The champions from last years Event #61: $1,000 Tag Team No-Limit Hold'em tournament have arrived on the scene here in the Amazon Ballroom. Doug Polk headlines the team with his returning partner Ryan Fee. Last year they scooped up $76,679 for their victory in the tag team event and they look to make some noise in this years inaugural $10,000 team event.
They have two additions to their team from last year in the form of Jason Mo, who has over a million dollars in WSOP event cashes. Mo is in search of his first bracelet and has picked a good team to try and get it with. The fourth player rounding out the group is Michael Finstein. Finstein has over a quarter million in various WSOP event cashes and is also in search of his first bracelet.
Doug Polk has two bracelets, eleven cashes and over $850,000 in WSOP earnings. He is most well known for all of his work with his coaching site, Upswing Poker and has over $5,000,000 in total live recorded tournament earnings. His biggest live cash was for $1,648,350 when he took down the $100,000 No Limit Hold'em Super High Roller ii at the Bellagio in Las Vegas.
Keep an eye out for this team throughout the remainder of the night.
About 10 of some of the biggest names in poker just walked in to join the $10,000 Tag Team event. Here is how the new teams look.
Team Holz - Fedor Holz, Erik Seidel, Koray Aldemir
Team Kempe - Rainer Kempe, David Williams, Stephen Sontheimer
Team Boeree - Liv Boeree and Igor Kurganov
Steadily climbing the leaderboard has been the team of Juan Ramirez, Senovio Ramirez and Matt Lapossie.
Here is a look at the latest hand they played:
Juan Ramirez was in middle position and opened the action to 2,800. Kevin Johnson was in the big blind and defended.
The flop was and both players checked to the turn which was the . Both players checked again and the river came up the .
Johnson checked a third time and Ramirez fired out a bet of 5,000. Johnson went into the tank for a couple of minutes and then called. Ramirez announced he had a straight and tabled the . Johnson's hand went into the muck and left his team very short at this stage of the tournament.
Late registration is now over and the total number of entries has reached 102 for this Inaugural Tag Team Championship Event. Prize pool information will be posted as soon as it's available. Sixty-nine teams remain and the action is certainly picking up.
Chris Ferguson and Andy Bloch have combined to make up one of our last team entrants. They both have exceptional live poker resumes and round out a talented and tough field.