Phil Hellmuth has made three final tables on the World Poker Tour. He’s gone o’fer three. He’s entered countless more and gone O’fer all of them. That being said Phil Hellmuth is the greatest poker player in the world–just ask him. Ask anybody else and you’ll get answers as varied as “The greatest live tournament player ever–yes,” “Over the hill,” “Live nit,” “One of the greatest of all time,” “One trick pony–but the best one trick pony ever.”
Sure, there are other holes on Hellmuth’s resumes. The folks that will tell you he’s the greatest one trick pony every will point to his 11 World Series bracelets not as proof of his greatness rather as evidence of him being one dimesional. They are all in Texas Hold ‘Em poker and that means two things he doesn’t need an explanation of Texas Hold ‘Em rules and in that field of poker he holds a big edge on everybody else. Phil Hellmuth might counter most of Phil Ivey’s are in variations of Stud, no surprise for a kid growing up near Atlantic city, and 11 braceletes are 11 bracelets and that’s more than anybody’s won.
Another hole in Hellmuth’s resume is cash game inexperience. He’s rarely seen in the big games and when he’s played on televised games, like he could turn down a TV camera even if he were an underdog, he’s often times been snapped off. People question his online poker skills and wonder if his abilities translate off the felt into the virtual world.
Hellmuth says he is a great reader of people, so it’s no surprise, despite playing a game critics have challenged for not adapting he still runs deep in tournaments. This last year or so for him has been a lull, but even the best have to deal with not winning every week. It’s a fact of poker and a fact of life.
Still, the World Poker Tour has introduced a ton of young, new faces and talents to people’s living rooms, and those fields have been arguably tougher than many of the fields Hellmuth bested for his bracelets. Those fields have been a killing field for Hellmuth too. Hellmuth came into today’s action at the Bay101 shooting star event as the chip leader and as everybody was intent on making the final six and getting some TV time, Hellmuth for the first time in a long time, was just looking to win. Finally TV time might have been secondary for the Poker Brat. We did say might.
He watched other young WPT stars like Jonathan Little and Faraz Jaka get eliminated and still he hung around. Scotty Nguyen who seems to do just as well in WPT events as he does at World Series events also went out. Hellmuth has been close before but the highest he’s finished in his other World Poker Tour Final tables was third.
On that one Hoyt Corkins, the Alabama cowboy had Hellmuth’s number, as Hellmuth will tell you he has for most of his career and won the event. Hellmuth had the not so little consolation prize of 281k. Course to player as decorated as Hellmuth this is one of the few live tournament accolades that has avoided him. He’s won the NBC Heads Up National Championship, winning the inaugral one, and solidifying his excellence in the eyes of the casual poker fan forever, he’s done well in older once relevant events but triumph in the World Poker Tour has always eluded him.
So it has to be with some Poker Brat glee, commonly seen when he dodges bullets or evades an opponents big starting hand, that he enters the final table tomorrow second in chips. As the 27 were pared down to six Hellmuth always was looking down at the chipleaders rather than up. Of course the other five gathered enough chips to be his peers but with 1.43 million in chips Hellmuth is enjoying his stay near the top of the leaderboard.
Chip counts are:
1. Andy Seth, 2.16 million
2. Phil Hellmuth, 1.43 million
3. Dan O’Brien, 1.13 million
4. Mclean Karr, 1.11 million
5. Hasan Habib, 455k
6. Matt Keikoan, 371k
First place gets almost 890k and sixth place is assured over 115k.