Legends of Poker Day 3 RecapJoe Sebok Rises to the Top |
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Fifty-three players returned for their third day of play, but only 45 would leave the Bicycle Casino with something to show for their efforts. After half an hour of quiet, methodical play around the money bubble, the action opened up and the players started dropping quickly.
The bubble would burst after only a few rounds of hand-for-hand play. The action moved around to Steve Kerman in the small blind, who pushed all in for $72,000. Joe Sebok insta-called and had Kerman outchipped by only a few thousand. Kerman showed Q 10 and Sebok showed pocket aces. The flop came Q J 9 giving Kerman several outs, but the turn and river came 6 4, making Kerman the unfortunate bubble boy.
Once the bubble burst, the eliminations came at a rapid rate and many well-known professionals were among the casualties, including David Daneshgar (45th), Josh Arieh (44th), Minh "PokerHost" Nguyen (41st), and Steve Brecher (37th).
Anna Wroblewski, the lone remaining female participant, ran into some bad luck to finish in 42nd place. She raised from late position to $24,000 and Brian Powell moved all in from the button for $165,000. Wroblewski called all in with K K and Powell showed A 10. The board came A A 7 Q 3, and Powell flopped trip aces to eliminate Wroblewski. As she started to collect her things she said, "I never win with that hand."
With four tables left, Barry Greenstein and Joe Sebok were moved to the same table. But the father-son final table wasn't mean to be when Greenstein was eliminated in 31st place. Greenstein raised to $25,000 from the cutoff and Gavin Griffin reraised to $75,000 from the button. Greenstein called all in showing Q J and Griffin showed 10 10. The board came A A 2 A K and Sebok was left fatherless at the table.
Other notables to finish in the money included David Chiu (35th), Justin "looshle" Pechie (34th), Jordan "iMsoLucky0" Morgan (33rd), Dutch Boyd (30th), Peter "number1pen" Neff (29th), "Miami" John Cernuto (27th), and Adam "Csimmsux" Geyer (24th).
Gavin Griffin had an up-and-down day. After eliminating Captain Tom Franklin, Griffin had a massive chip lead on the rest of the field. But Griffin got unusually cold-decked to drop down to one of the short stacks. As the day wound down, Griffin pushed all in for his last $95,000 from under the gun, and Joe Sebok moved all in behind him. Griffin tabled K3 but was dominated by Sebok's A K. The board ran out A 5 2 8 8, and Sebok's hand held up to put him over the $1 million mark. Griffin was sent to the rail in 20th place.
Eighteen players will return tomorrow to battle down to a sixhanded World Poker Tour final table. Here are the remaining players and their chip counts:
Table 13
Seat 1 - Mike Jung - $191,000
Seat 2 - Thu Nguyen - $490,000
Seat 3 - Franco Brunetti - $218,000
Seat 4 - Mike McClain - $684,000
Seat 5 - Lee Markholt - $873,000
Seat 6 - Raymond Davis - $539,000
Seat 7 - Brian Powell - $248,000
Seat 8 - Shi Jia Liu - $476,000
Seat 9 - Joe Sebok - $1,057,000
Table 17
Seat 1 - Peter Feldman - $853,000
Seat 2 - Dan Harrington - $370,000
Seat 3 - Robert Goldfarb - $296,000
Seat 4 - David Pham - $1,007,000
Seat 5 - Don Zewin - $378,000
Seat 6 - Sean McCabe - $183,000
Seat 7 - Wayne Chang - $281,000
Seat 8 - Tom Schneider - $803,000
Seat 9 - Billy Pilossoph - $788,000
Come back to CardPlayer.com and WorldPokerTour.com at 2 p.m. for all your live updates, chip counts, photos, videos, and favorite player pro blogs.