Ryan Riess, a.k.a. “The Beast,” came back from the break to a stack of 3,000. “I’ll be all in a lot if you want to stick around,“ he told this reporter, so we did.
Riess was in the big blind and shoved over the top of an open to 425. No one looked him up and he added a few chips. The next hand he was in the small blind and completed and the big blind checked his option. The flop was and a bet of 350 from Riess won the pot.
On the button in the next hand, Riess opened for 450 and the big blind called. The flop was and both players checked. The turn was the and Riess called a bet of 550. A river card saw the big blind bet 750. Riess counted his stack and made the call but mucked when he was shown .
Not much longer after that Riess was dealt an ace and shoved for eight big blinds over an opening raise, but unfortunately for him got called and shown . His opponent's kicker was best, and after Riess's hand failed to catch up the 2013 Main Event Champion’s first event at this year’s WSOP came to an early end.
Eric Froehlich opened on the button for 375 and from the big blind, Dan Shak made it 1,200. Froehlich then four-bet to 2,975 and Shak five-bet shoved for nearly 8,000.
Froehlich called with and saw Shak turn over the .
Froehlich told PokerNews, “Seven in the window, king in the door.” Shak was eliminated with another player speculating later that maybe he had a dinner appointment.
Tony Cousineau has built a solid reputation as one of the tightest players in World Series of Poker history. If there’s a WSOP money bubble approaching somewhere in the Rio, Cousineau can likely be found short-stacked and folding to cash.
All jokes aside, this approach has seen him cash an astounding 59 times at the series, good for an impressive 13th on the WSOP All-Time Cashes list.
Here in the six-max, Cousineau has built himself a respectable 11,500-chip stack in the first four levels, making him an overwhelming favorite to cash in this event already.
Unfortunately, his reputation wasn’t enough to get him a small pot that was checked down three-handed just moments ago. With the board reading , Cousineau showed ace-high, but one opponent held to scoop it.
Greg Raymer has moved tables and has wasted no time in talking up a storm, entertaining the table with various stories of people he has played with and the bizarre poker theories they have told him about. For example, one group of amateurs had worked out that if they didn’t play a single hand on a Day 1 WSOP event they would be guaranteed to make Day 2. That seemed to tickle him.
There was no chat though when Raymer face off in a hand against David Zeitlin. The got to the turn of a board reading and Zeitlin check-called a bet of 700 from Raymer.
The river card was the and now Zeitlin led for 2,400. Raymer contemplated the board and raised him to 5,000. Zeitlin checked how much the bet was before giving up his hand.
Raymer was free to start talking again, and he did.
We mentioned Martin Staszko is short on chips, but then so are most of the other players on his table. The exception is Ryan Hughes, who seems to be vacuuming up all the chips. He was up to 24,000 at the start of a hand we just witnessed.
Hughes was in the small blind and called an open. The two players saw a flop of and Hughes then check-raised his opponent to 1,300 which was called.
The turn was the and Hughes checked again. His opponent went all in for 2,700 and after a quick look back at his cards, Hughes made the call. His opponent showed , but Hughes was ahead with . The river was the and another pile of chips headed over to the table's big stack.