A FAIR FIGHT
When
the Final Table formed today, there were
three Texans and seven non-Texans sitting
at it. Why, down Texas way son, that's
what we'd call�a fair fight.
There
were 107 entrants in the $5,000 Pot-Limit
Omaha for a total prize pool of $502,900.
Two tables were paid, a total of 18 players.
It looked like the French were the only
Europeans to show up. Not true. This is
the WSOP. With a $5,000 buy-in, the stars
of poker from around the world are sure
to attend. Here are some of the 'names'
who played but didn't get paid: Jim Bechtel,
Lyle Berman, Chris Bjorin, Barny and Ross
Boatman, Humberto Brenes, John Cernuto,
Eskimo Clark, TJ Cloutier, Claude Cohen,
Allen Cunningham, Paul Darden, Ian Dobson,
Chris Ferguson, Layne Flack, Ted Forrest,
Phil Hellmuth, Phil Ivey, John Juanda,
John Kabbaj, Robin Keston, Jim Lester,
Kathy Liebert, O'Neal Longson, Marcel
Luske, Elie Marciano, Tom McEvoy, John
McIntosh, Men Nguyen, Scotty Nguyen, Amarillo
Slim, Ben Roberts, Erik Seidel, Mike Sexton,
Johan Storaakers, Surinder Sunar, Dewey
Tomko, Simon Trumper, David Ulliott, Ram
Vaswani, Steve Zolotow.
To
setup the Final Table Monday night, French
movie star/singer Patrick Bruel had A
K. The all-in Ralph Perry was completely
dominated with K Q.
THE
FINAL TABLE:
12 mins left of 75
The blinds were $1,000/$2,000
Player
Hometown Chip
Count
Seat
1 Ken Flaton Las Vegas NV $ 88,000
Seat 2 Issam Tannouri Paris, France $
39,000
Seat 3 Robert Williamson III Dallas TX
$103,000
Seat 4 Patrick Bruel Paris, France $ 88,500
Seat 5 Berry Johnston Las Vegas NV $ 51,000
Seat 6 Johnny Chan Houston TX $ 47,000
Seat 7 Jacky Chitwood Calina TN $ 44,000
Seat 8 Chau Giang Las Vegas NV $ 30,500
Seat 9 Reza Daeipour Paris, France $ 34,500
Seat 10 John Bonetti Houston TX $ 10,000
You'd have thought you were watching a
tournament at the Aviation Club in Paris
rather than one at the WSOP. To have three
Frenchmen and no other Europeans at the
table appeared bizarre. You could forgive
the Parisians for thinking that it was
the Americans who had come to visit them
at their home Club in Paris, not them
coming to Las Vegas.
This
report could have been called "Waiting
For Aces, the Sequel" after the last Pot-Limit
Omaha we had. Pocket Aces seems to be
the only hand these fellas have enough
confidence in to bet with any vigor. From
the beginning we were seeing maybe three
or four showdowns an hour. It was 'bet
and take it' or 'bet, call, bet out and
take it.' Seeing a turn card was cause
for crowd jubilation.
The
only thing that stops this process from
taking forever is the increasing blinds.
The short stacks are eventually forced
to make a move. That's what happened to
Reza Daeipour. He was running low on ammunition
so he reraised all-in from the small blind
with A Q 7 3. Jacky Chitwood had the Aces
this time and covered Reza. To no one's
surprise, the Aces were good. Aces up
sent one of three Parisians out for caf�
au lait..
In
a brief appearance by 'The Lion' John
Bonetti, we didn't get to hear him roar.
"I did the best I could, " John said.
He did well to move up to 9th with only
$10,000. Chau Giang seemed to be the only
player with guts and imagination. He saw
how tight this table was and stole plenty
of chips with raises. Caught on a steal
attempt from the button by Bonetti's all-in,
Giang turned over J 10 10 5. Bonetti had
a high wrap with K Q J 9. With three overcards,
John figured to win this hand, but it
didn't happen. The 10's played as 10's
up when the board came low and paired.
There
were 18 bracelets at this table to commence.
Six of them belonged to the 'Chinese Wall'
Johnny Chan. Today "the Orient Express"
was derailed by lack of cards. In one
hand where he said he had K K, Johnny
couldn't call a 'pot' raise after the
flop by John Williamson when it came Q
10 9. Chau Giang, who'd survived a couple
of all-in hands early to accumulate a
healthy stack with his aggressive play,
reraised Johnny all-in with Q J 9 8. Chan
had A 10 10 8. The wall crumbled in 8th
as Giang made Jacks full of 9's.
Now, we were down to only one Texan out
of seven players. But that Texan was the
confident chip leader. When he heard us
discussing the loss of two Texans, Robert
Williamson looked over to the writer's
area and said, "I'm the anchor."
In
Pot-Limit Omaha, the hand that gets whacked
the most it seems is pocket Kings. The
'Ace-Magnets' were working overtime today.
Issam Tannouri loves to show his hand.
It caused some tension at the other end
of the table, as they wanted to see it
also. Finally, Steve Morrow was able to
convince Issam that he'd get a penalty
if he didn't quit. Frustrated by not being
able to speak French between hands as
well, Tannouri seemed almost relieved
to find pocket Kings in his hand and to
go all-in. Issam's good buddy, Patrick
Bruel, did the honors with (of course)
pocket Aces. Issam got to go to a less
restrictive game in 7th.
Everyone had chips now, so it was an hour
of 'bet and take it.' In this game, if
you don't take enough turns you lose.
Jacky Chitwood didn't take enough turns
of 'bet and take it.' Jacky was the only
player at the table from the real world.
All the rest were either from Paris, Texas
or Las Vegas. Chitwood is probably the
best poker player in Calina Tennessee,
but Jacky didn't have enough chips to
stop Ken Flaton in the big blind from
calling his short stack all-in with an
underpair and getting there.
During
an early break, Berry Johnston went over
to someone in the stands and said, "Isn't
it unbelievable? I'm getting nothing."
The great Johnston, with a record 45 cashes
at the WSOP, couldn't even limp in against
the big blind. Berry being Berry, he just
kept tossing that garbage away until he
had no choice but to play. Patrick Bruel
flipped in the last $3k to cover Johnston's
all-in. Berry had the dreaded pocket Kings.
They don't need to find Aces to lose.
These Kings lost to 7's and 6's to give
Berry the berries in 5th.
Being
French, Patrick Bruel wanted to stop for
a dinner break. But Bob Williamson sensed
that Chau Giang was getting antsy. Bob
thought Giang would make a move to either
get more chips or go to a big, live game
somewhere else. Williamson was correct.
Giang did make a move. And for once pocket
Kings held up. That's because Chau's move
didn't have an Ace with it. Giang went
all-in with a high wrap, Q J 10 9. If
he'd had an Ace, he would have cracked
the pocket Kings again. The high straight
didn't materialize and Chau was free in
4th to go make real money.
With
Chau Giang gone, the remaining three chopped
up the prize money on chip count and played
for pocket change and the bracelet. Suddenly,
a game that had been so s-l-o-w got very
fast. Pocket Kings found a new way to
lose for Ken Flaton. He was all-in with
the unlucky pair and lost to Bob Williamson's
Q's and 10's.
"Remember
The Alamo!" Bob Williamson was the only
player of the last five without a bracelet.
He'd said he was "the achor" when it was
6-1 against Texas. Now it was 1-1. Paris
had Patrick Bruel and he was on a mission
to save his countries future. "When I
won in 1998," Patrick said, "France won
the World Cup two months later. So it
is very important that I win today for
France." Bruel was afraid if he lost,
France would lose the 2002 World Cup that's
being played this summer. Stay tuned 'cause
Patrick lost. He should have known better
than play pocket Kings. The next new way
they lost was to the nut straight by Bob
Williamson with a 7 5.
Maybe
three Texans against seven non-Texans
ISN"T a fair fight after all.
Mike Paulle
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