2014 WSOP APAC Day 3: Danzer Takes Over Player of the Year Lead; First Final Table
The 2014 World Series of Poker Asia-Pacific continued its third day of action on Saturday. The AU$1,100 No-Limit Hold'em Accumulator completed its second day of play, and the AU$2,200 No-Limit Hold'em kicked off in the afternoon.
AU$1,100 No-Limit Hold'em Accumulator
Day 2 of the opening AU$1,100 No-Limit Hold'em Accumulator event from the 2014 WSOP Asia-Pacific has reached its conclusion on Saturday night. The third and final day of play is just one night's sleep away, and that's the day when someone will be crowned the first gold bracelet winner from Down Under this year. Also awaiting the champion is AU$131,365 in prize money.
The man best positioned to capture the top prize is Luke Brabin. He bagged up 336,000 in chips and will lead the remaining 10 competitors into Day 3. This is an all-Australian final 10, and each player is guaranteed a minimum payday of AU$9,831.
Joining Brabin are Ryan Hong, Stephen Lindeblad, Brian McAllister, Didier Guerin, Kahle Burns, Zane Ly, Daniel Murphy, Piyush Gupta, and David Profaca.
More than 90 players began Day 2, including the big chip leader Scott Clements. Unfortunately for Clements, though, his run fell short of the money. Paul Sharbanee also fell short of the money, and he was the tournament's bubble after busting out in 55th place.
One player hitting a cash was Brandon Shack-Harris, but he could only muster a min-cash. Coming into this event, Shack-Harris led the WSOP Player of the Year race, but that's in the past. George Danzer — the man closely trailing Shack-Harris by less than 10 points — worked his way to a 22nd-place finish in this event and took over the pole position. Shack-Harris' run resulted in him earned 8.5 points towards the WSOP Player of the Year, whereas Danzer picked up 17 points. Danzer now leads the race with 762.2 points to Shack-Harris' 760.5.
Other notables to finish in the money were Antonio Esfandiari (45th - AU$2,560), Dan Heimiller (31st - AU$3,159), Julius Colman (25th - AU$4,094), and Jeff Madsen (19th - AU$5,591).
Day 3 will certainly be an exciting day on the felt. Just nine eliminations stand in the way between the crowning of the first gold bracelet winner from the 2014 WSOP Asia-Pacific, and it couldn't be a more exciting time at Crown Casino in Melbourne, Australia.
The action will commence at 12:10 p.m. local time with PokerNews live coverage plus a final-table live stream, and of course PokerNews will have a recap upon completion of play.
AU$2,200 No-Limit Hold'em
On Saturday, the 2014 WSOP APAC continued with Day 1 action from Event #2 $2,200 No-Limit Hold’em. The tournament – one of the new events added to the WSOP APAC schedule – attracted 215 players, but after ten one-hour levels of play, just 31 remained with Sam Ruha and his stack of 122,000 leading the way.
Ruha got some of his chips in Level 7 (200/400/50) when Daniel Negreanu opened for 950 from middle position and Ruha called. The 3♥7♣2♠ flop saw Ruha call a bet of 1,600, and then he called one of 2,800 when Negreanu bet the A♥ turn. Both players then checked the 6♦ river and Negreanu rolled over the 7♦10♦ for a pair of sevens. It was no good though as Ruha held an overpair with the 10♥10♣. Negreanu would fall later in the night while Ruha went on to bag up the chip lead.
Others who made it through with big stacks included Tim O’Shea (100,200), Michael O’Grady (82,200), Bill Zahris (82,100) and Sam Nee (68,400).
Straight out of the gate the tournament was characterized by one thing – eliminations. The reigning WSOP champ, Ryan Riess, was among the first to go when he ran kings into aces, but he was far from the last. Among those to exit on Day 1 were Vanessa Rousso, Jack Salter, Jonathan Dimmig, Jonathan Duhamel, Phil Hellmuth, Antonio Esfandiari, Brandon Shack-Harris, Jackie Glazier, Jonathan Little, Scott Clements, Bruno Politano, and George Danzer.
After finishing in 22nd place in Event #1 and surpassing Shack-Harris atop the 2014 WSOP Player of the Year leaderboard, Danzer jumped into Event #2 just as registration came to a close. Danzer managed to work his 6,000 starting stack up to 15,000 or so, but that's as high as he'd get.
Danzer lost a good deal of his chips when he raised from the button and then called a shove from the player in the small blind. Danzer was ahead with 3x3x against his opponent's KxQx, but a king on the river saw the German fall to six big blinds.
He got it in a short time later after two players had limped, one of which called him with 10x10x. Danzer held Ax9x but failed to improve. He confirmed that he will be playing Event #3 $1,650 Pot-Limit Omaha on Sunday.
While dozens fell, a lucky throng of players made it through to Day 2 including Dan Heimiller (55,200), Kitty Kuo (45,400), Russell Thomas (13,000), and Jeff Gross (13,000). The latter two will have their work cut out for themselves if they hope to make the money at the top 24 and contend for the $107,500 first-place prize.
The remaining 33 players will return to action at 12:30 p.m. local time on Sunday, and the plan is to play down to the final table of nine. Of course the PokerNews Live Reporting Team will be there every step of the way to bring you all the action in our live reporting blog.
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