$10,000 No Limit Hold'em Championship Day 5 | 2009 L.A. Poker Classic

02-25-2009 21:37 UTC-7

Break Time

[user75032]

Players are on a fifteen-minute break.

02-25-2009 21:35 UTC-7

Mark Bryan Eliminated in 9th Place ($96,883)

[user38449]

Mark Bryan's roller coaster ride of a main event has just come to the end, as he was recently eliminated from the tournament by big stack Blake Cahail.

Bryan's demise came after he attempted to make a move holding the {10-Diamonds}

. Facing a 100,000 preflop raise from Cahail, Bryan moved all in over the top, but was quickly looked up by Cahail who tabled a pocket pair of kings.

A {K-Hearts}

flop ensued, giving Cahail a monstrous lead in the hand, but as the WPT's B.J. Nemeth pointed out, Bryan wasn't drawing completely dead.... he still had running outs to a straight flush. While that might've made for some pretty sweet blog material, the possibility was killed when the {9-Spades}

fell on the turn, locking things up for Cahail.

We'll have new chip counts posted momentarily!

Tags: Blake Cahail Mark Bryan

02-25-2009 21:20 UTC-7

Rich Getting Richer

[user75032]

Action is still hard to come by at the final table, but we did have a recent pot that went to showdown. Pat Walsh was the preflop aggressor, raising to 105,000. Blake Cahail, the chip leader, called from the button to a flop of {A-Clubs}

. Both players checked. When the turn fell {8-Diamonds}

, Walsh took a stab with a bet of 110,000. Cahail wanted to see the river; he put a matching 110,000 chips into the pot. The river was the {A-Spades}

, which both players quickly checked. Walsh's {K-Hearts}

was no match for Cahail's pocket pair, {6-Spades}

. Another pot was pushed in Cahail's direction.

Tags: Blake Cahail Pat Walsh

02-25-2009 21:09 UTC-7

Tales from the Rail

[user38449]

There's no shortage of spectators inside the walls of the makeshift poker room that's housed the final three tables of the tournament. Fans are currently lined up four and five rows all around the ropes to try and catch a glimpse of the action as we play down from nine to six.

"We want to see some action! Let's go!" said one fan.

"Somebody double down!" yelled another.

02-25-2009 21:05 UTC-7

Action Slows

[user75032]

Now that we're down to the last table, the action has come to a predictable crawl. We're on another bubble, after all -- the TV table bubble. Nobody wants to be one of the three players to miss out on the exposure (and the prize money) that comes with making it to the final six.

Here's an example of what's passing for action right now. Blake Cahail opened for 100,000 from middle position and was called by Binh Nguyen from the button. On a flop of {2-Diamonds}

, Cahail fired out an additional 150,000. Nguyen folded.

Tags: Binh Nguyen Blake Cahail

02-25-2009 20:50 UTC-7

Quick Double Up to Start the Unofficial Final Table

[user38449]

Payman Arjang managed a quick double up courtesy of chip leader Blake Cahail to move past the million chip mark, lifting himself from short-stack status.

According to Tournament Director Matt Savage, all of the money went in before the flop; Arjang's with {A-Spades}

and Cahail's with two black fives. Arjang was able to spike a king to secure the double up, sending Cahail back down to 2.1 million in chips.

Tags: Blake Cahail Payman Arjang

02-25-2009 20:39 UTC-7

Tam Ly Eliminated in 10th Place ($64,477)

[user75032]

Tam Ly was recently eliminated in 10th place. With his elimination, the remaining nine players have collapsed to a single, final table. This is not the end of the night, however. WPT television tables are played six-handed. We therefore must eliminate three more players before ending for the night.

Here's the re-draw for the final table:

Seat 1: Chris Ferguson
Seat 2: Cornel Andrew Cimpan
Seat 3: Pat Walsh
Seat 4: Payman Arjang
Seat 5: Blake Cahail
Seat 6: Chris Karagulleyan
Seat 7: Mike Sowers
Seat 8: Binh Nguyen
Seat 9: Mark Bryan

02-25-2009 20:30 UTC-7

Donnie D'Auria Eliminated in 11th Place ($64,477)

[user75032]

Donnie D'Auria can say he got his chips in with the best of it. Payman Arjang opened preflop for all 240,000 of his chips. D'Auria, on the button, had a similar-sized stack and moved it in as well. Once the blinds folded, the players opened their hands:

Arjang: {K-Clubs}

D'Auria:

D'Auria was in prime position to eliminate Arjang, but a board of {A-Clubs}

gave Arjang the nut flush and the pot. That setback left D'Auria with 20,000 chips.

He folded the first hand after putting in a 5,000 ante; the second hand, his whole stack went in. He was called by Cornel Andrew Cimpan, Mark Bryan and Pat Walsh. Walsh bet the {9-Clubs}

flop, folding the other live players. He turned over {J-Diamonds}

for a pair of jacks against D'Auria's {A-Diamonds}

; the turn {5-Spades}

gave Walsh two pair and an unbeatable hand.

D'Auria reported to the cage after the dealer burned and turned the {2-Spades}

as the river card. He earned $64,477 for finishing in 11th place. Not bad for a freeroll.

Tags: Donnie D'Auria Pat Walsh Payman Arjang

02-25-2009 20:27 UTC-7

D'Auria Loses a Heartbreaker; Falls to 275K

[user38449]

One of the nastiest hands of the tournament just went down between Pat Walsh and Donald D'Auria. Pat Walsh, sitting under-the-gun plus one, open-shoved all in for a total of 785,000 with the blinds at 20/40k. Action then folded to D'Auria who, after peeking as his cards, became visibly uneasy in his chair.

After asking the dealer for a count, D'Auria dove deep into the tank. A few minutes then passed before Payman Arjang, who folded before the action fell on D'Auria, spoke up, saying, "Ah... we need to go a little bit quicker. Not you (D'Auria), but in general."

Cornel Andrew Cimpan quickly came to D'Auria's defense. "This is huge. Give him time."

"The blinds are getting up there and the clock is working against us," Arjang replied, barely able to blurt out a complete rebuttal before D'Auria announced "Call!"

Everyone else got out of the way and when the hands were turned over, the room let out a collective groan as both players revealed variations of ace-king:

D'Auria: {A-Diamonds}

Walsh:

Before the dealer spread the flop, D'Auria stood up and reached out to Walsh offering a friendly fist pound.

"No hearts!" D'Auria pleaded with the dealer, as she revealed the flop:
{Q-Hearts}

.

Matt Savage narrated from there; here's the gist of it:

"There's one heart," he said, after the flop was on the table.

Turn: {3-Hearts}

"There's two hearts! Let's see the river..."

River: {J-Hearts}

"It's a heart! Pat has made a flush!"

The room was stunned. The hand left D'Auria with just 275,000 in chips while Walsh improved to 1.6 million with the win.

In an impressive display of good sportsmanship, D'Auria stood up once more to pound fists with the guy who just cleaned out most of his stack. "Good job... right here," he said, with absolute sincerity.

Tags: Donald D'Auria Pat Walsh

Level: 27

Blinds: 20,000/40,000

Ante: 5,000