2008 WSOP Event 13 No-Limit Hold'em

Individual Event Reports

Event 13 -- No-Limit Hold'em Day 1

In another excellent sized turnout, 1397 players came to the table for this tournament. Size of the cash pool grew to $3,213,100, of which 99 will see a part of and the champion will pocket a sweet $666,697 for their efforts. The goal is 10 levels of play for the field with survivors to meet again tomorrow. A number of players complained that the cutoff of 99 players was too small, seeing that the average cutoff is 10% of the field number. The WSOP stated they did so to increase the payout for the final table. (Supposedly under Harrah's the payout schedule was changed to give more money to the players and not concentrate so much to the upper end of the field. Unfortunately Harrah's does not own the WSOP any more so I guess things were bound to change.) All levels last 60 min with all players starting with 5,000 in chips.

Players seen at the tables were Phil Hellmuth Jr., Jamie Gold, Lee Watkinson, Shannon Shorr, Layne Flack, Humberto Brenes, Jeff Madsen, T.J. Cloutier (who later busted Madsen out of the tournament), Vanessa Rousso, talk show host Montel Williams, Paul Darden, Andrew Black, Chris Ferguson, Jimmy Fricke, Courtney Harrington, Mark Seif and Event #1 champion Nenad Medic.

Lots of pain was handed out as many busted out of the tournament. We didn't get the details on Phil Hellmuth's bust, but with his past history it probably was not anything anyone wanted to be around. Following Phil for some fresh air were Brandon Cantu, Mike Matusow, Phil Laak, Clonie Gowan, Stuart Patterson, Jamie Gold, Jean-Robert Bellande, Hasan Habib and Amir Vahedi.

There were 137 left to move on to the next round of play. Here are the top 9 with chip counts:

1. Eli Elezra 147,500
2. Theo Tran 134,900
3. Greg Sellgren 130,000
4. Dean Bui 127,600
5. Napoleon Ta 127,200
6. Asger Boye 119,000
7. Marty Wong 113,700
8. Pedro Rios 113,500
9. Mathias Kuerschner 107,400

Event 13 -- No-Limit Hold'em Day 2

Today will be a good day as players will have the opportunity to see the money. There will be cash for the top 99 in this event. But in order to get there, some players have to be eliminated. Such as Eli Elezra who busted out from chip leader to railbird in 15 min, John Phan, Chris Ferguson who busted out just before the money, Lee Watkinson, Chau Giang, Craig Gray, Liz Lieu, Vanessa Selbst and Theo Tran on the way to the final table.

But there were those who performed well. Jason Sanders did so moving up from 63,000 on Day 1 to over 1 million to make the final table. So did Duncan Bell who doubled up frequently to grow his Day 1 stack from 42,500 to almost 2 million. Nathan Doudney did manage to hang on taking his Day 1 total of 55,000 and increasing it to 113,000 for the final table. Action will begin tomorrow continuing at level 21 with blinds at 12/24,000 and antes of 3,000.

1. Duncan Bell 1,966,000
2. Shawn Buchanan 1,133,000
3. Steve Merrifield 1,109,000
4. Jason Sanders 1,099,000
5. Brent Hanks 755,000
6. Brent Ditzik 384,000
7. Nicolas Levi 233,000
8. Ariel Soffer 191,000
9. Nathan Doudney 113,000

Event 13 -- No-Limit Hold'em Final Table

Here is an event summary as given by the WSOP:

So far at this year's WSOP, the average final table has run about seven hours in duration. However, this finale ended in slightly more than three hours. Only 73 hands were dealt. It was the quickest final table of the year. Last year's champion, Francois Safieddine entered the tournament, but did not cash. The champion's curse continues. To date at this year's WSOP, no defending champion has cashed in their respective event. Notable in-the-money finishers included former WSOP gold bracelet winners Patri Friedman (24th), Chau Giang (43rd), Paul Kobel (62nd), and Lee Watkinson (91st). Three former world poker champions entered this event � including Jerry Yang (2007), Jamie Gold (2006), and Phil Hellmuth (1989). None cashed.

The tournament was played over three consecutive days. Day Two ran longer than usual, due to the large field. On Day Three, the final table was dealt out on the ESPN stage, also known as the "feature table." The secondary final table, located adjacent to the main stage area, featured the conclusion of Event #14 in an intentional scheduling overlap. Most days at the WSOP this year will include two final tables.

Action continued at level 21 with blinds at 12/24,000 and antes of 3,000. In the first hour, players busted out of the tournament at an amazing rate. In 9th place two hands into play, Nicholas Levi lost his all-in bid against Steve Merrifield who had a set of 10's by the river. Then Brent Ditzik went out in 8th after his A Q met up with Duncan Bell's set of J's. Duncan next sent Ariel Soffer to the rail in 7th after he made a King high straight. Jason Saunders who was crippled in a prior hand battle with Brent Hanks who came up with quad Kings, left the building in 6th place when he met the full house of Duncan Bell (2's/6's).

Maybe 45 minutes went by before the elimination cascade began all over again. Brent Hanks went out in 5th holding A 2 which was outdone by the A 10 of Steve Merrifield with no other cards helping either player. Shawn Buchanan went out in 4th after his A K suited lost to Merrifield's pocket 9's that turned into a 9 high straight by the river. Merrifield then sent Nathan Doudney out in 3rd with the two pair he made by the turn (Ks and 8's).

With the blinds up to 20/40,000 and a 5,000 ante, heads up began with Duncan Bell having 3,300,000 and Merrifield with the same amount. After just 3 hands, the winning hand came. Both players saw a flop of 8s 6c 2s, after which both went all-in with their chips. Bell had pocket A's to the pocket 10's of Merrifield and after the turn and river bricked out, Duncan Bell became the newest WSOP champion and now has the gold bracelet to prove it.

1. Duncan Bell $666,697
2. Steve Merrifield $428,949
3. Nathan Doudney $260,261
4. Shawn Buchanan $218,491
5. Brent Hanks $178,327
6. Jason Sanders $139,770
7. Ariel Soffer $107,639
8. Brent Ditzik $83,541
9. Nicolas Levi $59,442