In what some consider a controversial decision, tournament director Jack Effel decided to stop play with 1:15:44 left in level 16 (2,500/5,000 w/ 500 ante) to have the 751 players remaining (747 make the money) take their 90-minute dinner break. Effel\’s explanation was that they needed time to prepare for paying the players who bust out immediately after the bubble bursts. The field had planned to start hand-for-hand play before the announcement. The current leader is Theo Jorgensen with 1,325,000 in chips. Other notables: Matt Affleck (1.26m), Tony Dunst (1.18m), Phil Galfond (1.05m), Adam Levy (840k), Johnny Chan (785k), Jean-Robert Bellande (753k), David Benyamine (630k), Scotty Nguyen (540k) and Eric Baldwin (500k). Also in the field are all 4 Mizrachi brothers: Robert 310k, Michael 118.5k, Donny 115k and Eric 60k.
Gavin Smith and Jason Somerville discuss the decision with Wicked Chops Poker.
Notables who were eliminated earlier today: Matt Savage, Annie Duke, JJ Liu, Hank Azaria, Robert Varkonyi, Dan Harrington, Erica Schoenberg and Barry Greenstein. Team Pokerati\’s only remaining hope (?), The Big Randy, was eliminated in early action.
Follow the action on the money bubble with play resuming at 8:30pm at wsop.com.