From early-middle position, Artur Koren raised to 600. He was called in two spots, but had position on both of his opponents as the callers were Bruno Portaro from the small blind and Manig Loeser from the big blind.
The flop fell , and Portaro checked. Loeser also checked, and then Koren bet 1,100. Portaro reached into his stack and came out with more than 1,100 — he check-raised to 2,600. Loeser took a few moments, then folded, and Koren made the call to see the turn.
Fourth street was the , and Portaro bet 2,500. Koren made the call, and the dealer completed the board with the on the river. Portaro checked, and that was Koren's cue to pounce with a bet of 8,000. Portaro tanked for a little over a minute, then called, and watched Koren tabled a bluff with the .
Portaro showed the for bottom two pair, and he won the pot.
Right now, on Day 1b of the $10,600 Aussie Millions Main Event, Esfandiari's playing at a table without any of his regular prop-betting friends, but the 2012 $1,000,000 Big One for One Drop winner got acquainted with his opponents real fast.
"I got a good question for the next game," a player at the adjacent table yelled. "What percentage did Antonio have of himself when he won the One Drop tournament?"
"That's actually a great question," Antonio smiled, "But I'm not gonna pose that question myself, that would be too arrogant."
"How much was the buy-in of that, $100,000 or $1,000,000?" John Caridad asked.
The players talked about the question for a bit, and Martin Boersma, in Seat 2, offered himself up to be the brain again.
"Alright," Boersma said as he put his phone down. "I got the number locked in."
"How much are we playing for?" Esfandiari asked. "$200 this time?"
"I won a satellite for this tournament, my wife wouldn't let me play for more than $100 per game," Caridad joked.
Caridad, no stranger to big events with a fourth-place finish in the 2010 Bellagio Cup for $237,902, convinced Esfandiari to play for $100 and the betting began.
"Seven," Esfandiari opened up the betting.
"Ten," Caridad responded, and the line quickly shifted up to 22 before the two ended up playing a hand against each other.
"You play a lot of poker?" Caridad then asked Boersma.
"You can't be asking questions mid-bidding," Esfandiari joked, "That's the fun of the game, we both don't have any info!"
"It's about what he thinks, and that's what f***s me," Caridad said, and everyone burst out in laughter.
After Esfandiari raked in the pot, Caridad reopened the bidding with 23, Esfandiari went to 24, and Caridad upped it to 25.
"You're learning," Esfandiari smiled, as he'd clearly been teaching the players at his table how to play this game.
Esfandiari then went to 26, and Caridad bought, meaning he would get every number from zero to 25%.
"You want to double the bet?" Esfandiari then asked Caridad.
"Yeah, we'll make it $200," the all-of-a-sudden-confident Lodden Thinks rookie said, despite the threat of his wife not liking him betting this big.
"You lose, Antonio," Boersma said, as he revealed his number was 20%, and the entire table cheered.
"Beaten at your own game!" one player laughed, while Esfandiari laughed with them.
One player bluntly asked, "So much did you really have of yourself?"
"Only two people know," Esfandiari said without revealing the actual number, as he won the Big One for One Drop for $18,346,673.
After the dust settled, Caridad collected his $200, and Esfandiari said, "Alright boys, let's kick if up!" and he got everyone to laugh again while being serious at the same time.
Boris Becker bet 2,100 on the board, and his opponent, Paul Hoefer, made the call to see the land on the river. Becker fired 3,600, and Hoefer made the call.
Becker showed the for two pair on the river, and Hoefer mucked with a shake of his head.
We just spotted a massive stack in the second room that's being used for the Main event, and it belongs to Josep Maria Galindo.
Galindo wrote his name down for us, before getting back to his 105,000-chip stack.
The Spanish pro already cashed three events as this year's Aussie Millions, his best result being a tenth place finish in the Mix Max for $4,520, and right now he's holding a big chip lead in this event.
Most of Galindo's cashes were made in his native Spain, his best result to date being a second-place finish in the European Masters of Poker for €48,405 in Barcelona.