Event #32 of the WSOP saw another No Limit Hold’em tournament draw a big crowd. This time it was 2,304 people paying the $1,500 buy-in to make the prize pool worth $3,144,960.
However, this huge field wouldn’t be quite so big at the end of the day as only 166 players were left standing to start day 2. Players such as David Williams, Lee Watkinson, Allen Cunningham, Jennifer Tilly, and Chris Ferguson were among those who fell by the wayside early.
In fact most of the players that did make it to day 2 were far from big names. Phil Hellmuth and Beth Shak were a couple of the more notable ones who moved on.
Here were the top 10 chips stack heading into the second day:
Rank/Player/Chips
1. Andy Garza 169,200
2. Donny Carlton 148,100
3. Jonathan Jaffe 134,700
4. Anil Jivani 130,200
5. George Lind 125,300
6. Michael Banducci 117,000
7. Adrian Dresel-Velasquez 116,000
8. Scott Sitron 114,000
9. Jose Luis Velador 110,500
10. Steven Weusten 104,000
Day 2 would see a reversal of fortune for those at the top of the leaderboard standings. Andy Garza, who was the big story of day 1, wouldn’t be quite the darling on this occasion as he busted out fairly early.
Garza wasn’t the only person to blow a big chip stack though as, in the end, only one of the top 10 players from the day before made it to the final table.
Here is how the final table looked going in:
Seat/Player/Chips
Seat 1: Dean Bui 211,000
Seat 2: Justin Hoffman 138,000
Seat 3: Jose Luis Velador 1,898,000
Seat 4: Joseph Georges 1,086,000
Seat 5: Utsab Saha 961,000
Seat 6: Jae Chung 716,000
Seat 7: Shane Stacey 640,000
Seat 8: Osmin Dardon 660,000
Seat 9: Anthony Signore 636,000
Justin Hoffman was having a great start to his first ever WSOP event but the dream was up when he was the first to be eliminated from the final table.
Utsab Saha was just like Hoffman in that this was his first WSOP tourney and he was also much like Hoffman in that he was one of the quicker exits from this final table.
Dany Georges was looking for a way to get back into the thick of things. But that way certainly wouldn’t be his suited A-J combo as they were beaten by Jose Luis Velador’s pocket 6’s.
Velador got into another big hand later with Dean Bui and it looked bad for Jose as Bui cornered trips 10’s. But Velador would grab a set of kings to top Bui and eliminate him into 6th place.
Osmin Dardon would do the eliminating next as he hit a 10-high straight to knock Shane Stacey out. Jae Chung joined Stacey shortly when he busted out in fourth.
Down to four-handed play, Dardon had a good hand to start with in his A-K combo. But Velador called his all-in bet with pocket queens and eventually hit a flush sending Dardon out of the tourney.
Now down to Velador and Anthony Signore, it looked like Velador all the way since he held a 5-1 chip lead. But Signore battled to almost even the chip count between the two.
However, the end saw Velador hit a two pair with A-7 while Signore’s A-6 was rendered meaningless at this point. Velador won the bracelet and collected $573,374 for the win.
Here’s how the rest of the players faired:
Rank/Player/Money
1. Luis Velador $574,734
2. Anthony Signore $366,387
3. Osmin Dardon $243,734
4. Jae h Chung $204,422
5. Shane Stacey $166,682
6. Dean Bui $132,088
7. Dany Georges $100,638
8. Utsab Saha $77,051
9. Justin Hoffman $53,464
10. Kenneth Hughes $34,594
11. Jesse Maupin $34,594
12. George Lind $34,594
13. Ray Henson $26,732
14. Courtney Harrington $26,732
15. Scott Kahler $26,732
16. Joel Nichols $18,869
17. Zeph Baer $18,869
18. Donny Carlton $18,869
19. Tim Hebert $15,095
20. Scott Sitron $15,095
21. David Desilva $15,095
22. Scott Bergman $15,095
23. John Jackson $15,095
24. Jamel Maistriaux $15,095
25. Brian Rissman $15,095