| Event #4 $1,000 Limit Hold'em
WE HAVE A zzzzzzzzzzzzz WINNER
Remind me to call in sick the next time there is a Limit Hold'em event.
There were 73 entries, 9 were paid. Total prize pool: $70,810. Each player started with 2,000 in chips so there were 146,000 total chips in play.
FINAL TABLE
Seat/Player/Hometown/Chips
Seat 1 Andrew Bloch Las Vegas NV 19,400
Seat 2 Jim Meehan Las Vegas NV 9,800
Seat 3 Paul Kroh Battle Mountain NV 3,500
Seat 4 Naresh Ghai New York NY 10,700
Seat 5 P T Hayes Las Vegas NV 16,100
Seat 6 J J Liu Palo Alto CA 13,000
Seat 7 David Sternbaum Houston TX 18,100
Seat 8 Aiten Hillel Los Angeles CA 50,300
Seat 9 Sam Lewis Las Vegas NV 5,100
There were 37 minutes left in the 300/500 blinds, playing 500/1,000
Eight hours and 318 hands. Almost half of all that time, three handed. Ever wonder why Limit Hold'em isn't a game loved by television? Watching this Final Table would give you your answer. In fact no one could watch it, outside of those of us who were paid to. Not even the loved ones could stick it out.
Watching this made Chinese water torture seem like a health spa.
After two hours of three handed play, Andy Bloch, David Sternbaum and Aiten Hillel were still about even. No one could go on a rush or go card dead. Whoever had the chip lead gave it right back to whomever was last of the three. Finally, a money deal was struck were each of the three remaining players saved $15,000 and they played for the $2,745 left in the prize pool. And a gold ring that came with the title..
So, the money's about gone. Do they speed up? NOOOOO! The three guys played for almost two more hours for pocket change. Bless their hearts, it wasn't as if they weren't trying to bust each other. The blinds climbed so slowly that no one was even threatened with an all-in.
At last Aiten Hillel went on a negative run and lost, with the best of it, all-in on hand 254. Aiten had A 7 to Andy Bloch's A 5. Bloch had been making two pair all day, so it wasn't much of a surprise when an Ace flopped an a three-out 5 hit the turn.
Heads up, Andy had a 79k to 67k chip lead on a very impressive player from Houston named David Sternbaum.
The chips ebbed and flowed back and forth between David and Andy for another 64 hands before just short of midnight, eight hours after beginning. Andy Bloch flopped top pair with his Q 3 of Hearts. David Sternbaum flopped an up and down straight draw with J 9 and missed. It was only the second hand David had been all-in on the entire 17 hours of tournament play yesterday and today. The guy can play Limit Hold'em.
This didn't start out like it was going to be a marathon. On hand 23 one of the several short stack made an exit in 9th. Sam Lewis is a Las Vegas promoter. He was unable to promote himself out of last place, however, when his A 8 caught top two pair on the flop. The problem was the third card on that clop. It was a 4 and made a set of 4''s.
J J Liu made her second Limit Hold'em Final Table in the second Limit event. Can't beat that.. In an uncharacteristic show of frustration for J J, she slammed the table on hand 42 when P T Hayes with A 3 versus her A K rivered a trey. Liu was a disappointing 8th for her. She is brimming with confidence right now.
Naresh 'Sunny' Ghai, which is a great nickname when you say his last name like guy, didn't feel so sunny when he was all-in from the small blind with J 10. The Ghai flopped an up and down straight draw. The straight didn't get there, but Jim Meehan's pocket Kings did. Sunny was a cloudy 7th.
Five hands later, Paul Kroh got a few extra bucks for 6th. He started dead last in chips and doubled up a few times to climb the money ladder. Raising nearly all-in to get some equity, Paul had the 9 7 of Hearts. Aiten Hillel had a real hand, K Q and flopped a Queen.
Jim Meehan was 5th. A Q for Jim. A 9 for Andy Bloch. The board comes 10 8 7 J 10, a straight. Bloch. This is after Andy had rivered an unbelievable two pair, earlier, against Jim with the J 4 of Hearts. Andy called to the river with only a 4 on the flop and caught another of his dozens of two pair hands with a Jack on the river.
P T Hayes is a craps dealer. He rolled snake-eyes on hand 93 when his A 10 of Diamonds, all-in, ran into J 8 from Andy Bloch and two Jacks on board.
As the guy on the radio says, "Now you know the REST of the story." Someone write me with his name, I'm cross-eyed with fatigue at 1:30 in the morning and I can't remember it.
It took three hours to dump six players and five more to get a zzzzzzzzzzzzz winner.
MikePaulle@PokerPages.com
| 
