Daniel ‘djk123’ Kelly Wins WSOP $25,000 Six-Handed No-Limit Hold’em Title

The inaugural $25,000 six-handed no-limit hold’em event at the 2010 World Series of Poker was a sign of the times in poker. Shorthanded events have grown in popularity in recent years, and six-handed no-limit hold’em events have been a part of the WSOP schedule since 2005. The $25,000 price tag marks another trend aimed at professionals; one-fifth of all WSOP tournaments now come with a buy-in of at least $10,000.

The tournament attracted 191 players, and the total prize pool tipped the scales at $4,536,250. The first-place prize of $1,315,518 marked the second time this summer that more than a million dollars was up for grabs for first place; the first time was in the $50,000 Players Championship.

Two things were apparent when the tournament began. The first was that the most popular and successful players in the game had flocked to the event, as expected, and many of them were the youngest players in the game. Young online players have been partly responsible for the growth of shorthanded poker, thanks to its aggressive nature, so it came as no surprise that when a winner was crowned after four days of play, he was just 21 years of age.

Days 1-3: Big Chip Swings Define Fast Play

The first day of the tournament acted like a wrecking ball for the initial field. Despite a huge starting stack of 75,000 in chips, more than half the field busted out. At the closing bell, just 78 players remained. Daniel Negreanu captured the headlines, finishing close to the chip lead, but he was joined at the top by 2010 double-bracelet winner Frank Kassela and young Internet professional Dan Kelly, who started their journeys to the final table with early success. The second day of action featured more fast play, and the field reached the money when strong 2010 WSOP performer John Juanda was the unfortunate bubble boy, busting out in 19th place.

Bryn Kenney dominated day 2, amassing a chip stack of 2.4 million when his next-closest competitor held just shy of 1.5 million. Kassela and Negreanu stayed near the top of the leader board, while Kelly plummeted, ending the day with the shortest stack left in play, 260,000 when the blinds were 10,000-20,000 with a 3,000 ante.

That all changed for Kelly on day 3. During one of the shortest tournament days of the entire WSOP, which saw the field shrink to the final half-dozen from the 18 who entered the starting gates, Kelly showed his skill by storming back to take the chip lead. He scored an early double-up, and then poured on the aggression. He really gained momentum when he took out former chip leader Kenney near the end of the day. Kelly held J-9 with a 9-6-2 board that had two clubs. Kenney had the J 10, and after the turn and river both bricked, Kenney busted out and Kelly was well on his way to ending day 3 with 5,895,000 of the 14.3 million in chips in play. Using the stark truth of statistics to highlight this accomplishment says it best. Kelly started the day with 1.8 percent of the chips in play, and now was headed to the final table with 41 percent of the chips.

Final Table: The Young Gun Tops the Record Chasers

The final-table seat positions and chip counts were as follows:

Leading the chase to catch Kelly at the beginning of the final table was Kassela. He was in the market for his third bracelet of the summer after winning event No. 15 ($10,000 seven-card stud eight-or-better) and event No. 40 ($2,500 razz), and he had the chips (2,610,000) to make a run at the three-peat; the only player besides himself and Kelly to hold at least 2 million in chips was Shawn Buchanan. The three did well with their large chip stacks, and were the last three players standing after Eugene Katchalov (sixth place – eliminated by Kelly), Mikael Thuritz (fifth place – eliminated by Kelly), and Jason Somerville (fourth place – eliminated by Buchanan) busted out.

Each of the final three stood to make his mark on the 2010 WSOP with a victory, but for different reasons. Kassela was chasing his three-peat, while Buchanan was facing a trifecta with a much more dubious distinction. His appearance at this final table was his third of the summer, but in each previous case, he had fallen short of a victory. He already was assured of his eighth cash of the summer, which put him just two short of Nikolay Evdakov’s all-time record for most cashes in a single WSOP. Kelly, on the other hand, was looking to make a statement in the live-tournament arena at a young age.

At just over 21 years of age, Kelly was set to become the youngest winner of a WSOP event with a buy-in of more than $10,000, but no one was surprised. He has won multiple titles online while playing as “djk123,” and he finished in 10th place in the Card Player 2009 Online Player of the Year race. A victory here would just reaffirm his skill to the online-poker community, and announce his presence on the live-tournament scene in the loudest way possible. He was hardly intimidated by the pressure. Just a few weeks earlier, he had made the $50,000 Players Championship his first WSOP event ever, which is akin to a pitcher in the major leagues making his first start take place in the World Series or the All-Star game.

Soon after three-handed play began, Buchanan built on the momentum that he had after eliminating Somerville in fourth place, as he knocked out Kassela in third place. He moved all in with 6-5 on a Q-4-3-10 board, and Kassela made the call with Q-3. A deuce on the river gave Buchanan the straight, and he took a slight chip lead into heads-up play against Kelly.

Shawn Buchanan: 7,870,000
Dan Kelly: 6,460,000

Kelly took initial control in the heads-up battle, and after winning a few pots, his stack had grown to 8.6 million. That was when one of the most dramatic hands of this year’s Series took place.

Kelly raised to 200,000 preflop from the button, and Buchanan three-bet to 650,000 from the big blind. Kelly four-bet to 1,425,000, and Buchanan moved all in. Kelly made the call and turned over the A 10, while Buchanan revealed the J J. The flop came 6 4 3, keeping Buchanan in the lead. The turn was the 5, and Kelly gained some outs for a chop. However, he did better than a chop on the river when the A hit the table, giving him the title and $1,315,518.

Kelly already has amassed millions in tournament earnings online, and his first live cash took his total career tournament earnings up to $3,983,036. Buchanan racked up another impressive performance that earned him respect in the poker community, and he continues to quietly build his career list of accomplishments. The runner-up prize of $812,941 gives Buchanan a total of $4,019,080 in tournament earnings for his career.

Kelly also cemented a place in the “Brunson 10” after the win. There was competition among David Sands, Faraz Jaka, Michael Martin, and Kelly during this year’s WSOP to see who would be the next member of the DoylesRoom.net team of online superstars. Kelly is now officially the newest member of that team.

Kelly has a promising poker career ahead of him, but that has not interfered with his studies at Villanova University. He just completed his junior year; his major is mechanical engineering. “I’m going to graduate and use that as my backup,” said Kelly. His parents initially were not enthusiastic about him playing poker. But, Kelly has performed well in school despite his rise in the poker world, and the fact that he has earned large sums of money playing poker doesn’t hurt, either.

Although his answers during the post-tournament interview were short, you could see that he was excited, and as one might expect from a player so young, he was just trying to wrap his mind around what he had just accomplished. “Hopefully, I can keep winning bracelets; it’s amazing that I’ve already won one. This definitely exceeds my expectations, winning one,” said Kelly. “It’s a mixture of being shocked and excited. I’m shocked and surprised, more than anything.”

Lurking just below the surface of that shock was a distinct level of confidence. One doesn’t make his first WSOP event the $50,000 Players Championship unless he is supremely confident in his skill, and his first WSOP win doesn’t come in a $25,000 buy-in tournament unless he has the skill to warrant that confidence. “I definitely thought I could win, or I wouldn’t be playing. But you can’t expect to win a tournament, even if you play perfectly. This field is tough when you go deep, and this definitely exceeds my expectations,” said Kelly.

There is really just one thing left for Kelly to achieve after a win like this, and he made that clear in answer to the simple question of what he would like to do next was asked. “Win the main event, I guess,” said Kelly. There isn’t a 21-year-old in poker who has a better shot than he does at accomplishing just that.

Final-Table Results:

With a Sponsorship on the Line, Dan Kelly Leaves No Doubt
Big Win Distances Him From Three Other Top-Tier Competitors

By Stephen A. Murphy

It’s difficult for an online poker site to reintroduce itself to the poker community these days. Most players have found a site they are comfortable on, and most of the well-known “ESPN pros” have long been taken by other sites with sponsorship deals.

DoylesRoom decided to go a different direction, and it’s paying off. Instead of trying to stack itself with players whose credentials consist of just TV time, the site decided to focus its energy on assembling a team of the most successful online poker players.

Handpicked by Doyle Brunson himself, DoylesRoom’s aptly named “Brunson 10” quickly found its first six members: Zachary “CrazyZachary” Clark, Amit “amak316” Makhija, Chris “moorman1” Moorman, Dani “ansky” Stern, and the last two Card Player Online Player of the Year winners, Alex “AJKHoosier1” Kamberis and Steve “gboro780” Gross.

This summer, DoylesRoom raised the stakes. Instead of simply choosing its seventh member, the site decided to allow four elite players to compete for it during its “Become a Legend” competition. Whoever had the best 2010 World Series of Poker would become the seventh member of the Brunson 10.

Three 25-year-olds — David Sands, Faraz Jaka, and Michael Martin — were selected for the competition, along with 21-year-old Dan Kelly.

Despite their youth, these players had already posted impressive results, both online and in the live arena. Sands (nearly $2.4 million in career tournament winnings) has been an absolute beast online, winning no fewer than 10 online tournaments that paid out a minimum of $37,000 each, with a couple of them in the six figures.  Jaka (nearly $4.3 million) has made the transition to the live arena quite well, making final tables in the WPT Bellagio Cup, a $5,000 WSOP event, and the Doyle Brunson Championship, and winning an event at the L.A. Poker Classic.

Martin’s ($4.1 million) biggest claim to fame was winning the EPT London main event, for $1.7 million, but he has two other half-million dollar scores — a runner-up finish in the Master Classics of Poker in Holland and a sixth-place finish in the 2008 EPT Grand Final. Because of his age, Kelly (nearly $4.6 million) hasn’t had as many opportunities as his competitors to rack up live scores before this summer, but that hasn’t stopped him from racking up seven $50,000-plus scores in his online career, including a fourth-place finish in the World Championship of Online Poker main event, for $643,200.

Sands and Jaka quickly jumped out to an early lead in the competition. Jaka cashed for $16,607 in a $5,000 shootout event, then made it to the quarterfinals — the equivalent of a final table — of the prestigious $10,000 heads-up championship, for an additional $92,580. Sands went deep in two huge fields — finishing 69th out of 3,289 players in a $1,000 event, and 18th out of 2,394 players in a $1,500 event.

Kelly, playing in his first World Series, tallied three cashes in $1,500 events, but failed to make it close to a final table, busting out in 33rd, 50th, and 62nd places. In the final week of the Series, he trailed both Jaka and Sands in the competition. But, thanks to the $25,000 six-max event, considered to be one of the most prestigious and one of the toughest events on the WSOP schedule this year, that soon would change.

The college student dominated the elite field and wrapped up the DoylesRoom challenge.

“They had told me before the Series that if I won [an event], I definitely would become a Brunson 10 member,” Kelly told Card Player.

Brunson left no doubt about it when he tweeted during Kelly’s deep run: “An aspiring Brunson 10 member, Daniel Kelly, is the monstrous chip leader in the 25K with almost 6 million. If he wins, he will be a Brunson 10.”

With the win, Kelly solidified his spot in the Brunson 10 and could say only good things about his new team.

“It feels really good. I know the guys who are already in there, and they’re all really good. I’m looking forward to joining them.”

Even before Kelly’s massive score, DoylesRoom representatives were having a very successful World Series.

Besides the success of those trying to earn their way into the Brunson 10, Allen Kessler cashed eight times during the 2010 WSOP to rake in nearly $400,000 while wearing a DoylesRoom patch.

Brunson 10 members Makhija and Stern both won six figures at the World Series, while every other member of the team cashed in at least one event.

Dan Kelly Punishes Final-Table Opposition With the Big Stack

By Julio Rodriguez

Away from the table, Dan Kelly sports a friendly smile and diminutive stature, but on the felt, the 21-year-old professional is nothing short of a beast. Going to the final table of the World Series of Poker $25,000 six-handed no-limit hold’em championship, Kelly had more than 40 percent of the chips in play.

With huge six-figure pay jumps on the line, Kelly simply could have waited out his opponents in order to lock up at least a third-place payday. Instead, he kept his foot on the gas, putting the other players to the test and ultimately guaranteeing himself a say-so in the final outcome.

Despite being the youngest player in the field, not many would argue that Kelly wasn’t one of the more experienced players in the tournament. Even the other online professionals who made the money — such as Justin Bonomo, Isaac Haxton, Bryn Kenney, Mikael Thuritz, and Jason Somerville — can’t hold a candle to the number of hands the Villanova University student has seen in his short career. Kelly holds online titles in H.O.R.S.E., razz, and pot-limit Omaha, but it’s no-limit hold’em where he really shines, having more than $2 million in tournament earnings prior to his victory.

From the very first hand of the final table, Kelly made it his priority to establish himself as the table captain. Even with a short stack sitting to his left, he wasn’t afraid to raise with marginal hands in an effort to take down the mounting blinds and antes and add to his fortress of chips. It was his preflop aggression that saw him score his first knockout after Eugene Katchalov made his final push with pocket sixes. Kelly made the priced-in call with the Q J, and connected on both the flop and turn to boost himself over the 6 million mark.

He continued to raise at nearly every opportunity, and at one point had to show down 8 high after firing two barrels against Shawn Buchanan, who called him down with third pair. You’d think that would have ruined his credibility, but Kelly was able to force the second-biggest stack, Frank Kassela, to make a huge laydown.

Kassela had begun to take a few stands against the raise-happy Kelly, three-betting him from the blinds in an effort to slow him down. Kelly opened for 125,000, and Kassela reraised to 475,000. Either he didn’t give Kassela credit for a hand or he knew that he’d be unwilling to gamble so early at the final table, but Kelly decided to move in, forcing Kassela to fold his A K faceup on the table.

After eliminating Thuritz, Kelly was suddenly over the 7.5 million mark, holding nearly half of the chips in play. Buchanan made things interesting by taking out Somerville, leaving himself virtually tied with Kassela three-handed, but the similar stacks gave Kelly the upper hand, enabling him to play his two opponents against each other.

It wasn’t long before Buchanan made a stand, getting it in with an open-end straight draw against Kassela’s top and bottom pair. The river gave Buchanan a straight, and all of a sudden, Kelly wasn’t atop the leader board any longer.

Kelly quickly remedied the situation with rivered trips to take back the chip lead. The blinds were at a manageable level, and many feared that the heads-up duel would last hours. Instead, it was Kelly’s first misstep of the final table that led to a quick ending.

The hand looked more like it was played out online than live, when Kelly opened for 200,000 and Buchanan three-bet him to 650,000. Kelly decided to four-bet to 1,425,000, and Buchanan wasted no time in moving all in for almost 5 million. Kelly made a somewhat loose call with the A 10, and saw that he was behind to Buchanan’s pocket jacks. Nonetheless, the board came 6 4 3 5 A, giving Kelly a dramatic win in the hand, ending the tournament for his first WSOP gold bracelet.