Scouring the room, the abundance of big names and top players seem to not make for tons of tough tables. Instead, the players are fairly spread out to keep things more even throughout. We did spot two tables that look pretty enticing. The first one is within a feet feet of our media desk and holds Matt Stout, Nenad Medic, Team PokerStars Pro Vanessa Rousso and November Niner John Dolan.
Over in the middle of the room, there's another tough table consisting of a log of young-gun talent. David Peters, Shawn Buchanan, Andy Seth and Phil Collins are all at the same table. Throw Kenny Nguyen into the mix and this table has a lot of potential energy.
With about 3,500 in the pot and a board reading , a player in middle position checked to Jason Senti, who bet 1,000. The middle position player then threw in a check-raise to 5,000 and Senti was clearly perplexed. He eventually made the call but mucked after seeing his opponent's .
"Ah, slow playing the nuts," Senti rationalized. "That was a pretty bad river bet by me I guess." Senti is down to 18,000.
Michael "The Grinder" Mizrachi may very well be the most popular poker player in the world at the moment and he is playing in today's field. In a recent hand, Mizrachi raised to 425 only to have the player in the cutoff raise to 1,600. Action folded back around to Mizrachi and he made the call.
The flop came down and Mizrachi check-called a bet of 2,100. Both players then checked the on the turn and the appeared on the river. Mizrachi took the initiative to bet 3,000 and the cutoff quickly folded. Mizrachi is up to 37,500.
There was about 18,000 in the pot with a board reading when Nenad Medic checked to his sole opponent on the button. The check resulted in a bet of 5,000 and action was back on Medic. He was clearly struggling on the decision and eventually shook his head and folded face up. It was a huge flop for Medic but in the end he concluded his hand wasn't good enough. He dropped down to 18,000.
"Miami" John Cernuto recently informed us about a hand that he became involved in. According to him, a player with pocket kings raised preflop and Cernuto flat called with pocket queens. Another player limped with and the big blind opted to raise to 1,400.
This time the pocket kings flatted and Cernuto put in a raise to 6,000. This cleared out the 9-10 and big blind players and resulted in the pocket kings just calling. The flop came down and Cernuto had flopped a set of queens. Action checked to him and he fired out 10,000 only to be reraised all in by the pocket kings. Cernuto called and the turn and river changed nothing. He took down the massive pot and is up to 56,000.
"If the 9-10 would have called, he would have busted me," Cernuto was quick to point out.
Action folded to the button and he put in a min-raise to 200. The small blind folded and action was on Freddy Deeb in the big. He smiled, looked at his opponent, and then said he was going to raise 1,000 more. The button smiled back and then made the call.
The flop came down and Deeb continuation bet 1,600 and the button simply folded. Deeb took down the small pot all the while smiling away.
There are certainly many more players in the field today than yesterday's Day 1a field. The room is just about packed full while some late stragglers still roll in. Right now, the board reads 338 players and that's eight more than the 330 from yesterday. With late registration open for a little while, this thing should easily get 400 players.
Also of note is that any of the late registrants are being seated at the next open table. So if you sign up with a bunch of buddies, you'll most likely get placed at the same table with them. Jennifer Tilly and Phil Laak just missed being at the same table and are seated at adjacent ones. Michael Mizrachi, Anthony Rivera, Dale Philip and Tilly are all seated at the same table after all buying in at the same time.
We picked up the pot on the turn as the board showed . Tamayo checked and let his opponent bet 2,500 before check-raising to 5,600. His opponent called, and the filled out the board. Tamayo, ever the deliberate actor, took his pause before stacking out a bet of 10,500. After a moment to make sure, the player made the call, and Tamayo tapped the table in acknowledgement that he was beat.
His opponent turned up , and that won him a nice early pot to knock Tamayo down under 11,000 here early.
With all of the big name pros in today's field, it is not surprising to see some interesting table combination. PokerStars Team Pro (Canada) member Daniel Negreanu is seated at the same table as November Niner Jason Senti.
At another table, Dwyte Pilgrim is seated to the right of Mark Seif, who is seated to the right of Nick Binger. Now that is a tough stretch. However the toughest table in the room might be one row over and contains Faraz Jaka, Jose "Nacho" Barbero, Isaac Baron, and Maria Ho.
In a recent hand, Ho and Jaka faced off in a pot worth about 7,000 preflop. When the flop came down , Ho bet 2,600 and Jaka put her to the test with a raise to 5,900. Ho tanked for a bit before folding and dropping to 23,600. Jaka is off to a quick start with 38,000.
button in Safari
, a player in middle position checked to Jason Senti, who bet 1,000. The middle position player then threw in a check-raise to 5,000 and Senti was clearly perplexed. He eventually made the call but mucked after seeing his opponent's 
.
and Mizrachi check-called a bet of 2,100. Both players then checked the 
on the turn and the 
appeared on the river. Mizrachi took the initiative to bet 3,000 and the cutoff quickly folded. Mizrachi is up to 37,500.
when Nenad Medic checked to his sole opponent on the button. The check resulted in a bet of 5,000 and action was back on Medic. He was clearly struggling on the decision and eventually shook his head and folded 
face up. It was a huge flop for Medic but in the end he concluded his hand wasn't good enough. He dropped down to 18,000.
and the big blind opted to raise to 1,400.
and Cernuto had flopped a set of queens. Action checked to him and he fired out 10,000 only to be reraised all in by the pocket kings. Cernuto called and the turn and river changed nothing. He took down the massive pot and is up to 56,000.
and Deeb continuation bet 1,600 and the button simply folded. Deeb took down the small pot all the while smiling away.
filled out the board. Tamayo, ever the deliberate actor, took his pause before stacking out a bet of 10,500. After a moment to make sure, the player made the call, and Tamayo tapped the table in acknowledgement that he was beat.
, and that won him a nice early pot to knock Tamayo down under 11,000 here early.
, Ho bet 2,600 and Jaka put her to the test with a raise to 5,900. Ho tanked for a bit before folding and dropping to 23,600. Jaka is off to a quick start with 38,000.
