It’s a very surreal setting in the Bellagio poker room. We have star-studded pros like Erik Seidel and Daniel Negreanu seated in the high-limit room in the rear of the casino’s poker room vying for millions of dollars. Meanwhile, just a few feet from them, a bevy of “Average Joes” are competing for low- and high-stakes pots alike.
The action kicked off around 12:10pm local time here in Las Vegas on Day 2 of the $100,000 World Poker Tour (WPT) Super High Roller Event. The tournament drew 29 players in the post-Black Friday era and, as Day 2 began, 17 remained in contention. Many I’ve talked to believe that if this tournament were to have been held pre-Black Friday, it would have fetched at least 50 players.
Daniel Negreanu was the first player to arrive this morning, showing up at about 11:45am and immediately taking a seat alongside the Royal Flush Girls, who were here en masse and huddled around a poker table in the high-limit room. Negreanu, not wearing a PokerStars patch and instead dressed in an array of green and blue clothing, proceeded to break out his iPad 2 and begin checking Twitter.
Eugene Katchalov came out on the short end of a race with A-K against Negreanu’s pocket sixes for his tournament life and was the first player eliminated today. In fact, Sam Trickett, who is wearing a Titan Poker logo, didn’t even arrive in time to see Katchalov go out. Instead, Trickett showed up 20 minutes after the opening gun.
Former WPT Championship winner Yevgeniy “Jovial Gent” Timoshenko was the next player to be eliminated. Timoshenko also came out on the losing end of a race, this time with pocket eights against Full Tilt Poker pro Erick Lindgren’s A-9. Lindgren and Erik Seidel are both wearing Full Tilt patches despite the site not having paid back players post-Black Friday.
Former “High Stakes Poker” host Gabe Kaplan doubled up through Seidel before being knocked out in 15th place. Kaplan ran kings into aces in an unfortunate cooler and could not draw out. By the way, the top five players will land in the money in this tournament, with nearly $1.1 million on the line for the winner.
Gregory Brooks and John Morgan were the next two players to find their way to the rail. Brooks was all-in from the button with A-Q and received a caller in Seidel, who looked up him with K-5 offsuit from the big blind. The flop came king-high and there was no catching up for Brooks, who departed in 13th place.
Then, Morgan moved all-in on a board of Q-9-9-K-3 and showed K-J for kings-up. However, Day 2 chip leader Justin Bonomo flipped up 9-8 for trips and Morgan was headed into the Bellagio poker room in 12th place.
Dan Shak ran jacks-up into queens-up to end his day in 11th place and the field was condensed into one table of 10. Rick Solomon then pushed all-in with A-K on a flop of K-3-3, but Seidel called and turned over A-3 for trips. The board finished out 9-10 and Shak was sent packing.
We just took a break and now we’re back on here at the Bellagio. WPT officials are busy setting up the Fontana Lounge for tomorrow’s WPT Championship final table, which will be televised on Fox Sports Net in the United States. Meanwhile, the Super High Roller Event is scheduled to play down to a winner today, although tournament officials have reserved the right to add on an extra day if needed. As it stands, we’re nine-handed at 2:30pm local time.
Stay tuned to Poker News Daily for the latest WPT headlines.