The final table of the Bay 101 Shooting Stars Classic concluded early Saturday morning as McLean Karr, down to just 10 big blinds with 27 players left when day 3 started, winning $878,500, which includes a $25,000 WPT Championship seat, defeating Andy “BKiCe” Seth in heads-up play. Phil Hellmuth was the first elimination at the final table, when his QQ lost to Seth’s AJ when another ace hit the river, causing Hellmuth to curl up in the fetal position, leading Tony G to blog an open letter to Hellmuth, expressing concern for his mental health after his stunning elimination. Here’s the full results from the final table:
1 McLean Karr $878,500 including $25k WPT seat
2 Andy Seth $521,200
3 Daniel O’Brien $292,800
4 Hasan Habib $234,300
5 Matt Keikoan $175,700
6 Phil Hellmuth $117,000
Here’s an interview tournament director Matt Savage had with McLean and friend Maria Ho after his win:
A spokeswoman for Berlin police — who did not give her name in keeping with department policy — said the suspect had been set free due to a lack of evidence. The suspect, who was detained late Friday, denied throughout several hours in questioning having taken part in the heist at the Grand Hyatt hotel in the capital.
Hmm. While it briefly seemed like the case might be unravelling for the robbers, maybe not so much … apparently just because a guy robbed one casino in Germany doesn’t mean he committed all casino robberies in Germany.
UPDATE UPDATE:The suspect has been released. Apparently German coppers got the wrong guy … or are running a high-level police play where they detain a person and let him go hoping he will lead them to someone else. No word on whether or not they are still looking for a black Mercedes somewhere in Germany.
Police have arrested a man in connection with last weekend’s armed robbery at the Grand Hyatt during EPT Berlin:
Few details on the suspect himself, other than that his arrest has something to do with info police received about a black Mercedes getaway car … and that he may have been a guy convicted and sent to prison for a casino robbery in 2004.
The thugs made off with $331,000 in the daytime heist, pulled off as cameras rolled at the biggest poker tournament in German history.
Supposedly, we’re also hearing, the robbers left behind a lot of clues, and more arrests are likely to follow. Police don’t think it was an inside job, but are looking into whether or not there was an accomplice who entered one of the events.
UPDATE: A little more news from Germany … the heist took place while guards were on break and the money was being prepared for transfer to the casino’s main cage. Also, from TheLocal.de:
The arrested man was thought to have taken part in another high-profile robbery in 2004. That January four armed masked men stormed the casino at the top of the Park Inn on Alexanderplatz in central Berlin. They were later arrested and convicted, receiving jail terms of between two and four years.
An article by Howard Stutz at the Las Vegas Review-Journal states that the Nevada Gambling Control Board is considering establishing a set of guidelines between casinos and the .net section of online poker sites, which could lead to widespread changes into how poker tournaments are run in Nevada. In 2007, Harrah’s established a series of rules that prevented online poker sites that took US customers from registering their satellite winners directly into the World Series of Poker. Those sites were also prohibited from having their players promote .com sites, while they were allowed to promote their “poker school”, with a .net suffix.
When these guidelines will be finalized is unknown, they could have a huge effect on the World Series of Poker, North American Poker Tour, and televised poker programming such as Face the Ace and Poker After Dark if .net sites were also not allowed.
After having what he admitted was his worst year in poker last year, Phil Hellmuth decided some changes were in order. In his blog from February, Hellmuth hired mindset coach Sam Chauhan and had a battery of tests among other changes to get his poker game back to the when he was considered by more than himself as the best player in the world. It appears to be paying off this week, as Hellmuth has made the final table of the WPT Bay 101 Shooting Stars Main Event Friday afternoon. Here’s how the rest of the final table will be seated when play resumes around 4pm PT (results come from the Hendon Mob Database):
Other big names who missed the final table: Scotty Nguyen (8th), “Miami John” Cernuto (11th), Nick Schulman (13th), Chau Giang (14th), and current WPT Player of the Year leader Faraz Jaka (18th). Live updates will be available from BJ Nemeth and the other good people over at the WorldPokerTour.com site.
In other news related to Hellmuth, Ultimate Bet has decided to cancel the 2010 Aruba Classic as they decided to expand their offerings online, including having a second Ultimate Bet Online Championship series each year.
None other than KevMath stepped into a new dimension across the pond last week, appearing on The Poker Show with Jesse May. Our favorite 2+2 moderator — and arguably the second or third most mysterious man in poker — shares his refreshingly sober analytics from what May calls “the best AND worst journalism about poker”. Check it out … there’s a lot to be learned from the guy charged with shepherding ducks on NVG (and cleaning up their mess).
They also get into the personalities at the NBC Heads-Up Championship for a bit, and talk about the peculiar appeal of Luke Schwartz — what’s behind FullFlush’s rising star in the UK, and why is he more than just a 2+2 blowhard?
Really good stuff from a new (to audio) voice serving a necessary role in the poker world. He clearly does it all for the glamour:
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The eventful EPT Berlin Main Event final table came to a conclusion Sunday afternoon, and it would be American Kevin MacPhee taking down the first prize of 1 million Euros, defeating Ilari Tahkakollio heads-up. MacPhee also had the chance to do this brief interview Monday about his weekend:
An interesting footnote to the excitement from Saturday was a decision Tahkakollio made when play eventually resumed. With 21 players remaining, he was involved in a hand with Luca Canielli, who was all-in for his last 600,000 with As-Qd, against Tahkakollio’s Ad-10h, with the board showing 3c-Kc-8s-4c. At that moment, the armed robbery took place, scattering players and chips leaving this for the players to return to about four hours later (picture from pokerolymp.de):
As the players and tournament staff came back to their seats, and exact chip counts impossible to determine, tournament director met with the remaining players in the main event. It was decided that the players would go by the honor system to determine each player’s chip stack.
Next was to decide how to handle the Tahkakollio-Canielli hand. Since it was impossible to know if the deck had been tampered with amongst the confusion, Kremser ruled that the hand be ruled dead. However, Cainelli was unhappy with this decision as he was in need of doubling up. Kremser then ruled that the deck could be reshuffled so the river could be dealt, but would also need the approval of Tahkakollio, who could have decided to have the hand ruled dead and the two get their chips back. After thinking for several minutes, Tahkakollio decided to allow the river to be dealt, and when the 5h came on the river, Cainelli received his double up, while Tahkakollio had lost about a third of his chips. Tahkakollio recovered from that setback to make the final table third in chips, and after a tense back and forth battle with MacPhee when play got to heads-up, eventually collecting 600,000 Euros for finishing 2nd.
The original reporting of the hand was done by the PokerStarsblog.com team.
Was going to post this over the weekend, but stuff happened in Berlin to delay things a bit. One of these days, GSN will get its act together and put the current season of High Stakes Poker on Youtube AND decide to put it up earlier in the week than Friday.
Numbers 4 and 2 are the only ones that seem possibly questionable to me. The Bounty Shootouts, indeed, are likely to become great. But it’s not even clear yet where the real championship will take place. (The upcoming version at Mohegan Sun will be the first open one of these.) Likewise for the WSOP’s new $25k six-handed event. High-roller and fast no-limit hold’em action, sure … but again, can you really put something at #2 when it hasn’t even happened yet? I’d rather see an Ironman tourney on that list … even though they aren’t big, yet, I think all who have battled in them can attest they are tough.
UPDATE: Anyone else finds Daniel’s omission of the NBC Heads-Up curious? I wouldn’t think much about it had he not included WSOP Heads-up as #8. Now I gotta wonder if his list woulda been different had he been in the final four this weekend / Annie Duke not won.
The Poker Beat has needed a new commercial, and Annie Duke’s win in this year’s NBC National Heads-Up Championship at Caesars’ Palace may just do the trick. First a brief run down of today’s matches:
Clubs/Spades Bracket:
Erik Seidel beat Peter Eastgate
Scotty Nguyen beat Jason Mercier
Hearts/Diamonds Bracket:
Dennis Phillips beat Doyle Brunson
Annie Duke beat Jerry Yang
Semifinals:
Erik Seidel beat Scotty Nguyen
Annike Duke beat Dennis Phillips
The finals commenced with Duke (1-5 lifetime before this year’s event) taking on Seidel (0-5 lifetime at the NBCHU) in the best of three final. Duke won the first match, Seidel would tie it up in the second and held the lead in the deciding match, and had Duke all-in while holding the best hand, but his AdKd was no good for Duke’s Qd9d when she made two pair to take the lead. Duke eventually sealed the deal when her pocket nines turned a straight against Seidel’s A-2. Seidel was left with two outs to a chop, but the river was a blank, with the second place winnings of $250,000. Duke picks up $500,000 for the win, her first major win since her 2004 victory in the WSOP Tournament of Champions.
Kevin interrupting this post to include some breaking news
PokerStars has just released a statement with an update on Saturday’s robbery at EPT Berlin along with clearing up various rumors:
“Yesterday at approximately 2.15pm, an armed robbery took place at the European Poker Tour (EPT) event in Berlin. Nobody was seriously injured. Four armed men were involved in the robbery which targeted the tournament registration desk outside the tournament area.
No shots were fired and the suspects quickly fled after a security guard intervened. The police investigation so far has shown that the suspects had a handgun and a machete. Contrary to tabloid reports, no Kalashnikov assault rifles or hand grenades were used. The suspects did not enter the tournament area and the money taken was substantially less than what has been reported.
The tournament resumed after a few hours and a police investigation is now under way. The tournament is taking place on the first floor of the Grand Hyatt Hotel at Marlene-Dietrich-Platz and is being held by SPIELBANK Berlin Casino.
The police are working closely with the EPT and SPIELBANK Berlin. Police are asking anyone who has information, video footage or photographs that might aid the investigation to contact them.”
14 clock in Berlin’s luxury hotel “Grand Hyatt”: The European Poker elite has the honor. It is the biggest tournament in Germany. Prize money: one million euros! Even Boris Becker was as an advertising face of Pokerstars.de at the table there – until he is rausflogen on Thursday. In addition, author Charlotte Roche ( “Wetlands”). Today I want to photograph the friend of Poker Europe champion Sandra “Black Mamba” Naujoks (28). He had lost a bet, now disguised as a woman sitting at the table. So far, so ordinary.
While so much can get lost in Google translation, sometimes it spits out pure poetry. The robbers haven’t even gotten there yet, and it would be Theater of the Absurd if it weren’t about to become so real.
And that’s exactly what it is: a story that I tell surely in abundance in my back, emphasizing the amusing details. But on the stroke during the two minutes that lasted the confusion, I fear the belly.
How they got to that final table on Saturday took an approximate 5-hour detour when a group of masked robbers stormed the Grand Hyatt Hotel around 2:30pm local time. You can check out my previous two posts from Saturday for some clips here and here.
Various mainstream media reports have said that up to 1 million Euros have been stolen, or as some called it, a “jackpot“. While the EPT Berlin event did boast a 1 million Euro first prize, it’s expected that the amount the robbers were able to pocket is expected to be far less than that.
While there have been numerous eyewitness accounts, most of them are German, which can make some interesting translations for those looking for something in English. Here’s a few foreign reports (translated through Google Translate):
They’re in the money at the National Heads-Up Championship. Everyone’s brackets have turned to shit — I’ll update that situation as soon as I put this post up here — and Jerry Yang’s crew is apparently rolling old-school Hevad Khan, getting all up in Jennifer Harman’s grill. (Jennifer of all people!)
Everyone left guaranteed at least $25k in pursuit of the $500k first prize.
The payout breakdown:
Champion $500,000
Runner-Up $250,000
3rd & 4th Place $125,000
5th – 8th Place $75,000
9th – 16th Place $25,000
randompoker: RT @MeanPokerDealer: I think it's SO cool how you guys loop the earbuds around your ears so they're hanging there all not in your ears and stuff. I hate you. 57 minutes ago
