The PokerStars Spring Championship of Online Poker (SCOOP) is seven days into its fortnight of tournaments and Jason Mercier has been the dominant force of the event so far.
It isn’t just No Limit Texas Hold’em that Mercier has been showing his proclivities but a wide array of games. On back-to-back days last week, one of the United States’ best players would earn two of his championships in the $2000 Badugi and the $2000 No Limit Draw events, but only beat approximately 100 players in achieving those two titles. Over the past weekend, however, Mercier added a third title to his resume in this year’s event under much tougher circumstances.
Battling through a 398 player field, Mercier was one of the 16 men to emerge on the second day of the $2000 Four-Handed No Limit Hold’em event. Facing off (and knocking off) other online foes such as Calvin ‘cal42688’ Anderson, Griffin ‘Flush_Entity’ Benger and Tom ‘hitthehole’ Middleton, Mercier drew closer and closer to his third SCOOP title of 2015. Mercier would make the official final table with Anderson, Ryan ‘HITTHEPANDA’ Franklin and ‘TransSib.’
Coming in on the short stack, ‘TransSib’ was the first to depart the final table in fourth place, leaving the remaining trio of men to square off for the crown. An extended fight between Anderson and Mercier saw Mercier gradually take over the lead from Anderson, while Franklin kept himself in the game with some timely moves. The tournament would eventually see Anderson coming up on the wrong end of a situation, losing his final chips with a K-Q to Mercier’s pocket Kings, to depart in third place.
Sitting nearly even in chips, Mercier and Franklin paused the tournament and discussed a deal for the remaining $330,000-plus in money left on the table. After working out the details, the twosome decided that Mercier would take down a minimum $170,457 for his two days of work and Franklin picking up $152,789. Leaving $8000 and the overall title on the table, Mercier and Franklin continued the fight.
Almost as soon as they restarted the tournament, each man found a hand he could comfortable end the tournament with and put the chips at risk. After a five-bet pre-flop all-in from Mercier, Franklin called off his stack and showed a pocket pair of tens that were greatly ahead of Mercier’s pocket nines. A 3-J-A flop didn’t change anything, but the nine on the turn completely shifted the situation into Mercier’s favor. Now looking for one of the two tens left in the deck, Franklin instead saw a five complete the board to seal Mercier’s third SCOOP championship.
1. Jason Mercier, $178,457*
2. Ryan ‘HITTHEPANDA’ Franklin, $152,789*
3. Calvin ‘cal42688’ Anderson, $68,408
4. ‘TransSib’, $42,315
* – indicates final table deal
It has also been a decent run for Anderson during the 2015 SCOOP. Coming into this year’s schedule of events, Anderson was tied with Shaun Deeb for the most SCOOP titles in the event’s history. During the first week of the 2015 SCOOP, Anderson broke that tie in the $2000 Stud tournament, chopping up the remaining prize money with Dan ‘djk123’ Kelly before motoring to the Stud championship. Former European Poker Tour Grand Final champion Nicolas Chouity, former World Champion Joe Cada, Jon Turner, Dylan Linde, Stephen Chidwick, Andrey Zaichenko and Deeb are some other notable pros who have earned some cash in being at the final table in the first week worth of tournaments.
With its triple tiered system of tournaments – which means that there are three different buy in levels (low, medium and high) to offer something for every player and their bankroll – the SCOOP event has always proven to be one of the more exciting times in online poker. There is also still a huge portion of the $40 million in guaranteed prize pools still available, including the $10,000 Main Event (with a $1 million guarantee for the champion) on the High Bankroll side and the $109 Main Event (with $100,000 guaranteed for its victor) on the Low Bankroll side beginning on May 24. Even though winning one of these tournaments would be exceptional, it will be tough to top Mercier’s trio of victories in one of online poker’s premiere events.
