Russell Crane opened to 3,300 on his three-handed table and Vojtech Ruzicka three-bet to 9,100. Jarred Jaffee was in the big blind and he asked Ruzicka how many chips he was playing before four-betting all -in for 41,900.
Crane quickly folded but Ruzicka had much more thinking to do.
"Aarrgghh! This is close." Ruzicka said to himself, before turning to Jaffee and asking, "You gotta big hand?"
"Big enough to shove with," was Jaffee's response.
After the big blind reraised his opening bet to 4,200, Jonathan Jaffe bumped it up to 16,800. His opponent flatted to see the flop fall .
Jaffe then bet 9,800 when it was checked to him, and once again the other player flatted. On the turn, both players tapped the table, and the completed the board on the river.
On fifth street, his opponent led out for 18,500, and Jaffe responded with a power move, raising it up to 42,000. The other player became a believer, and his hand went into the muck, while Jaffe flashed the to plant the seeds of doubt into his opponent's mind.
Moments after claiming Trevor Pope's entire stack on a virtual freeroll, Stephen Chidwick turned the trick again, felting an opponent who was drawing dead after a ridiculous raising war on the flop.
The drama began with the flop showing , and Chidwick having checked to the preflop raiser. His opponent obliged with a c-bet of 3,300, and Chidwick pumped it up to 7,700. The other player paused for over a minute before cutting out a raise, four-betting to 16,300. Chidwick was undeterred by this aggression, however, and he hoisted a single stack of 20 yellow T1000 tournament chips forward for a five-bet to 27,500.
Chidwick's move sent the opponent into the tank, and he waited for more than two minutes before calmly moving his entire stack of 55,000 or so chips forward.
Chidwick snap-called and rolled over the , hoping the other player would not show up with the dreaded . Instead, the all-in player sheepishly turned over his for pure air. He had been on a stone cold bluff the entire time, raising preflop and barreling hard with eight-high, but ultimately running into a hand that had flopped perfect.
On the turn, the all-in bluffer picked up four outs to the wheel straight, but fortune did not favor the bold on this day, and the river ended his tournament.
Chidwick, meanwhile, catapulted to over 370,000 with the win, giving him the chip lead by a wide margin with more than four times the average stack.
Trevor Pope ran extremely well when he took down Event #2 of the 2013 WSOP, but that run good eluded him here today.
Stephen Chidwick checked from the under the gun on a flop, Pope betting 7,900 from the button. Chidwick check-raised to 16,900 and after 45-seconds, Pope moved all in and Chidwick called immediately.
Chidwick:
Pope:
Pope let out a hiss as he saw he was being freerolled. The fell on the turn, leaving Pope drawing dead. The inconsequential completed the board and confirmed Pope's demise.
"I lost a flip," said Craig McCorkell to us as we saw all but 1,700 of his stack being pushed towards David Benefield.
The next hand McCorkell moved all in from under the gun for his last 1,500 and William Stevenson isolated him with a three-bet to 4,100. McCorkell showed and Stevenson the .
The flop put McCorkell ahead, the turn changed nothing and the river meant McCorkell doubled to 3,700 chips.