World Series of Poker Report

by Gambling Correspondent Andrew W Scott
Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
Sunday 15 July 2007, 9:00am (Las Vegas time)

Day 5: Saturday 14 July

Of the 6,358 starters, only 112 remained at the start of day 5.  They included the following:

12:14pm: Play begins at the twentieth level.  Blinds were 10,000/20,000 with a 3,000 ante.  The average chip stack was 1,135,000.  Immediately there was a string of eliminations, as the short stacks made their stands:

12:44pm: Scotty Nguyen won a big hand, crippling Cory Carroll in the process.  Scotty bet 125,000 on the turn and Cory called.  The river came a Queen and Scotty bet 300,000.  Cory raised it to 750,000 and Scotty called, showing pocket Queens for a full house.  Corey showed his Ace-Queen, losing the hand and being crippled to 350,000.  Scotty moved up to 2,200,000.

12:50pm: Avi Cohen won a huge pot, when Charis Anastasiou moved all in to a pot which already had 1,200,000 in it.  Cohen called, and showed that he had a runner-runner flush with the King.  Anastasiou mucked and Cohen pumped his hands in the air in delight, moving his chip stack to 4,700,000.  Anastasiou has only 300,000.

1:32pm: Alan Keating was eliminated by Maria Ho.  Maria raised in the small blind, and Keating moved all-in from the big blind.  Ho called with King-Jack unsuited, but Keating was in front with Ace-Queen unsuited, but the flop came perfect for Ho, J-K-5.  When the turn hit J she filled up and it was all over for Keating who picks up $58,570 for his 102nd place.

1:48pm: Young and fearless Italian internet player Dario Minieri exited the tournament, on a flush draw.  His opponent had a set, and all the money went in the middle on the turn.  Dario missed his flush and was out, picking up $67,535 for his 96th place.

1:49pm: The second last woman in the field, Kelly Jo McGlothlin, busted out when she moved in her relatively short-stack of 367,000 into the middle of the table with 2-9 of hearts on a flush draw.  Her opponent, Senovio Ramirez III called and showed his pocket 10s.  There was no improvement for McGlothlin and she takes home $67,535 for her 95th place, and bragging rights that she beat every woman in the field, bar one.  That one is Maria Ho, of Arcadia, California, now cemented in place as the tournament’s highest placed woman.  I have been following Maria closely and she is playing well, with about 1,000,000 in chips.  A Bodog sponsor’s tag has suddenly materialized on her clothes, and she is tasting considerable media attention.

2:12pm: With the board reading 10-5-6-10-Q with no possible flushes, Francois Safieddine bet his last 200,000.  After waiting several minutes, Tuan Lam asked him “do you want a call?”  Safieddine’s response was a stony silence.  Finally Tuan called, and Safieddine tossed his hand away without even showing, and headed to the rail.  Tuan showed his cards: no pair, just A-K.

2:17pm: Scotty Nguyen kicked up to 2,700,000 in chips he moved all in on a busted flush draw.  His opponent Kevin Kim thought long and hard, before finally folding.  Scotty showed his worthless 7-8 of spades much to Kim’s dismay.

2:41pm: The twenty-first level begins, with blinds of 12,000/24,000 and a 3,000 ante.

2:58pm: Alex Kravchenko, the sole Russian left in the field, bet 100,000 on a flop of A-7-5 rainbow (meaning three different suits).  Richard Harris raised another 100,000, making the bet 200,000.  Kravchenko’s reply was to re-raise, making it 300,000 to go.  Harris called.  The turn came 2 of spades, making a second spade on the board.  Kravchenko immediately bet 500,000, building a monster pot.  Harris pondered for a considerable time, before folding.  Kravchenko moves to 2,640,000 in chips.

5:06pm: The twenty-second level begins, with blinds of 15,000/30,000 and a 4,000 ante.

5:20pm: Huck Seed, one of only two former champions still in the hunt, is eliminated in 73rd place, the last player to pick up $106,382 before the prize money jumps to $130,288.  Huck Seed is known for his outrageous proposition bets.  He once bet that he could go an entire year without shaving.  He lost that bet when he had to shave before a family funeral.  He has also bet that he could stand in the ocean for 18 hours straight.

5:30pm: Warren Karp looks down at his hand to see the best hand in poker, a pair of Aces.  When Kevin Farry raised it up pre-flop to 100,000, Karp moved all in for 900,000.  Farrycalled, and Karp was extremely unlucky when a 5 fell on the turn.  Karp was eliminated and Farry moved up to 2,870,000 in chips.

5:32pm: An enormous pot develops.  Avi Cohen check-called Scott Freeman’s 175,000 bet on a flop of 9h-Kd-6h, the turn comes 10 of diamonds and Cohen bets 400,00 but Freeman moves all in for 1,009,000!!  Cohen called and tuned over 7-8 for the straight, but Freeman had 6-8 diamonds for the flush draw.  The river came 5 of diamonds and Freeman pulled a huge pot.

6:08pm: German Stig Tap Rasmussen pulls off an audacious bluff when he moves all-in for over 1,000,000 to a pot that already had about 800,000 in it.  Hoa Nguyen folded, and Rasmussen showed his Ace-10 for just Ace high, no pair.  Rasmussen moved to 1,620,000 and Nguyen slipped to 1,280,000.

6:27pm: A call with three seconds to go.  After being in the tank thinking for what seemed like forever, the 1 minute clock was called on Kenneth Smith by his opponent Dag Martin Mikkelsen.  The minute ran out and the ten second countdown ensured.  As the floorman counts “five, four, three”, Smith yells out “I call, I call!”  He regrets his decision, the board was 6-Q-3-4-2 and his Queen-9 was outkicked by Mikkelsen’s Ace-Queen.

7:06pm: With the level already ended but the a final hand of the level still in progress, Jeff Tunkel was eliminated.  Five players saw the flop but it came down to Tunkel (holding 9-10 clubs) and Ray Henson (holding pocket jacks) with a board of 6c-8s-Jc.  Tunkels monster draw did not improve and he busted out to Henson’s set.  Henson moved into the tournament lead with 6,200,000 in chips.

7:07pm: Well respected pro Gus Hansen was eliminated well into the break time, on the last hand before the break on his table.  Hansen had been short-stacked for some time made a stand with his final 99,000 with a hand of King-5 unsuited.  He was up against Jason Koshi’s Queen-4, but Koshi spiked a 4 on the turn and Hansen was out.

7:08pm: The break was also bad news for John Spadavecchia, who moved all in with Ace-10 unsuited and lost to King-Jack when a Jack came on the flop and a King on the river.

7:09pm: The room was cleared of spectators and Tournament staff coloured up all the yellow 1,000 chips and introduced 50,000 chips to the tournament for the first time.

9:00pm: Play recommences at the twenty-third level, with blinds of 20,000/40,000 and antes of 5,000.  It now costs 105,000 to play a lap of the table nine-handed, which is more than five times the amount of chips that players were first issued with!  A single big blind is double the player’s starting stack amount at the beginning of day 1.

There is a rush of eliminations after dinner:

10:00pm-10:30pm: The room suddenly goes very quiet, as the players seem to realize as one that they are now in the very serious money.  US$8.25 million is at stake here.  For an entire 30 minutes there are no eliminations, as each player desperately tries to hang on.  Almost every hand seems to be a pre-flop raise followed by a complete fold by the rest of the table.  Even still, some hands take as long as six or seven minutes.  No player calls time on any other player, as they are hoping that other players around them will bust out and every minute counts.  But since all of the six remaining tables are doing this, bust-outs don’t happen.  It is like a very serious, high stakes games of watching paint dry.

The entire room takes on the mood of a Mexican stand-off, no-one wanting to budge first.  Many chips stacks are stacked in such a way that it is plainly obvious the chips haven’t moved for hours.  This is a great example of Tom McEvoy’s famous quote that poker is “hours of boredom punctuated by moments of terror”.  Meanwhile, the clock ticks inexorably down to the next level, when the blinds will increase yet again, this time to 25,000/50,000 with an ante of 5,000, at 11pm.  The average chip stack is 2.5 million.

10:33pm:  Finally, someone busts out.  It is Lamar Wilkinson, who was only forced to be because he was down to his last 450,000 in chips, relatively short-stacked.  Wilkinson’s Ace-King loses to Lee Childs pairs of Kings, when the board comes with a King.  Lee Child’s stack increases to a huge 6.5 million.

10:42pm:  Hevad “Rain” Khan is the room’s most animated character.  He has already erupted several times when eliminating other players. He picks up pocket Jacks, and eliminates Ken Smith with pocket tens.  Khan instantly erupts in an explosion of energy, throwing both his arms in the air,  “come on, come on…yeah!!!!”

10:42pm:  Hevad Khan is on a roll.  Only nine minutes after eliminating Lamar Wilkinson, he picks up pocket Queens and knocks Adam White’s Ace-King out.  The moment the last board card hits, Khan goes wild.  He leaps from his chair, releases all his pent up energy literally shaking wildly, then picks up his chair, turns it upside down and wears it as a hat, running around the room yelling “do you like my new hat!”  He is clearly beyond ecstatic to be this deep in the tournament.

11:00pm:  Players go on a break.

11:20pm:  Players commence the twenty-fourth level, blinds are 25,000/50,000 with an ante of 5,000.  There are 47 players left alive, with an average chips stack of 2,705,000.  The chip leaders are starting to move in on 10 million in chips.  Player will continue until there are 36 players left, no matter how long it takes.

12:32am: Hevad “Rain” Khan does it again.  He made it 150,000 to go pre-flop, and got three callers, but then Avi Cohen moved all-in for his decent sized 2,100,000 stack.  Khan was the only caller, turning over Ace-King making Cohen feel sick with his Ace-8.  The board helped neither player and Cohen was out.  This sparked Khan’s totally ballistic celebration, during which for some inexplicable reason Khan yells out “I’m good at basketball” to no-one in particular.

1:08am:  My personal pick for person mostly likely to go deep in the tournament, Mario Ho, is out.  After coming to the rail and saying she was going to just survive to the next day, she decides to move all in with Ace-10 suited.  She gets called by Kevin Farry with pocket tens.  The board doesn’t help her, and she is busted as the highest placed female finisher.

1:30am: The players take a twenty minute break.

1:50am: The players resume for the twenty-fifth level, blinds are 30,000/60,000 with a 10,000 ante.  This means it costs 170,000 to play a lap of the table.  At say eight hands per lap (some tables are eight handed and some are nine handed), the average blind and ante cost per hand now equals the 20,000 that were the starting stacks of the players.  Making it this deep in the tournament could only have been a dream for these players at the start.  Day 1 seems like a long, long time ago.  There are 37 players remaining alive, and play will stop when we get to 36 players.  Everyone is desperately trying to hang on for day 6 tomorrow.  Who will be the unlucky last person to be eliminated today?

2:03am: We have an answer.  The last elimination for day 5 is Ayaz Mahmood.  Mahmood and Mikkel Madsen find themselves in the classic coin flip:  Mahmood’s Ace-King against Madsen’s pocket Queens.  The board comes ten hair and Mahmood is out.

2:15am:  It takes fifteen minutes to bag up the enormous piles of chips on the tables.  The 36 players still in contention now include only one former winner, Scotty Nguyen (1998).  They are vying for a first prize of US$8.25 million.  The top five all receive over US$1 million.  They are all guaranteed a minimum of US$285,678.  Those 36 men are: