Phil Ivey's table was moved to the main feature table, and our view is unfortunately limited. From the looks of it, Ivey still commands a very large stack with just under 100,000 chips sitting in front of him.
Daniel Negreanu is currently seated at the secondary feature table alongside Erik Cajelais, Cliff Josephy, and 2011 runner-up Chris Oliver, among others. Of those, Negreanu is currently doing the best.
In a recent hand, there was around 10,000 in the pot and a board reading when Portugal's Fernando Brito bet 5,500 from the small blind. Negreanu made the call from the button, and then he slide out his entire stack of 47,500 when Brito checked the river. It looked more dramatic than it was (the cameras were there after all) as Brito only had 7,800 behind.
Brito shifted in his chair and attempted to talk out the situation, but in the end he folded his hand.
"I either had the or the ," Negreanu said. "I had one of those two, I promise."
Marc-Andre Ladouceur opened on the button, Carlos Mortensen three-bet from the small blind, and Ladouceur four-bet to 6,000. The 2001 World Series of Poker Main Event Champion called.
The flop fell , and Mortensen checked. Ladouceur fired 5,500, and Mortensen called. The two checked after the turned, and the completed the board. Mortensen led out for 8,500, and Ladouceur released.
After a series of bets and raises, James Fregeau was all in and at risk preflop with . Olivier Busquet had him crushed with , but the board ran out . Fregeau doubled, while Busquet is still healthy with 47,000 chips.
To say this field is stacked would be an understatement. Everywhere you look there are notables players from around the world... Las Vegas legends... former WSOP Main Event champs... EPT and LAPT superstars... the list goes on and on.
The field is saturated with pros and there's essentially a big name or two at every table. With that said, we were impressed with the lineup over at Table 58, which is particularly stack. It currently includes the likes of circuit up-and-comer Joe Kuether; 2001 WSOP Main Event champ Carlos Mortensen; two-time PCA Main Event finalist Anthony Gregg; Quebecer Marc-Andre Ladouceur; the always-entertaining Humberto Brenese; and Ryan "TheCart3r" Carter, who finished as runner-up in the WCOOP Main Event back in September.
In a recent hand, Mortensen checked a flop of from the big blind and watched Carter bet 1,100 from the cutoff. Kuether then called from the button, Mortensen folded, and the turned. Carter ended up check-calling a bet of 2,100, and then both players checked the river. Kuether sheepishly flashed , and seemed to know it was no good even before Carter showed down .
We caught up with the action to find two Team PokerStars pros taking a flop together with over 7,000 already in the pot. Victor Ramdin and Vanessa Selbst saw a flop of hit the felt and Ramdin took the lead with a bet of 4,000.
Selbst took 4,000 out of her stack and set it aside while she riffled chips.
"All in," she quietly said.
Ramdin snapped her off and shot all of his blue t5,000 chips into the middle.
Selbst:
Ramdin:
Selbst stood up from the table, visibly upset from the ordeal. She was looking for help on the subsequent streets but did not find it as they brought the and the , making Ramdin's straight the best hand.
Ramdin now commands 87,000 while Selbst made a quick exit out of the tournament area.
Here on Day 1b of the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure Main Event, there are a lot of tough tables. With the $100,000 Super High Roller ending yesterday, and the first-ever major Open Face Chinese Poker tournament running as well, dozens of the best players in the world waited until today to play.
Table 10 can certainly be considered one of the tougher tables in the room, because sitting in Seats 8 and 9 are 2012 Players of the Year Marvin Rettenmaier and Dan Smith respectively.
Rettenmaier, winner of the 2012 BLUFF Magazine Player of the Year award, earned over $2.5 million last year, and Smith, winner of the 2012 Global Poker Index Player of the Year award, earned over $3.7 million. The POY races culminated at EPT Prague where Rettenmaier won the €10,000 High Roller ($477,479).
He joined the PokerNews Podcast afterwords to discuss his amazing year:
PCA Main Event began at noon, I woke up at 1, took a long walk and swim in Sea, now starting nap (3:50) & having my chips dropped at 5 pmJanuary 08 2013