button in SafariWesley's Still Standing After Thinking He'd Been Eliminated Early in WSOP Main Event
"Wes Side" Wesley Fei thought he was out of the WSOP Main Event on Day 3. He lost a big pot and was heading out the door before being called back to the table as he still had a few chips left.
The Chinese high roller known for his appearances on Hustler Casino Live took that small stack and built it up to reach Day 5, which began with 533 remaining players at 11 a.m. PT on Friday. He was a tad below average stack with 44 big blinds when the session began. But, given where he was two days earlier, he'll take it.
How Wesley Got Here
Wesley lost a monster pot on Day 3. He began to get up from his seat thinking he'd been eliminated, which wasn't the case. He said, "I didn't even count the chips, I saw we were very close."
"I left, I'm ready to go," he told PokerNews on a Day 5 break. "And then, people were telling me, 'hold on, hold on.'"
He wasn't out of the tournament like he initially thought because he had his opponent convered. Unfortunately, for the crytocurrency investor, his stack was barely bigger. Wesley was left with just 15,000 chips, only one-fourth of his starting stack. And this wasn't Day 1. The tournament was more than 10 levels into play, so he was down to just three big blinds.
Even worse for him, he was the big blind the next hand, leaving him with just one big blind behind after putting in his ante.
But, as the saying goes, a chip and a chair. That's exactly what happened the rest of the session. He first doubled up, then again, and then again. Before long, he wasn't a short stack and bagged an above-average stack heading into Day 4, just a few spots away from the money.
Wesley again had an up-and-down day on Thursday, falling from an average stack to a short stack before finishing the session strong and bagging close to an average stack. He increased his stack by about 20% during the first level of Day 5, as the pay jumps will start to become massive before long.
Wesley has reached Day 5 along with someone he isn't too fond of — Arnaud Mattern, a 2007 PokerStars European Poker Tour (EPT) champion. The poker players have played against each other in high-stakes private games in Southern California, and Wesley refers to Mattern as a "mechanic dealer," accusing Mattern of cheating the games.
Nik Airball, a Hustler Casino Live regular, made similar accusations against Mattern in tweet while responding to a PokerNews article involving a crazy hand Mattern won on Day 3.
"He's a mechanic dealer, that's the truth," Wesley said. "He burned his bridges. He cheated the casino. He deal his friends Royal Flush in the casino. He's a mechanic dealer. He has all skills. If he sits down at my table, I will be very careful he marks the cards."
Wesley and Mattern are both in the money, and it would make for an interesting livestream if the two ended up seated together on an ESPN feature table deep in the Main Event.
