We have experienced the frills of the World Series of Poker 2009, with 56 events and a punishing 13 days of play in the Amazon Room at the Rio All-Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, the final table of the 2009 World Series of Poker (WSOP) Main Event was been decided.
At the start of Day 8 we had a total of 27 players back to the Amazon Room at Noon on Wednesday with dreams of being at the final table of the most prestigious poker tournament in the world. Everyone remaining would receive a minimum of $352,832, but the true aim was on making the November Nine final table. Leading the pack was poker newbie Darvin Moon, a logger from Maryland, who held slightly over 20,160,000 chips as play began.
Leo Margets is the last female standing, who came to the start of play as one of the shorter stacks in the room, she was the first to depart in 27th place. She was shortly followed by notable players including Antonio Esfandiari (24th place for his largest WSOP cash ever) and Day Six leader Warren Zackey, who dropped from the tournament in 22nd place after his pocket deuces were out-floped by Ian Tavelli’s [Qs] [Js]
Tavelli’s aggressive play eventually caught up with him, the 21-year old was eliminated in 17th place ($500,557). Almost immediately after Tavelli’s departure, one of France’s top professional players, Ludovic Lacay, was defeated by Jeff Shulman in 16th place.
As the field continued to dwindle, both Darvin Moon and Steve Begleiter used their large stacks to climb to astronomical levels at the tables. Moon never seemed to be in any trouble during play on Wednesday and Begleiter, continued his march up the leaderboard. For all of their work, however, most of the eyes in the Amazon Room where following Top poker professional Phil Ivey.
Ivey has had one of his best World Series of Poker's ever with his skills at their highest level for some years. He has captured two bracelets during the six weeks of the WSOP tournament and had been at or around the top of the Main Event leaderboard since Day 1 started. Starting the day with over 11 million in chips, Ivey seemed happy to sit back and manage his stack, being aware of the 2 hour blind levels and plenty of chips in front of him. I am sure he is scouting potential opponents should they reach the November Nine final table.
After over 11 hours of battle, the final table of the Main Event was determined. The unlucky Bubble Boy was pro player Jordan Smith, who fell in tenth place ($896,730) at the hands of our November Nine Chip Leader Darvin Moon, his Pocket Ace's losing to pocket 8's with a [8c] [4d] [2d] flop.
World Series of Poker 2009 - November Nine
These are the nine players who will gather at the Rio in November to determine the next WSOP Main Event Champion:
- Darvin Moon (Oakland, Maryland) – 58,930,000
- Eric Buchman (Valley Stream, New York) – 34,800,000
- Steve Begleiter (Chappaqua, New York) – 29,885,000
- Jeff Shulman (Las Vegas, Nevada) – 19,580,000
- Joe Cada (Shelby Township, Michigan) – 13,215,000
- Kevin Schaffel (Coral Springs, Florida) – 12,390,000
- Phil Ivey (Las Vegas, Nevada) – 9,765,000
- Antione Saout (Paris, France) – 9,500,000
- James Ankenhead (London, England) – 6,800,000
With our some of the top poker professional players including Ivey, Shulman (Editor of CardPlayer Magazine), and Ankenhead in the mix, some are reporting that this will be one of the strongest Main Event final tables of the past few years.
Play will pause on the Las Vegas leg of this year’s WSOP, however focus is now turn to Europe in London, with four events to go. The 2009 WSOP Europe, beginning in September, will offer a chance for the survivors of the Main Event to tune up their games. The November Nine then will emerge from their respite. All are now dollar millionaires, but the eventual winner will take the $8.5 million first place prize.
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