WSOP

WSOP

While there have been some rather interesting changes announced in the Poker Media world in the past 24 hours, the majority of the attention is still on a single casino’s poker floor in Las Vegas. As the crown jewel of Live Poker Events, the WSOP Main Event attracts many different players from all over the world, some with an expectation to make some serious money, others to just enjoy the experience, and effectively set fire to $10,000. The majority of the players who made it to Day 2c are in the first camp, making this probably the more difficult of the three Day 2s.

Main Event

Day 2C saw more well known players start than I could write down in a single article, but if I mention Daniel Negreanu, Phil Hellmuth, Jason  Mercier, Jamie Gold, Joe Hachem, Phil Ivey, Tom “durrrr” Dwan, Gus Hansen and “Broke Living” Jean-Robert Bellande as a start it might give you an indication of the players I’ve not been able to get in.

After their Day 1 shenanigans of getting blinded off while playing Open Face Chinese Poker for more money than either could honestly expect to make in the Main Event, Full Tilt Professionals Tom Dwan and Gus Hansen didn’t seem to be taking the Main Event seriously, and probably considered it an impediment to getting back to those cash games. Both players busted pretty early, and were last seen heading in the direction of the OFC cash tables to continue their $3,000 a point game.

It didn’t seem to be a good day to be a Full Tilt Professional, but it also wasn’t a good day to be a former WSOP Main Event Winner. Both of the former winners playing Day 2C, Joe Hachem and Jamie Gold, failed to make it through the day. While Jamie Gold is considered to be one of the top 3 worst players to ever win the title, he actually busted in a pretty standard, if cold decked, spot. Gregory Liang, in the small blind, called an early opening raise and a call from the button. Gold three bet from the big blind, and Liang was interested, and made a decent sized four bet. Gold called, as did the button, and all three went to the flop.

The flop came JJT, and all three players checked. The Q turn stirred up some action, and Liang shoved his remaining stack over the line. Gold seemed to be caught in two minds, and announced “I don’t think I can fold!” soon followed by several frustrated cries of “Holy Shit!”

Finally Gold made up his mind, and with the obviously crying call comment of “No way I can fold this hand!” Gold slid his remaining chips into the middle to be the player at risk. The button open folded big slick, and Liang turned over QQ for a turned full house, and Gold flipped over AK for a turned Broadway straight, that also happened to be drawing dead.

In some anguish, Gold let lose several F-bombs, as the river was dealt, and showed the inconsequential A. He won’t be making a climb back out of the depths of poker obscurity his has been hiding in since his 2006 win.

Joe Hachem however didn’t seem to be having any cards, and busted out in unspectacular fashion, He tweeted soon after:

 

  Joining these two former champs on the rail were Daniel Negreanu and Jason Mercier. Negreanu still isn’t out of the 2013 WSOP Player of the Year Race, as the WSOPE in October still awards points for that race. He’s planning a big October based on this tweet:

 

 

Jason Mercier on the other hand hasn’t said anything about his plans fro the rest of the year, but I’d be surprised not to see him in Barcalona, London and Paris for the EPTs and the WSOPE. He busted out of the main when he got his shortish stack in with Ace King, only to run into Pocket Rockets.

One of the big stories of the day was the rise of “Broke Living” Jean-Robert Bellande. Having tweeted a picture of his supposed bank account balance earlier this week, he was apparently down to his last $10k or so. Now he seems to have turned that $10k into a 320,900 chip stack, placing him in contention to go deep in this Main Event.

The biggest chip stack of the day belonged to Mark Koon, who with 507,300 chips is in a very nice spot going into Day 3 on Thursday.

Day 3 is going to see the amalgamation of the three different flights into a single field, and the players still in will play down to a single table of nine over the next five days.

We will, of course, be keeping a close eye on the action, and will continue to bring you all the important action, all you need to do is keep a close eye on our twitter account for the details.