Day 4 of the WSOP $50,000 Players ChampionshipWinner Will Take Home $1,559,043 |
|
There are few money bubbles in tournament poker bigger than the World Series of Poker $50,000 Players Championship. Squeak into the money and you are guaranteed $98,331. Fall short and you are left wondering what could have been.
A total of 21 of the world’s best players returned for day 4 action at the Rio’s Amazon Room, but only 16 would receive any monetary compensation for their efforts.
It took nearly an hour before the first player fell. Eli Elezra was short and got the rest of his chips in with second pair in a hand of limit hold’em. Daniel Alaei held top pair and Elezra failed to come from behind, ending his tournament run. Elezra was quickly followed by James Van Alstyne and Erik Seidel, who both failed to get anything going in the stud rounds.
The next elimination was particularly brutal, when David Singer made a king-high spade flush in his first five cards in stud, only to see Mikael Thuritz hit running diamonds to best him with an ace-high diamond flush. All of sudden, the players were on the bubble.
Kirk Morrison was short and found himself all in against Alaei in a hand of stud eight-or-better. Alaei started with sevens in the hole and made jacks up by seventh street. Morrison held sixes and needed to trip up, catch an ace, queen or low card to stay alive. Instead, he bricked out to make him the official bubble boy for this year’s tournament.
After a very small celebration by the seasoned group of pros still remaining, they focused on the matter at hand of making the final table of eight.
Short stacked Andy Bloch quickly found himself all in, but he couldn’t overcome Vladimir Schmelev’s rolled up treys. Schmelev continued to rack up the knockouts when he cracked fellow Russian Ilya Bulychev’s aces in pot-limit Omaha. Then he made it three in a row when he caught trip threes to eliminate Allen Bari in limit hold’em.
With only 13 players remaining, Brett Richey made his move in pot-limit Omaha, only to run into Michael Mizrachi’s single-suited aces. The Grinder flopped a flush and Richey was shown the exit.
Mizrachi’s momentum continued with Lyle Berman’s elimination, marking easily the most exciting hand of the night. Berman limped under the gun and Mizrachi reraised to 108,000 from the button. Berman called and the flop came down A
J 6
.
Berman checked and Mizrachi bet the pot. Berman repotted all in and Mizrachi made the easy call with A
A 5 4 for top set. Berman showed 7 7 6 6
for bottom set, but caught the one-outer 6 on the turn to make quads.
Mizrachi was temporarily stunned, but he jumped from his seat when the case A hit the river. An ecstatic Michael quickly ran over to the next table to tell his brother Robert Mizrachi about the hand as the room quietly began to consider the possibility of a brother vs. brother showdown.
After Abe Mosseri was eliminated in 11th palce, it was just a matter of getting rid of the short stacks. Alexander Kostritsyn fought hard, but was forced to make a move in no-limit hold’em, running right into John Juanda in the blinds, who made trips to bring on the final table bubble.
Both Nick Schulman and David Oppenheim were very short and the rest of the table spent some time waiting for one of them to make their move. Schulman was the victim, getting it in with a small pair against Juanda’s up and down low straight draw in stud eight-or-better. Sixth street killed the suspense when Juanda locked up both halves of the pot and the final table was set.
Here are the final table chip counts:
Seat 1 — David Baker — 3,095,000
Seat 2 — Mikael Thuritz — 2,300,000
Seat 3 — Vladimir Schmelev — 1,925,000
Seat 4 — John Juanda — 2,620,000
Seat 5 — Daniel Alaei — 1,705,000
Seat 6 — Michael Mizrachi — 2,175,000
Seat 7 — David Oppenheim — 460,000
Seat 8 — Robert Mizrachi — 3,125,000
Card Player will be bringing you live updates and results straight from the final table, which begins at 3 p.m. Join us then to see who will take down the $50,000 Players Championship.
Copyright © 2001-2024
CardPlayer.com. All rights reserved.
