Hidden Court West - Eric W. outdrew opponents Marc H. and Jason Tr. in the early Sunday morning hours to claim Event VIII in Season IV of the Fish 'N' Chips Poker Tour!
The last two league events were gimmicky variations of hold'em. Event 8 saw the return of the "Cadillac of Poker"...No Limit Texas Hold 'Em.
The event booked full weeks in advance at 20 players. But for the second consecutive event, a player dropped out late due to sickness. This time it was Anita G. and the culprit was likely ranch dressing from Buddy's Pizza in Livonia the night prior. Substitute Mike M. filled the seat late keeping the event full at 20 players.
Fran D. was the first elimination after not electing to rebuy. Fran may have suffered tournament fatigue from playing in the QPT Satellite just prior to the tournament. Jason Ta. followed Fran to the rail (out 19th) also not exercising a rebuy. Jim O. was next (out 18th + a rebuy), followed by spouse Lolly (out 17th).
Kevin A. headed to the cash table in 16th place after Jason Tr's top pair of 10's held in a race. Nick G. followed on a rebuy (out 15th) who was followed by Chris S. who's all-in with pocket 6's was out-drawn by Eric W's A-T.
Sean O. bowed out in 13th place followed by Angie S. who's pocket 9's ran into a buzz saw in the form of Mike T's pocket aces.
Despite being the chip leader through the first 3 levels of the tourney, Keith K. found himself card dead and frustrated after a seat change to the black table. After being crippled holding pocket jacks (he won 3 huge earlier pots holding them), Keith moved his short stack in with Q-J. Jason Tr. and "Buffalo" Bill B. both called all-in as well. Bill tabled pocket 8's while Jason showed pocket 6's. But a 6 came on the flop giving Jason a flopped set. No help came for Keith or Bill on the turn and river and they were eliminated in 11th and 10th place respectively thus forming the final table.
Mike M. was the first elimination from the final table followed by Jim H. who dodged a few bullets before finally succumbing to the hand of Mike T. Chris Ba. built a huge chip stack early on, but just like Keith, a brutal 2 hours dwindled him down leaving him no choice but to push with Q-4. Unfortunately Eric looked him up with a bigger kicker and Chris was out in 7th place.
With 6 players left and blinds at 1,600/3,200/400, John raised to 11.5k. Mike called with J-9. The flop brought 8-10-Q giving Mike a flopped straight. John made a continuation bet of 11.5k and Mike quickly raised to 30k. John moved all-in and Mike snap called. John tabled pocket 8's for a flopped set while Mike showed his straight which was a 65% to 35% favourite. The turn brought a 3 keeping Mike in front. However the river brought a 10 giving John a full house and Mike 6th place.
Tom became the event's "Bubble Boy" (eliminated in 5th place) when he pushed-in his short stack holding pocket 10's and got a caller in Jason Tr. in the BB holding Q-J. Tom dodged the flop however a jack fell on the turn giving Jason the lead. The river brought no assistance and Tom was out.
4-handed play between Eric, John, Marc and Jason continued in the 3k/6k/500 blinds level when John took a big blow to his stack courtesy of Eric. Less than 10 minutes later, John pushed with K-Q suited. Eric looked him up with pocket aces and the overall points leader graciously bowed out in 4th place.
Eric, Marc and Jason played 3-handed into level 15 where blinds reached a staggering 5k/10k/1k. Eric had 202k, Marc had 140k and Jason had 114k. It was nearly 2am and all three players agreed to chop the prize money based on the percentage of chips held to the remaining prize pool and play out the next hand or hands face-up until one player held all the chips. It took only one hand.
On the final hand, Eric was dealt Qh-3h, Marc Qs-6d and Jason Ah-Kc. The 8d-9h-Kh gave Jason a huge lead over his opponents with a 84.5% to a 9.91% and a 5.59% advantage. The Kh turn took Marc out of contention for the hand but gave Eric a flush draw. And as fate would have it, the 10h came on the river giving Eric a winning flush, first place points and John the $55 RJP. Because Marc had more chips than Jason, he was awarded 2nd place.
With the win, Eric moves into 2nd place in the standings, just 3.68 points behind the overall leader "Captain" John M.
~Jason Tr.
April 8 Update
With the win in Event 8, Eric picked up a healthy dose of points and climbed to the top of the leaderboard. It wasn't enough to overcome John's monstrous lead, however. Jason Ta. and Bill both fell back one spot to round out the top half of the April 8. With his third place finish, Jason Tr. inched up one spot to fifth. Marc made his first appearance in the April 8, stringing together back-to-back second place finishes and pushing both Keith and Tom back in the standings. Fran's disappointing 20th place finish in E8 dropped him out of the April 8, but still within striking distance.
1. John M.(41.64 points)
2. Eric W. (37.96 points)
3. Jason Ta. (31.77 points)
4. Bill B. (28.86 points)
5. Jason Tr. (26.49 points)
6. Marc H. (26.44 points)
7. Keith K. (24.03 points)
8. Tom W. (22.91 points)
On the outside looking in are a slew of dangerous players. Angie maintained her spot in 9th (19.87 points) despite a 12th place finish in E8. Behind her are players that would certainly be fighting it out for the top spots had they not missed a couple of events: most impressive is Chris Ba., who jumped 4 spots to 10th place (19.25 points) despite playing in only 3 events; Chris is followed closely by Lolly in 11th place (19.16 points) who has missed two events and Fran in 12th (19.08) who has not only missed two events, but had to take a penalty when he found out about a surprise birthday party hours before Event 4. Last season's league chump (damn autocorrect) Jim H. is also in the running; even though he has missed three events, he has accumulated enough points (18.89) to put him in 13th place. The last three events should be interesting with enough points at stake that any one of these players could end up in the April 8.
