Poker News

Since the airing on television of the 2008 WSOP 50K HORSE event there has been a great degree of controversy over the bevaviour of eventual winner Scotty Nguyen at the final table.

Scotty was seen faily inebriated, demanding more cocktails, and swearing and baiting his opponents.   None of this behaviour is really acceptable, but no action was taken by the tournament director to penalize him.  Erick Lindgren was so incensed that he said at the table that he’ll never be on “Team Scotty”, a reference refering to the fact that he’s not a great fan and wont be cheering him to win.    As he busted out of the event in a very credible 3rd, he was heard saying that he hoped “the kid” wins, a reference to Michael DeMichelle.

At first sight the lack of penalty smells a little of favouritism of a big poker name, but I think some of the media attention following the airing of the event has been slightly sensationalist.  Yes he was a bit over the top, but we all know Scotty talks to get into the heads of opponents more than almost anyone of the top pros, perhaps Tony G notwithstanding.

The network showing the coverage inevitably chases the ratings and they therefore are quite naturally selective over the most dynamic footage.  The effect this can have is that often soundbites are played a little out of context with a lot of “before” and “after” missing.  We cant really criticize the network, as the footage is there to be utilized, but I think it is more likely that the reason the tournament directors didnt take any action is that when seen in context the coffee-housing wasnt really viewed as that much of an issue.

Scotty has apologized following the shown coverage, but really this is a media frenzy gone bananas rather than a true reflection of one of the game’s great eccentrics.

The PokerStars Sunday Million picked up an impressive 7557 entrants this week, meaning the $1.5 million guaranteed prizepool was met with no overlays

After over 10 hours of poker NFrost_10 took it down.   There was a 2-way chop of $140K each and then NFront_10 scooped the extra $30K left on the table

1st NFrost_10 United States  $170,900.91
2nd es_dame  Denmark $140,900.91
3rd karelli  Poland $84,638.40
4th Duffs#1fan United States $69,524.40
5th SonnyInMtl Canada $54,410.40
6th lecharentais Poland $39,296.40
7th kidkanda99 Canada $26,449.50
8th hidden1s United States $17,381.10
9th afiopeneyes2 United States $10,579.80 

 4880 players showed up for the Main Event of FTOPS IX on Full Tilt, each paying $535 for the privaledge.   12 hours of top class poker saw dubbeemin take down over $400K and the title

1. dubbeemin - $432,400
2. valleyho - $262,500
3. TheTotalPkg - $170,000
4. Pokerguru19 - $132,500
5. sckilla - $100,000
6. hemlock1313 - $75,000
7. tvcsa - $57,500
8. aaaFRANCESCOzzz - $43,750
9. TiltinShoes - $32,500

Notable finish for B_O_K_E in 23rd

The PokerStars Sunday Million picked up 7651 entrants this week.  The tournament took 8 hours 44 mins to complete, with Gunslinger3 emerging the victor.

 Result

1. Gunslinger3 - $140,921.00
2. M.nosbocaJ - $89,013.00
3. OCTAGONS - $88,441.00
4. RBC* - $121,197.00
5. bastinho06 - $88,441.00
6. x-13 - $39,020.10
7. Neab - $26,778.50
8. exomil - $17,597.30
9. Octavian_C - $10,711.40

There was a 5-way chop this week

With the guarantee for the PokerStars Sunday Million going up to $1.5 million, there was a lot of cash on offer in this week’s tournament.  8236 players entered, looking for their slice.

What happened at the final table was nothing short of miraculous.  With the blinds at 150K/300K with a 30K ante, shortstack ziggy47 looked doomed to a very early exit, with basically a couple of big blinds remaining.

Here are the chip counts are the beginning of the final table:

Seat 1:- WSODice (11,975,400)
Seat 2:- ziggy47 (881,147)
Seat 3:- YrrsiNN (12,714,714)
Seat 4:- Foggsy (6,038,604)
Seat 5:- okidokiclub (5,543,549)
Seat 6:- ohhaaahhh (23,343,672)
Seat 7:- j.thaddeus (9,409,657)
Seat 8:- puntnko (10,016,289)
Seat 9:- lissem (2,436,968)

After a somewhat dramatic comeback, Ziggy47 found himself heads-up sat on around 52 million.   He raised to 1.9 million and puntnko reraised to 6.4 million. ziggy47 launched all-in  and puntnko called.

ziggy47 showed Ac Js
puntnko showed Ad 9h

Flop:- 8c Ah 2d
Turn:- 7c
River:- 5h

The monumental comeback was complete and ziggy47 was crowned the Sunday Million winner

Here is the full result (there was a 2-way chop before they played on for the title)

1. ziggy47 (Unted States) $182,438.77
2. puntnko (Australia) $151,283.95
3. j.thaddeus (Ireland) $91,419.60
4. ohhaaahhh (Unted States) $74,124.00
5. okidokiclub (Netherlands) $57,652.00
6. YrrsiNN (Switzerland) $41,180.00
7. Foggsy (Unted Kingdom) $28,826.00
8. WSODice (Unted States) $18,942.80
9. lissem (Norway) $11,530.40

8370 players entered the PokerStars Sunday Million this week.  The event took around 11 hours to complete

There was a 4-way chop of the money, and then those 4 players played on for the placings and the $30K left on the table

1st avkid86 — $138,101
2nd strahhh25 — $118,193
3rd pokerbrat13 — $138,078
4th Gambooooool — $113,017
5th tonijeromi — $58,590
6th dapoopta — $41,850
7th Jimboski30 — $29,295
8th gio_piso — $19,251
9th DonC33 — $11,718

Full Tilt Poker - Sunday Mulligan Result ($750K Guaranteed)

1st syzygy-1-1-1-1 — $143,285
2nd govshark2 — $86,739
3rd Babooyah — $56,798
4th blizair — $44,627
5th thekellster89 — $33,511
6th Brundaddy — $24,829
7th IndianRope — $18,662
8th Capax Infiniti — $14,605
9th EricaSchoenberg — $10,873

413 entrants made it for The Super Tuesday on PokerStars this week.  ely_cash41 emerged as the eventual winner after over 7 hours of play

1st ely_cash41 - $89,001.50
2nd bullgoose4 - $61,950
3rd 19FMS86 - $41,300
4th ftb_1988 - $33,040
5th Bounatirou - $24,780

The Full Tilt Sunday Mulligan, hit a million prizepool this week.  Top online player AJKHoosier1 had an impressive result in 2nd place

1st GulahPapyrus — $219,773
2nd AJKHoosier1 — $134,895 (Alex Kamberis)
3rd hurikane3 — $88,293
4th A__theKevlar__2 — $70,442 (Kevin Schulz)
5th SitAndStack — $53,311
6th Chipleader56 — $38,336
7th Nom Sayin — $28,153
8th acatlover — $22,043
9th ILIKEPONIES — $16,772

There were 8589 entrants in this weeks Sunday Million on PokerStars.  SAM66 took it down with no chop

1. SAM66 $209,571.60
2. Shantaram $141,718.50
3. MrMuck1976 $95,337.90
4. rubenrtv $77,301.00
5. pepperdiablo $60,123.00
6. my_emolument $42,945.00
7. moorten $30,061.50
8. Axinar $19,754.70
9. Cjh1224 $13,398.84