Peter Eastgate got the honors and said “Shuffle Up and Deal.” The Main Event Champion would test his mettle with the world’s greatest in the $40,000 buy-in special tournament to commemorate the WSOP’s 40th year. Mike Matasow groused this event would break the bankrolls of all the young guns. Maybe.
However, with half the field eliminated the top of the leader board is littered with kids. Unfortunately for Peter Eastgate, the defending Main Event Champion isn’t one of them. He like Dario Minieri and Tom Dwan went out early. Still, plenty of the older name pros were also early birds… as in early to the rail… birds.
Johnny Chan, Daniel Negreanu, John Juanda, Chris Ferguson, Barry Greenstein, Annie Duke all got to go home a little early. Phi Laak surged out to an early chiplead and then lost a huge pot. He’s been nursing the short stack ever since. Phil Hellmuth went through a similar pattern but managed to chip up late. Hellmuth, as usual was late, in fact, he was the last of the 201 players to sign up.
Yes, you read that correctly, 201 players cobbled together the 40k buy-in to play for a nearly 1.9 million dollar pay day. Though it’s be asserted what’s even more appealing is the TV final table, one of only four to be televised this year, and the buckets full of endorsement money that could translate to as the real prize. Many, big time pros seen playing satellites to get in.
One of the biggest names in poker, and perhaps a surprise, is Chris Moneymaker who spent much of his first day near the top of the leader board. Michael DeMichele scooped the biggest pot of the day and as a result took over first. He’s followed by onliners Lex ‘RaSZi’ Veldhuis and Emil “whitelime” Patel. Current chip counts are available here.
There were plenty of wagers made on the over/under of the total players as well as fantasy picks about which players would go deepest. With all the prop bets online, there’s plenty to gamble on even if you can’t play poker for a 40k but just like gambling.