The September 2012 tournament was hosted by Grover at the Ivymount Poker Center for Performing Arts. As always, it was a great spread of food all made by Grover with tender loving care. Though Eric Johnson had perhaps the most expensive food provided when he hosted, Grover always has the most time put into his. Grover is one of the best RPT hosts and I personally thank him for his time.
20 folks came out to play this month. Jeff Dixon was Beer Bitch this month. He did a poor job of providing beers for his other players and may win the award for the worst Beer Bitch of the year. I assume he was just frustrated in getting his fourth Beer Bitch finish in his RPT career which moves him into 2nd place behind Grover.
One of the most remarkable features of the tournament was watching pocket Aces get cracked on three different times to very interesting hands. The first one was early in the tournament and had Glenn with A’s and Brian Harnish with J’s. Harnish was all-in and caught a J on the River to pull out a set against Glenn. The second one had Mr. Tinker all in against Wilenski. John had A’s and Mr. Tinker had K’s. Mr. Tinker ends up catching a K to pull past John’s Aces. Tough losses.
The third was more of a misplay of the A’s then the A’s getting busted. Brian Bennett was slow playing his A’s in the small blind and limped in with Jason Ostendorf checking his big blind. The flop hits 8-4-3 in all different suits. Brian bets into the flop and Jason calls. The Turn is a 3. Bennett goes all in and Jason calls. Brian shows his A’s and Jason shows his 3-7 offsuit. The River comes out as a 8 which gives Voldemort a full house beating Brian’s A’s. Lesson learned: If you are going to slow play, you might get burned.
Voldemort cracks A's with big blind special
The final table consisted of Tony Huckstein, Brian Ross, Chad Twigg, FedEx, Voldemort, Wilenski, Mr. Tinker, Grover, and Doug Deleo. Grover and Mr. Tinker had solid stacks. Tony had 200 chips to his name and was quick to depart. Brian Ross was the next to go after going all-in with 5’s and Voldemort called with A-3. Voldemort caught a 3 on the Flop and another 3 on the River to make a set. 3’s were very kind to Voldemort this tournament. Doug was next out. Mr. Tinker then was all in against Wilenski. Mr. Tinker had A-Q and John had Q-J. If you are scoring at home, Mr. Tinker is statistically a 75% favorite to win the hand preflop. John ends up catching a J on the flop and that is all the board gives. This was John’s revenge for his A’s getting cracked by Mr. Tinker earlier. Grover was next out after what I can only call sloppy play and bad betting with his large chip stack. I believe he ended his night calling an all-in with 5-6 suited against Chad. Throughout this entire time, FedEx is quietly sitting with the small stack and biding his time. John was next to leave. He pushed all-in with 9’s against Chad who called with his A-J. For a 50/50 preflop odds perspective, the flop couldn’t have been more unkind to Wilenski: A-A-J. This gave Chad a boat and the turn card, an A, gave him Quad Aces. Just a tough break but a well played tournament by Wilenski.
The final three were now set: Voldemort, Chad, and FedEx. Chad and Voldemort had huge stacks. I missed the details of the hand but Volemort was the next out and gave Chad roughly 97% of the chips in the tournament. FedEx is now sitting heads up with a tiny stack and simply asks: “Want to chop the pot?” Got to love the optimism. After that, it was pretty straight forward as Chad ends up winning after an impressive march through the final table. Chad had gotten to the tournament early that night and prophetically declared that he would win tonight. He was right. This is Chad’s 2nd win and his 3rd top 3 finish of the year.
As far as the final table results, Voldemort continues his march towards RPT POY with another strong finish. The Top 8 is still wide open with roughly 17 players still in the running. The October and November tournaments are going to be huge in deciding who makes and who doesn’t make the Final Table. See you all next week.