Bubble Burst in 50k

The $50,000 Players’ Championship reached the bubble earlier today with day 2 chip leader Kirk Morrison the unfortunate bubble boy, leaving 16 players guaranteed almost $100,000. At this time, Robert Mizrachi is the current chip lead with over 2.5m in chips, followed by John Juanda at 2.4m in 2nd. Michael Mizrachi is currently in 5th with nearly 1.7m while Nick Schulman, and Daniel Alaei have around 1m in chips with just 13 players remaining. The Mizrachi brothers are looking to be the first brothers to make the same final table since Ross and Barny Boatman performed the feat in 2002. (Thanks to a poster on 2+2 for that info).

1k Donkament Day 2

The $1,000 NL Holdem event reached the money within the first level this afternoon, and the pace has not slowed down, with under 200 players remaining at the end of level 14. The chip leader at the dinner break is Drew Crawford at 230,000. Play continues to the end of level 20 or the final table, whichever comes first.

Omaha 8 Day 2

Around 120 players remain in the $1,500 Omaha 8 or Better event as they head to their dinner break. Phil Ivey, Allen Kessler, David Bach, Brock Parker, Andrew Black and Team Pokerati’s own Tom Schneider are some of the familiar names looking to make the money bubble at 81 players and the eventual final table.

$1,500 NL Day 1

The $1,500 NL holdem event drew a field of 2,092, with 216 making the money and the winner getting over $500,000. 638 players will return after their 90-minute dinner break. The early leader appears to be online legend Shaun Deeb with 55,000 chips. Lauren Kling is unofficially in second with 45,000, while Antonio Esfandiari, Daniel Negreanu, Mark Seif and Joe Cada off to a fast start as well.

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Mystery indeed … we’ll see what we discover today (as I finally make it back to the Rio) … but while Kevin is on top of the relevant seat assignments, at least one plausibly reliable source informs us:

Those tables mentioned on your site, green 146 and such, dont exist. The only tables in green all series were 150-155. Those other tables were ghost tables. Those players were given different seats, empty seats.

Ahh, see, this is why some people can’t handle seeing us dig in semi-real time … the business of gathering (and assembling) facts while reporting news can be messy. But hey, thanks for helping us understand.

Regardless of whether or not any shenanigans were in play, one thing for certain is that there will be a lot of hubbub and cries for asterisks should Joe Reitman, Kirk Morrison, Sully Erna, Tony Hachem, or Kevin O’Donnell go super-deep. That much we definitely know.