more fun.”
Parker, called an “online legend” by friend and fellow poker pro Alex Bortah, has been playing tournaments at the WSOP since 2004 but hadn’t made a No Limit final table until Wednesday. He considered himself a better Limit Hold’em player after having reached third final table last week but following his win last night he said he might put more time into No Limit Hold’em events in the future.
Youth is starting to become a theme at final tables of this year’s WSOP. Four of the top six finishers in the $2,500 Six Handed No Limit event were age 23 or under, including runner-up Joe Serock. The online heads-up specialist was the chip leader going into the final day but was terrorized by Parker in the format he knows best. Serock made several attempts to take pots away from Parker by three-betting preflop but Parker always came back with a four-bet, forcing Serock to fold. According to Joe he was card dead throughout most of the heads-up play.
When Serock finally did pick up a good hand it was trumped by Parker’s better hand. On the final hand of the tournament Serock raised to 200K at 40K/80K blinds and Parker reraised to 1 million. Serock moved all in and Parker quickly called:
Parker: [Qd][Qs]
Serock: [Td][Tc]
Parker’s hand held up as he made a set of queens on the river to capture the title. Serock was sent home with $341,783.
Online star Russell Crane took third place in the event for $220,633. After being short stacked for most of the day Crane moved all in over the top of a Serock raise with J-T and Serock called with A-9. Joe made two pair on the turn and was able to dodge a straight draw to send Crane to the rail.
Jesse Rios was the fourth place finisher when he got his entire stack in preflop with A-J against Parker’s A-Q. Parker’s hand held up and Rios, at age 33 the oldest player at the final table, left with $148,661. It was his fourth cash at this year’s World Series of Poker.
Alex Wilson (fifth place) and Clayton Newman (sixth place) were the other members of the final table. It took three hours to finally eliminate a short-stacked Newman, who moved all-in with pocket twos and was called by Jesse Rios with pocket tens.
Parker took over control of the WSOP Player of the Year lead with the victory and plans on playing Thursday’s $1,500 No Limit Event #24. “I’m excited for Player of the Year”, he said during a post-tournament interview. “I want to try for that, for sure. Especially now that they are making a big deal out of it.”
Here are the final results from the $2,500 Six-Handed No Limit Hold’em event:
1. Brock Parker – $552,745
2. Joe Serock – $341,783
3. Russell Crane – $220,633
4. Jesse Rios – $148,661
5. Alexander Wison – $104,323
6. Clayton Newman – $76,123
Two more bracelets will be awarded on Thursday as the $1,500 Pot Limit Hold’em and $3,000 HORSE events will play down to a winner. Twenty-one players are still alive in the $3,000 HORSE field, making for what should be a long day at the tables. Those remaining include Matt Hawrilenko, Chau Giang, Gavin Smith, Ylon Schwartz, and James Van Alstyne. They’re all chasing chip leader Zac Fellows, who goes into the final day with 470,000 chips. A first-place prize of $311,899 will be awarded to the winner of that event.
Stay tuned to Poker News Daily for updates on all of today’s events at the World Series of Poker.
