Tao of Poker: Dr. Pauly's WSOP Poker Blog and Sports Betting Discourses

By Pauly
Las Vegas, NV

Day 5. WSOP Main Event. 407 players remain. This is the day when the compelling stories emerge, scandals are revealed, and when the remaining pros garner more media attention than they have ever seen before. Let's not forget about the unknowns who all of a sudden become known players.

Today could be another abbreviated day since the goal is 175 players or five levels whichever comes first.

The Amazon Ballroom is substantially less crowded. The cash games are no longer in service and the thick-necks from the cage removed all of the lock boxes. There's a decent sized crowd for a Sunday morning. Some of the fans are still drunk from the night before. I can smell the booze seeping through their sweat glands from all the way up in the press box.

* * * * *
12:01pm.... Day 5 Begins...

The featured TV table is stacked with Elky, Happy Shulman, Rolf, Slotboom, Andy Black, and Tyler Patterson from Seattle.

DonkeyBomber has a tough table that includes... Tony Bagels, Jose Rosenkrantz and Kevin Saul. Another tough table... Prahlad Friedman, Vitaly Lunkin, and Jimmy Tran.

Julian Brecard has fellow Frenchman Fabrice Soulier and the legendary Bobby Baldwin at his table.

Sarne Lightman has lots of bullets and he's gonna need them at is table that includes Blair Rodman and David Benyamine.

Within seconds of cards going in the air, a player was busted on the first hand.

* * * * *
1:05pm... Bobby Baldwin Eliminated; Down to 348

Chip Leaders: Gabe Wells, Ludovic Lacay, and Matt Affleck
Recent Eliminations: Bobby Baldwin, David Levi, Jon Eaton, Sorel Mizzi, and Thor Hansen
Players Remaining: 348

The tables are breaking faster than I can keep up. Every few minutes, another table is broken and the room gets just a little bit smaller and colder. Kara Scott and Joe Hachem were together at the same table for a brief moment until they got broken.

I was sweating Julian's table who happened to have two shortstacks in Bobby Baldwin and David Zeitlin from NYC. Zeitlin is still alive, but Baldwin is out. His Jacks ran into Julian's tens. The lucky Frenchman flopped a ten and his set held. Baldwin is nevermore.

Dan Harrington is sporting a neck brace. Yesterday, he was without one. ESPN announcer Lon has been hobbling around on crutches and said something about knee surgery. That's what happened when you try to jump over parking meters for prop bets.

* * * * *
2:05pm... Vitaly Lunkin Eliminated; Down to 320

Chip Leaders: Gabe Walls and Ludovic Lacay
Recent Eliminations: Vitaly Lunkin, Burt Boutin, Hungarian cash game guru Richard Toth, CK Hua
Players Remaining: 320

I spoke to Ilya, my Russian colleague and he mentioned that Vitaly Lunkin had some bad karma coming his ay after he won a crazy hand on Saturday with K-7 against A-A and K-K. Shit happens, but today it was Lunkin's turn to get on the short end of the stick. He had Aces snapped off by 5-2! That hand crippled him and he was out soon after.

Dave Z from NYC has 150K. He picked up a small pot when someone raised from MP and he shoved from the button with A-Qo. No action for Dave Z, but he's still alive and might be one of the shortest stacks left among the final 300+ players.

Julian Brecard is up to 1.8 million. He now has a fourth story added to his chip stack. He's slowly amassing the Eiffel Tower of chip stacks. Since Elky and Ludovic slipped, Julian is the overall French chipleader. Benjo has 1% of Julian. I have 0%. But Julian said he'd buy me my own In-N-Our Burger franchise if he won the Main Event.

Here's an unofficial and incomplete list of players who busted today...

The following players won $27,469:
361 Kevin Mccarthy
362 Jeremy Kottler
363 Mo Hammoud
364 Gene Castro
365 Matt Molinari
366 Sorel Mizzi
367 David Whalen
368 David Levi
369 Marla Schwartz
370 Michael Reed
371 Charles Chrysostomou
372 Tyson Marks
373 Soutchay Chansombath
374 Michael Bisutti
375 Jon Eaton
376 John Bunch
377 Chris Viox
378 Arjan van Bavel
379 Rellie Sigua
380 Fergal Nealon
381 David Rubin
382 Brian Kennedy
383 Nick Brancato
384 James Bayer
385 Dariusz Paszkiewicz
386 Jeffrey Anderson
387 Thor Hansen
388 Thad Wolff
389 Christopher Adlesh
390 Ray Deruyn
391 David Blatte
392 Amir Esfandiary
393 C.K. Hua
394 Daniel Rudd
395 Vincent Curry
396 Todd Lundwall
397 William Robertie
398 Peter Debaene
399 Matthew Waxman
400 Ross Mallor
401 Jarrod Holmes
402 Jeff Kimber
403 Isidro Martinez
404 Emma Grace
405 Keith Burt
406 Joseph Michael
407 Leo Labbe

The live updates will be sporadic because I'm playing in the Dream Team Poker event which starts at 2pm in the Brasilia Room. My team is called Tao of Pokerati. My teammates? Michalski and Lana 'LJ' Maier. She's a last minute replacement for Shaniac and our X-factor.

You can follow my progress in Dream Team Poker via Twitter or come on down to Brasilia Room to sweat the action.

* * * * *
3:15pm... Go DonkeyBomber!

Chip Leaders: Gabe Walls and DonkeyBomber
Recent Eliminations: Nick Binger, Kevin Saul
Players Remaining: 265

DonkeyBomber crippled Kevin Saul with A-A against Saul's Big Slick. Kara Scott just doubled up.

Phil Ivey is having a rough afternoon. He took a hit with set over set.

Sorry for the lack of updates... over in Dream Team Poker, I have almost 14K. I have John 'Schecky' Caldwell's table and 2009 WSOP bracelet winner Michael Davis at my table. Oh, and there's a sizzling Viet-hottie who is on Liz Lieu's team. Hubba Hubba.

* * * * *
6:25pm... 190 Players Remaining

Chip Leaders: Warren Zackey
Recent Eliminations: Dan Harrington, Kara Scott, Mickey Mills, Tyler Patterson, Carl Olson, Justin Henry, Tony Bagels
Players Remaining: 190

Elky and Hachem have been playing at the featured TV table and the defending champ is still alive.

Play will be over shortly. Stay tuned for more info...

Sorry for the lack of updates... I'm still in the Dream Team tournament. LJ is out, but Michalski is up to over 50K while I have 42K.

* * * * * *
9:34pm... Day 5 Complete

Here's who won money today...

The following players won $36,626...
186 Lou Diamond Phillips
187 Huub Verdonschot
188 Paul Lieu
189 Eugene Fouksman
190 Corey Hochman
191 Mike Linn
192 Adam Sanders
193 Adam Croffut
194 Charles Wood
195 David Fox
196 Daryl Jace
197 Jonathan Cohen
198 Jaroslaw Jaskiewicz
199 Ilosvay Zsolt
200 Kevin Jenkins
201 Steven Doebler
202 Hans Hein
203 Estelle Denis
204 Brian Brubaker
205 Nick Schulman
206 Adam White
207 Mickey Mills
208 Kyle Wilson
209 Joe Monro
210 Tyler Patterson
211 Joseph Baldwin
212 Mark Fisher
213 Benjamin Kramer
214 Tom Lutz
215 Claudio Baptista
216 Kevin O'Donnell
217 Oliver Klatt
218 Richard Washinsky
219 Carl Johnson
220 Donald Crabtree
221 Patrick O'Malley
222 Saar Wilf
223 Guy Calvert
224 Alfio Battisti
225 Wayne Lewis

The following players won $32,963...
226 Amir Lehavot
227 Patrick Hanoteau
228 Pedro Fernandez Cavazos
229 Antonio Cavezza
230 Kyle Bowker
231 Ed Perry
232 David Russell
233 David Patent
234 Robert Preston
235 Justin Henry
236 Michael Castaldo
237 Todd Hunter
238 Kara Scott
239 Gabe Walls
240 Samuel Edwards
241 Ashley Cheung
242 Mads Andersen
243 Will Haydon
244 Vijayan Nagarajan
245 Jordan Rich
246 Benjamin Kang
247 Dan Shak
248 Jonathan Wertheim
249 Jeffrey Papola
250 Bruce Perry
251 Luis Silva Salinas
252 Dan Harrington
253 Sean Nolan
254 Carl Olson
255 Casey Sobczewski
256 Chad Awerbuch
257 Maxim Semisoshenko
258 Scott Baumstein
259 Markus Gonsalves
260 Thong Tran
261 Dominik Kulicki
262 David Zeitlin
263 Rolf Slotboom
264 Meyer Rainer
265 Steve Garfinkle
266 Charles Lehr
267 Craig Ivey
268 Gordon Eng
269 Sean Lew
270 Andrew Li
271 Frank Lomanno
272 Jesse Chinni
273 Ken Harbaugh
274 Brendan Taylor
275 Steve Phung
276 Vincent Mack
277 Sven Mol
278 Michael Shvartsman
279 Matt Schwarmann
280 Peter Kremenliev
281 Osmin Dardon
282 Jeremy Wien
283 Josh Tieman
284 Jeffrey Cuccurullo
285 Jacob Avital
286 Henrik Warn
287 Jeremy Maher
288 Rebecca Campbell
289 Mauro Corsetti

The following players won $29,911...
290 Allen Kennedy
291 Matthew Kurtz
292 Gjorgji Chuchuk
293 Nicholas Binger
294 James Keys
295 Lasse Nielsen
296 Kirk Banks
297 Adam Knepp
298 Fabian Ortiz
299 Nicholas Niergarth
300 Roger Pruzansky
301 Scott Buller
302 Jason Ramirez
303 Patrick Stemper
304 Erik Van Den Berg
305 Jamie Shaevel
306 Gregg Turk
307 Quentin Lae
308 Kevin Saul
309 Kenny Hsiung
310 Cornel Cipman
311 Olivier Busquet
312 Zhehao Zhang
313 Paul Houston
314 Niclas Elfstedt
315 Robert Lederer
316 Roger Goa
317 David Wickman
318 Craig Zotter
319 David Hong
320 Joshua Chait
321 Felix Osterland
322 Scott Mayfield
323 Kyriacos Dionysiou
324 Jose Carlos Paz Gutierrez
325 Igor Holiday
326 Zachary Walker
327 Thomas Koral
328 Stan Jablonski
329 Andrew Tuttle
330 Brian Taylor
331 Vincent Bartello
332 Mikael Ay
333 Antoine Dugast
334 Thomas Eggers
335 Huynh 'Coba' Cao
336 Tome Cardoso
337 Robert Lipkin
338 Burt Boutin
339 Raul Paez
340 Benjamin Eilers
341 Jaime Roberts
342 Joshua Mancuso
343 David Lovelace
344 Ron Amos
345 Jared Bluestein
346 Vitaly Lunkin
347 Rudy Carson
348 Dieter Albrecht
349 Sander Lylloff
350 Remy Biechel
351 Andy Black
352 Bobby Baldwin
353 Nicholas Power
354 David Pacheco
355 Shawn Pilot
356 Michael Brooks
357 Nicklas Flisberg
358 Richard Harrington
359 Thuyen Doan
360 Richard Toth

And here's some official info...

End of Day 5 - Top 10 Chip Counts:
1 Warrn Zackey, Waren (Honeydew, South Africa) - 4,872,000
2 Kasapr Cordes, Kasper (Copenhagen, Denmark) - 4,352,000
3 Darvin Moon, Darvin (Oakland, MD) - 3,218,000
4 Tom 'DonkeyBomber' Schneider (Scottsdale, AZ) - 3,168,000
5 Bernie Perner (Austria) - 3,022,000
6 Miika Puumalainen (Kuopip, Finland) - 2,894,000
7 Matt Affleck (Seattle, WA) - 2,882,000
8 Charlie Elias (Sydney, Australia) - 2,780,000
9 James Akenhead (London, United Kingdom) - 2,692,000
10 Steven Begleiter (Chappaqua, NY) - 2,621,000

Notables Who Advanced to Day 6:
12 Boeken, Noah 2,338,000
24 Lacay, Ludovic 1,817,000
32 Soulier, Fabrice 1,663,000
45 Ivey, Phil 1,380,000
53 Dang, Hac 1,286,000
54 Hinkle, Blair 1,284,000
55 Levy, Steve 1,278,000
56 Shulman, Jeff 1,266,000
58 Esfandiari, Antonio 1,227,000
60 Brecard, Julien 1,211,000
61 Tran, Theo 1,205,000
62 Morgan, Jordan 1,202,000
76 Serock, Joe 1,014,000
78 Phillips, Dennis 1,009,000
80 Sebok, Joe 992,000
82 Grospellier, Bertrand 973,000
83 Eastgate, Peter 927,000
85 Rodman, Blair 905,000
91 Lightman, Sarne 889,000
101 Benyamine, David 764,000
102 Tran, Kenny 752,000
106 Tran, J.C. 720,000
107 Friedman, Prahlad 715,000
110 Bjorin, Chris 693,000
123 Crowe, Owen 640,000
124 Rosenkrantz, Jose 630,000
137 Hachem, Joe 540,000
180 Cloutier, Eric 212,000