WSOP What To Watch For: Phil Ivey Makes Fifth Final Table in Event #35
Wednesday is set to be an exciting day at the 2012 World Series of Poker as two more events will be looking to close out. Event #34: $5,000 Pot-Limit Omaha — Six-Handed and Event #35: Mixed Hold'em both have some interesting stories and you can find out more about them in this edition of the PokerNews What To Watch For.
Event #34: $5,000 Pot-Limit Omaha — Six-Handed
Can Kihara Continue To Shine?
Naoya Kihara — the man from Japan — simply stole the show during Day 2. If a player was eliminated, you could almost be sure that Kihara was the man wielding the axe. Kihara is a former Physics student from Tokyo, Japan, and his favorite game is Omaha hi-low 8-or-better. He is being supported by his girlfriend who has watched every hand for the past two days. Kihara told us that his most difficult opponent throughout these two days has been Shaun Deeb. Kihara goes into the final day as the chip leader with 1,548,000 chips.
Le Looks To Outdo His Brother
Tommy Le will head to the final day second in chips with 965,000. Le is only in the series to play in the Omaha games and the Main Event. Le originally earned his bankroll playing exclusively online, but like everyone else living in America, he has had to wander outdoors to earn a living. Included in Le's adventures are cash games in Macau where he has played against Sam Trickett and Tom Dwan. Le is the brother of well known professional Nam Le and will be looking to beat his brother to a WSOP gold bracelet.
Can Winzeler Best His Finish From Last Year?
When Jason Mercier won this event last year, he had to get through a heads-up encounter with Hans Winzeler and guess who is sitting in fourth place with 613,000 chips? That's right, Winzeler is back and he is determined to go one spot better this year and win his first-ever WSOP gold bracelet. Winzeler is quite the Omaha aficionado. On top of finishing second in this event last year, he took ninth in the $10,000 Pot-Limit Omaha Championship.
Plenty of Big Guns Still Remain
All this talk about gold bracelets and there are still two players left in the field who have a chance of grabbing their second piece of WSOP gold. Davidi Kitai won his WSOP gold bracelet playing pot-limit hold'em in 2008 and Jason DeWitt who won the $5,000 No-Limit Hold'em event in 2010 for $818,959. Add November Niner Joseph Cheong and European Poker Tour winner Kevin MacPhee into the mix and you have plenty to watch on the final day of Event #34: $5,000 Pot-Limit Omaha Six-Handed.
Event #35: Mixed Hold'em
Ivey Makes Fifth Final Table and Still Searching for Gold
All that needs to be said about Event #35 can be summed up in two words — Phil Ivey. He's making his fifth final table appearance of the 2012 WSOP. That's an absolutely amazing feat, but he has yet to win one and will be gunning harder than ever to get the gold. By making this final table, Ivey has tied Daniel Negreanu's record for most final tables in a single series.
It's no secret that Ivey has tons of money wrapped up in bracelet bets and he's as focused as ever to win those. He wants to be the greatest of all time and he has set the bar at 30 gold bracelets, but he can't get there unless he wins number nine. Will this finally be the one Ivey takes down?
As always, you can find PokerNews' coverage of the 2012 WSOP on our Live Reporting Pages. We look forward to having you follow along and stay tuned for plenty more from our What To Watch For series.
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