Two Big Tournaments With Two Big Winners

The Jack Binion World Poker Open had 160 players pony up $10,000 each for the no-limit hold'em championship event. After a few days, the field was down to the final six players for the World Poker Tour filming. When the final six sat down, David "Devilfish" Ulliott had more than a $200,000 chip lead. Thus, everyone else was playing for second place unless he made some monumental mistakes. Devilfish played well, and got heads up with Phil Ivey. Of course, in no-limit hold'em, a huge chip lead means everything (unless I have it). Devilfish won $589,000 after beating a final table comprised of Phil Ivey, Johnny Davidson, Buddy Williams, Jeremy Tinsley, and Tommy Grimes. I would love to do an interview with Devilfish, but I would need a translator to help out, because I can't understand his English jargon. Congrats, Devil!

At Commerce Casino's L.A. Poker Classic, 415 players showed up for the $1,500 buy-in, $1 million-guaranteed limit hold'em event. After the first day, it seemed that everyone was playing for second place, because John Phan had one-sixth of the chips with 27 players left. As we all know, however, things can change quickly in tournaments. When it was all said and done, there were some great limit hold'em players at the final table, including Las Vegas high-limit star Jennifer Harmon, tournament phenom Paul Darden, John Phan, Kirk Conrad, Tommy Wang (one of the nicest guys in poker), Chris Bach, Ray Dehkharghani, and David "The Dragon" Pham. Ray Dehkharghani, who is definitely a great limit hold'em player, got heads up with David Pham, who had a great rush at the final table. David started off with a large chip lead, but Ray caught up after a while. After a long break, the players returned and the Dragon won almost every hand and was crowned king of limit hold'em. Nice win, David.

Don't forget to buy in to the $25,000 World Poker Tour championship at Bellagio before the end of the L.A. Poker Classic if you want to play in the WPT freeroll with all of the world champions and a few celebrities on Feb. 25. The World Poker Tour will be premiering on April 2 on the Travel Channel. This exposure to millions of people should be a boon to the poker industry.

On March 9, 2003, Hustler Casino will host a stud championship that will award the winner $1 million. The $125,000 buy-in will be the largest to date in tournament poker.*