We found Amit Makhija, on the button, and Matthew Huey, in the small blind, locking horns in a three-bet pot. Huey bet 40,000 on the flop, and Makhija made the call. The turn brought a and two checks. Huey bet 60,000 on the river, and Makhija pushed all in. Huey looked over, got a rough count of Makhija's 170,000 stack, and called.
Makhija:
Huey:
Makhija had flopped two pair and faded a good chunk of outs after Huey had turned the nut flush draw to go with his top pair.
Now that everyone left is in the money, a lot of players are really starting to have fun, especially if there are cameras nearby.
We arrived at a table to see the dealer pull in a bet and a call on the flop. The board read , and Max Steinberg and Age Spets were the only players in the hand. The turn was the , and both players checked. The then completed the board on the river, and Steinberg led out for 50,000.
Spets immediately contorted his face in an anguished look and took off his sunglasses. He said, party to himself, partly to the table, "I think I'm behind, here." He then pulled two dark green 25,000-denomination chips from his stack, and played with them in his right hand while he continued to talk about his situation. "I'm behind, that's what it looks like." "Do you think I'm behind?" he asked Steinberg. Steinberg sat motionless, saying nothing. "What do you want me to do?" Still nothing.
Then Spets had a minor epiphany. "We could flip for it." He pulled a coin out of his pocket and asked Steinberg, "Do you want to flip for it?" Steinberg still said nothing. "Ok, we'll flip for it," Spets decided. "Do you want heads or tails?" Spets finally got a reaction from Steinberg. "Heads," he said starting to crack a smile, as he couldn't help but be entertained by Spets's thought process. Spets then started to flip, but he paused. "Wait, is it heads I call or heads I fold?" Steinberg kept smiling, still slightly shaking his head, and said nothing. "Ok," Spets decided. "If it's heads, you decide, if it's tails, I decide." He then stood up. "Let's play," He flipped the coin, caught it and slapped it on the back of his other hand. "It's my decision," he said. Steinberg, still smiling, told him, "It was always your decision."
Spets sat back down, then tossed forward the green chips. "I have king-jack," Steinberg announced as he turned over . Spets nodded, as if that's what he expected, and tossed his cards to the muck.
Among the 648 players cashing in this year's Main Event is two-time Main Event winner, Poker Hall of Famer, and legend of the game Doyle "Tex Dolly" Brunson.
Brunson played in the very first World Series of Poker in 1970, and in nearly every one since. Besides winning the Main Event twice, he's now cashed in the Main Event in each decade it has been staged — the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, and now the 2010s.
Here are Brunson's Main Event cashes over the years:
Farzad Bonyadi came into the day with just 27,600, and before the bubble, he had a great day, working his stack up to 241,000. Unfortuantely for him, all of that is gone now, as he became our bubble boy after busting in a huge pot to Nick Schwarmann, who is now over a million and one of our chip leaders.
Action started with Schwarmann raising it up to 12,000 preflop in middle position. Bonyadi made the call in position, and the two went heads up to a flop of . Schwarmann checked to Bonyadi, who tossed out 14,000. Schwarmann went for a check raise to 37,000, and Bonyadi tagged along to see the hit the turn. Schwarmann fired out 54,000 on this card, and Bonyadi again opted to just call. The came on the river, then Schwarmann put pressure on Bonyadi by moving all in, easily having him covered. According to Schwarmann after the hand, Bonyadi snap called the bet.
Play had to be halted for almost five minutes so that all other hands could be finished first. There was only one other hand in the room that saw an all in and a call, but Bonyadi and Schwarmann were the first table up to table their cards.
Bonyadi showed for a pair of jacks, but it was no good, as Schwarmann showed for a rivered broadway straight. Tzu Yen doubled up in his hand, making Farzad Bonyadi the 2013 Main Event bubble boy.
From the hijack, Vladimir Geshkenbein raised to 11,000 only to have Tzu Yen three-bet the small blind to 38,500. Geshkenbein four-bet to 71,000 to put Yen in the tank.
"You did this to yourself. I'm going to show you if you fold!" stated Geshkenbein as Yen remained in the tank.
After a few minutes, Yen announced he was all in for 218,000 and Geshkenbein snap-called slamming down his .
The Tournament Director came over, told Geshkenbein to put his hand face down and wait until all action was complete.
Roughly seven minutes went by - and after the elimination of Farzad Bonyadi was complete - the hand was continued.
Geshkenbein:
Yen:
The board ran out to see Yen strike an ace and double to roughly 445,000 in chips as Geshkenbein slipped to 710,000 in chips.
Grant Hinkle opened to 10,000 from middle position and Eddy Sabat called from the button before Brian Kellogg moved all in from the small blind for his last 12,000 with both Hinkle and Sabat calling.
Action was paused for roughly 8 minutes before the hand could continue.
The dealer spread a flop and Hinkle check-folded to a Sabat bet of 13,000.
Sabat:
Kellogg:
With Kellogg needing to spike a king to stay alive or a combination of runner-runner straight cards, the turn would see the delivered to keep him alive. The river landed the meaningless as Kellogg tripled through to over 45,500.
"Haven't used my one time all tournament until now!" Kellogg stated before adding, "30 hours ... been a grind!"
On Day 3 of the 2013 Main Event, 1,753 players were whittled down to just 666. Unfortunately for 18 of those players, three long, grueling days of poker will all be for not, as only 648 will be making the money. The player who is least concerned about bubbling is Maxx Coleman, who is the chip leader with 1,071,500. He is the only player in the millionaire club, as the next two players are Joshua Prager (993,000) and Max Steinberg (987,500), who busted Phil Ivey in a huge cooler in Level 14 yesterday.
One of the biggest stories to come out of this main event so far is the continued success of the man, the myth, the legend, Doyle Brunson. Brunson had announced that he would be skipping the WSOP altogether this year for the first time ever, but a handful of side bets drew him back in for the $50,000 Poker Players' Championship. Well, it appears that Brunson got the tournament bug again, as he entered the Main Event. As we approach the money bubble, Brunson is one of the bigger stacks with 626,000. The 79-year-old legend is likely to cash in the Main Event for the first time since 2004, where he finished 53rd for $45,000.
Four members of last year’s Octo-Nine are still alive, including the defending champion Greg Merson. Merson, who comes into today with an above average stack of 390,500, was down for much of the day yesterday before he found a huge double up while on the main stage. The other three who are looking for back-to-back Main Event final tables are fourth-place finisher Russell Thomas (562,000), eighth-place finisher Steve Gee (292,000), and ninth-place finisher Robert Salaburu (218,000).
Some of the many other notables who are still in the hunt for the November Nine are Chris Johnson, Kyle Julius, Tuan Le, Annette Obrestad, Melanie Weisner, Bertrand "ElkY" Grospellier, Greg Mueller, Marvin Rettenmaier, Michael "The Grinder" Mizrachi, Jake Cody, Ronnie Bardah, Vivek Rajkumar and Carlos Mortensen, amongst tons of others.
Bardah, along with Christian Harder, will be looking for their fourth consecutive Main Event cash. If both hit the money, they will tie the record that Chris Bjorin currently holds.
The doors of the Amazon room will be opening shortly, as play is scheduled to get underway at noon local time. We will be playing five two-hour levels today, and the money bubble will be arriving soon. Be sure to stay tuned to PokerNews.com for all of your live updates all day. Until we get started, check out Sarah Grant’s recap from yesterday’s action-filled night.