WSOP: $10,000 World Championship of PLHE Day 2

On day two of the 2008 World Series of Poker, the remaining 70 players in the largest pot-limit hold’em event of the year returned to battle down to the final table, but first they were faced with the small task of making the money.

Meanwhile, taking up the remaining 200 or so tables in the room was “the fourth largest tournament in history,” as day 1A of the $1,500 no-limit hold’em tournament began. Registration is still open for day 1B, but the latest estimations have put the entrant count near 4,000. Play in that event moved dangerously fast, and as a result tournament officials were forced to stop play with 225 players remaining just before 11 p.m.

Over at the $10,000 PLHE championship, play slowed down considerably as the money bubble of 36 approached, everyone wanting to make history and perhaps more importantly, get off to a good start for their series. The unfortunate bubble boy was James Gorham as his flopped two pair was bested by a better two pair of Nikolai Evdakov.

The action continued for another hour and a half before the players were finally released for an abbreviated dinner break. Along the way we lost notables Marco “CrazyMarco” Johnson, David Bach, Matt “mattg1983” Graham, Mark Newhouse, Ted Lawson, and Vivek “psyduck” Rajkumar.

After returning from the dinner break, Phil Laak quickly took out Dustin “neverwin” Woolf when his Q-8 out flopped Wolf’s pocket tens. Card Player columnist Rolf Slotboom quickly followed Woolf out the door when his dominated K-Q ran into the A-K of Chris Bell.

The stacked field continued to push forward and then it was Eli Elezra’s turn to hit the rail. Mike Sowers doubled through Elezra after flopping a broadway straight and then later took his remaining chips after his top pair made turned into a straight on the turn. The two huge pots put Sowers over the 1 million mark and in clear control of the tournament.

Getting from two tables to one was a grueling affair, and some good players busted during the grind including Michael Pesek, Alexander Kostritsyn, Andreas Krause, Justin Newton, David "raptor" Benefield and Ryan Young.

It took roughly five more hours to get to the televised final table of nine, but the end result was well worth the wait. Here are the final nine and their approximate chip counts as they head into tomorrow.

Andy Bloch - 2,100,000
Nenad "serb" Medic - 1,200,000
Mike Sexton - 1,100,000
Mike "sowerss" Sowers -675,000
Amit "amak316" Makhija - 525,000
Chris Bell - 450,000
Phil Laak - 425,000
Kathy Liebert - 285,000
Patrik Antonius - 230,000

Related Articles

Podcast: Mark Newhouse Talks Ego And Comebacks

The Actual Odds Of What Newhouse Just Did

Mark Newhouse Bounces Back, Says He'll Be OK

Most Viewed Articles