Michael T. Davis Goes ShronkDaddy on Seniors

Michael T. Davis became the second player to take down a WSOP bracelet this year wearing a PokerRoad t-shirt, winning the $1,000 Seniors NL Holdem World Championship. Davis, 58, from Dubuque, Iowa, had just sold his home inspection business last week, and was looking to move to a warmer location. The $437,358 and gold bracelet for his win will surely help with the moving expenses. Like Brian Lemke earlier this month, Justin Shronk was in the winner’s thoughts. From Nolan Dalla’s tournament report:

“Justin gave me this shirt,” Davis said afterward. “A lot of people miss Justin. He was very good for the poker community.”

Davis never held the chip lead until the first hand of heads-up, when he doubled through runner-up Scott Buller with pocket aces against Buller’s pocket nines. The final hand had Davis’ A-9 best Buller’s A-J when another 9 came on the turn.

Kabbaj Dominating Pot-Limit

John Kabbaj is the only player with a seven-figure chip stack, holding over 2.2m in chips with 14 players remaining in the $10,000 Pot-Limit Holdem World Championship which resumes at 1pm today. Here’s how the remaining players will be seated:

(Table 154)
Seat 2: JC Alvarado – 924000
Seat 3: Eric ‘basebaldy’ Baldwin – 713000
Seat 4: Davidi Kitai – 581000
Seat 5: Mohsin Charania – 224000
Seat 6: Jason Lester – 240000
Seat 7: Darryll Fish – 368000
Seat 8: Kirill Gerasimov – 550000

(Table 154)
Seat 1: Billy Kopp – 772000
Seat 2: Eugene Todd – 351000
Seat 3: Thomas Pettersson – 121000
Seat 5: John Kabbaj – 2226000
Seat 6: Isaac Haxton – 660000
Seat 7: Ken Lennaard – 467000
Seat 8: Michael Kamran – 261000

When the final table is reached, streaming will be available at bluffmagazine.com and wsop.pkr.com

Tenner Looking to be a Winner in Omaha-8

Play also resumes at 1pm in the $2,500 Omaha Hi/Lo 8 or Better event with 23 players remaining, with Mark Tenner leading the field at 285,000. John Monnette (237,000), C.K. Hua (225,000), Day 1 chip leader Josh Schlein (201,000) Frankie O’Dell (194,000), Mark Gregorich (108,000), Pat Poels (89,000) and Mike Matusow (63,000) are the notables looking to pass the Omaha-8 author.

Greenstein Leader in Mixed Holdem

Barry Greenstein (177,200) will lead the remaining 67 players in the $2,500 Mixed Holdem event when play resumes at 2pm. Notables also making a return on Thursday include: Hasan Habib (165,000), Daniel Negreanu (101,000), Amnon Filippi (98,000), Mimi Tran (65,300) and Gavin Griffin (46,600) with 54 players making the money.

Thursday’s tournament

Only one tournament this afternoon, the $1,500 Pot-Limit Omaha 8 or Better event, won last year by Martin Klaser winning over $210,000 in a field of 720. The WSOP Staff Guide projects a field of 756 for this event, and expect less than 20% of the field when play concludes at the end of level 10.

Follow along at www.wsop.com for updates starting at noon PT, and Pokerati will have more stuff from around the poker community during the day.

The leader at the dinner break appears to be Michael Martin, who is just under 100,000 in chips. More familiar names near the top: Jeff Madsen, Chris Moneymaker, Mike Matusow, TJ Cloutier, and the lovely and talented Liz Lieu, Clonie Gowen, Evelyn Ng, Kara Scott, and Isabelle Mercier. More updates can be found at the WSOP update site here.

The returning horde of about 1,500 will return shortly to play two more two-hour levels, with those survivors returning to play on Wednesday, July 9.

More updates during the evening…

The $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha final table has been set, this group of 9 faces the hot lights of the ESPN cameras:

Seat 1: Kido Pham 1,080,000
Seat 2: Brandon Moran 1,286,000
Seat 3: Peter Jetten 492,000
Seat 4: Michael Mizrachi 1,767,000
Seat 5: Billy Argyros 729,000
Seat 6: Greg Hurst 637,000
Seat 7: Tom Hanlon 192,000
Seat 8: Marty Smyth 1,068,000
Seat 9: Richard Harroch 372,000

The other final table scheduled for today and the other tournament action on the next page:

The $1,500 HORSE event stopped play with 21 players left as they return to play down to a winner at 3pm today. Phil Hellmuth is the current chip leader, Victor Ramdin, Randy Holland, Keith Sexton and Jens Voertmann are some of the known names remaining in the field. If the PLO event ends early, and Hellmuth makes the final table, expect that table to be moved to the TV table as well.

The $1,500 NL Holdem event made the money late last night, with 233 returning at 2pm as they play down to their final table. Notable names still in the hunt for a bracelet: Mimi Tran, Matt Matros, Chris Gregorian, Dan Heimiller and Nath Pizzolatto.

Besides the $500k All-In “freeroll”, the last bracelet tournament before the Main Event starts at noon today with the $1,500 Limit Holdem Shootout. Last year, Hendon Mob member Ram Vaswani took down the bracelet in a field of 720.

More updates during the day, and surely a tournament report from Dan on the All-In clusterfuck…

JC Tran takes his name off of the “Best player to never win a bracelet” list, taking down the $1,500 NL Holdem event against Danish pro Rasmus Nielsen. JC, at one point down 3-1 headsup, chipped away at Rasmus until he eventually took the chip lead, winning when his KQ nipped the Dane’s QJ on a Q-high flop. Tran takes home over $631,000 plus 100 WSOP POY points, moving him into 6th in the race with 1 event remaining. Nielsen will be consoled with almost $390,000 to take back to Denmark.

Other tournament happenings on the next page:

The $1,500 HORSE event reached the money bubble just before they took their dinner break, they still have 70 more players to eliminate before making their final table. Chad Brown is the chip leader, other notable names remaining: Keith Sexton, Victor Ramdin, Phil Hellmuth, Joe Hachem, and Allen Cunningham. Follow all the HORSE-ing around at the WSOP website for updates here.

The $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha World Championship just reached the money at 36 Josh Arieh’s the current chip leader, other notables remaining: Michael Mizrachi, Kido Pham, Nikolay Evdakov (his 10th cash of the Series), Dario Alioto, and bracelet winners David Singer and Rob Hollink. The potting and re-potting action can be spotted here.

The last $1,500 NL Holdem event drew a field of 2,693, with about 600 returning from their dinner break. Notable names still in action: Vanessa Rousso, Jacobo Fernandez (looking to retake the WSOP POY lead), “Devilfish” Ulliot, Mimi Tran and Erica Schoenberg. See who survives the donkament here.

More updates from me tomrrow…

The one final table of today is down to heads-up play, as the $2,000 Pot Limit Holdem event is down to Chris Bell and Davidi Kitai. So far during heads-up play, there have been 10 lead changes as they’ve battled back and forth for over 3 hours, covering about 120 hands at this time. Follow along with the live updates at the WSOP website here.

Other action from today at the jump:

Meanwhile, the $1,500 NL Holdem event is down to about 45, filled with many names you probably don’t know. You can see if you can recognize anyone here. One development is that with Barry Greenstein cashing in this event (for 5 points), he moves into 3rd place in the ESPN WSOP Player of the Year standings.

The noon tournament today, $2,500 Limit Triple Draw 2-7 Lowball started with 238 entrants that has already dwindled down to 78 with three more levels of play today. George Lind is the current chip leader, with Raymond Davis, Bill Chen and Amnon Fillippi towards the top of the leaderboard. Further action in this event can be followed here.

The 5pm event $1,500 Mixed Holdem (Limit/No Limit) drew a field of 731 that has been cut in half. Among the leaders: David Pham, John Juanda, Mimi Tran and Todd “DanDruff” Witteles. Learn who’s moving up and who’s moving out here.

More updates tomorrow…

On the way to dinner John Duthie said he had about 160k. Duthie picked up pocket aces in the big blind with Gus Hansen on the button… but everyone folded. A fine example of not giving up is David Levi who is still working a short stack despite starting Day 2 with only 15k in chips.

Sexy (did I say that outloud?) Fabrice Soulier (….but not as sexy as my husband) is stacked at 325k. Fabrice took 7th against Hellmuth’s 11th bracelet win earlier this summer when the temperature was still in the 90′s.

Mimi Tran (long overdue to be on WPT Ladies Night) and Shirley Williams (sponsored by Bodog) are still in the tournament. Shirley’s table was filmed briefly by ESPN which should provide fun footage as Gavin Smith was on her left.