Online Poker -- Chris 'herdgolf86' Tipper Wins at Full TiltAri 'BodogAri' Engel Takes Third at PokerStars |
|
The Super Bowl is an event so large that it can sometimes affect completely unrelated venues, such as poker. It is safe to say that many of the overlays offered up by the various sites over the weekend were caused by a lack of participation due to the Big Game in Tampa Bay, Florida. Some sites even went so far as to lower their respective guarantees, knowing the traffic would suffer.
Football or no football, some of the best in the game were able to come out on top on Sunday. Over at PokerStars, Dan "Wretchy" Martin took second in the $100 rebuy. Joe "jpmetalman" Patrick and Tyler "tnetter" Netter finished second and third in the Sunday 500.
At Full Tilt, 2008 Card Player Online Player of the Year contender Mark "dipthrong" Herm (pictured left) took second in the Sunday Brawl and red pro David Pham notched a win in the $65,000 guarantee. Continuing his hot streak, Shaun "tedsfishfry" Deeb beat Stian "JohnnyBelow" Stabell heads up in the $85,000-guaranteed rebuy tournament to boost his career OPOY winnings to over $1 million. So far this year, all three of his qualifying cashes have been wins.
Read the recaps for Sunday’s flagship events on Full Tilt, PokerStars, UltimateBet, Cake and Bodog below:
PokerStars Sunday Million
PokerStars stuck to their guns this weekend and kept the Sunday Million guarantee at $1.5 million. The gamble paid off and 7,513 entrants bought in to just barely clear that mark.
A total of 1,080 places were paid, and among the notables to go deep were Shane "Anbessa9" Pacheco (88th), GrinderMJ (84th), Andrew "foucalt82" Brokos (61st), James "jcamby33" Campbell (19th), and Jordan "scarface_79" Smith (12th).
Despite coming into the final table with the chip lead, freakypokerd was the first to go out, losing with an overpair after FRfr111 had flopped a full house.
After a three-way deal was made, Ari "BodogAri" Engel (pictured right), hutzlerCrew, and MCLegend began to play it out for the extra $30,000. Engel was eliminated next when his A-J went unimproved against hutzlerCrew’s pocket sixes.
This gave hutzlerCrew a huge 2-1 chip lead, which he used to take out MCLegend in second place.
Here were the final results:
* Payouts shown are based on a three-way deal at the final table which left $30,000 for the eventual winner.
Full Tilt $500,000 Guarantee
Knowing their attendance would be down, Full Tilt decided to lower their guarantee from $750,000 to $500,000 in order to compensate. The move paid off when 2,805 players entered to create a total prize pool of just $561,000.
A total of 405 places were paid to players such as Matt "All In At 420" Stout (91st), Stephen "Stevie444" Chidwick (84th), govshark2 (64th), and Matthias "goodvibe" Neu (56th). Four members of the Full Tilt family also cashed, including Jose-Luis Velador (399th), Eddy Scharf (274th), Claudio Rinaldi (110th), and Michael Craig (71st).
Adam "Roothlus" Levy (11th, pictured above right) just missed the final table, which got started roughly seven hours into play.
In the end, Chris "herdgolf86" Tipper took out Antonio18 for the top prize of just over $100,000. This was the second time Tipper had final-tabled this event, improving on his eighth-place finish seven months ago.
Here were the final table results:
UltimateBet $200,000 Guarantee
UltimateBet definitely suffered due to the Super Bowl and only drew 838 entrants into their weekly $200,000-guaranteed tournament. The site had to then put up $32,400 to cover the difference.
Payouts were made to the final 11 tables-worth of players, including such notables as Ryan "RyanBluf" Karp (99th), Luke "IWEARGOGGLES" Staudenmaier (85th), Bryan "BadBeatNinja" Devonshire (54th), Ty "IPUFFPURP" Reiman (48th), Alex "AJKHoosier1" Kamberis (39th), Hunter "THEHUNTD" Frey (35th), Rick "Wachovia" Velilla (22nd), and Nicholas "BlumesiusX" Blumenthal (16th). Outlasting the rest of the UltimateBet team was Anthrax band member Scott Ian (pictured left), who finished 14th.
Once play got three-handed, SlowplayAA08 pleaded several times for a chop. The clock was stopped multiple times, but neither John "Michaeleahci" Michael nor Matthias "Technics_" Neu could come to an agreement. SlowplayAA08 seemed willing to do anything to guarantee just over a second-place payday, but Michael, who chopped the same tournament weeks earlier, refused to budge from his number, which was $1,000 over second place.
After pausing for the third time, the players came to an agreement, but then another controversy flared up when Michael demanded to get credit for first place, in order to improve his ranking. Neu also wanted credit for first, since he was the chip leader at the time, and yet another delay took place as SlowplayAA08 continued to plead for an ending. Finally, the deal was made, and the win was given to Neu.
Here were the final table results:
*Payouts shown are based on a three-way deal made at the final table.
Bodog Super Bowl Special
Bodog suspended its regular $100,000-guaranteed tournament in order to host its Super Bowl Special. The $100 buy-in event drew 399 players, who were anxious to get their hands on the $20,000 that Bodog added to the prize pool, meaning $59,900 was up for grabs.
The tournament paid out the final 45 places to players such as Brian Townsend (15th), Jon "PearlJammer" Turner (14th), and Brian "DUSoonerKid" Hansen (fourth, pictured right).
When it was all over, Justin "Justin58" Grandin was the champion, taking out subiime heads up for the win.
Here were the final table results:
Cake Poker $100,000 Guarantee
The big tournament on Cake Poker avoided an overlay when 686 entrants bought in to create a prize pool of $102,900.
Brian "SNoOoWMAN" Hawkins made a run at the title but fell short of the final table in 12th place.
Previous winner General Ts0 had another fine showing and finished sixth after making the final table. General Ts0 won the tournament two weeks ago.
The eventual winner clearly showed off his site pride with the name CAAAAAAAAKE and won $20,940 for the top spot.
Here were the final tables results:
Card Player is working with several sites that continue to serve U.S. players to provide deposit bonuses to our readers. Click on the following names to receive bonuses: UltimateBet, Bodog, Absolute, Cake and Full Tilt Poker.