The 2017 WPT Montreal is down to two tables – 16 players – and action is set to resume in just 30 minutes here at Playground Poker Club. Eric Afriat is the current chip leader with a 600K margin on Curt Kohlberg, in 2nd place. Here are profiles we prepared about each of the remaining players.
- Eric Afriat (120bb)
Eric is a very successful local player who is a member of the WPT Champion’s Club, having won the WPT Seminole Hard Rock Showdown in Hollywood, Florida in 2014. He has had a lot of other success as well, including a win and another final table in Bellagio Cup events in Las Vegas in 2012 and a WPT Final Table appearance at Bellagio in 2010. Eric has had success here on his home turf, but he has yet to win a big one – a fact he’ll want to change asap! - Curt Kohlberg (90bb)
Curt’s “home field” is Foxwoods Casino, where he’s had a ton of success with published results going back to the late 90s, but he’s also a regular big-event visitor at Playground Poker. With over $3M in lifetime earnings, he’s not a player to be overlooked. Card Player profiled Curt in 2011. - Ryan Rivers (83bb)
Ryan has over $500K in lifetime earnings, but is perhaps most famous for his participation in the final table of the Canada Cup right here at Playground Poker Club. He was part of the infamous four-way all-in that brought the premature end of the tournament. - Maxime Heroux (82bb)
Maxime is a local player that doesn’t have a ton of published live results but has demonstrated a high level of skill over the years in events here at Playground Poker Club. - Duff Charette (79bb)
Duff hails from the Ottawa area and has been making a name for himself on the international poker scene with results in the US, Canada, Australia, Asia, and Europe in the past couple of years. He has almost $350K in live earnings and knows how to close out an event – he won the Deepstacks Poker Tour’s Tour Championship event in 2016. - Bradley Ellis (79bb)
Brad hails from Nova Scotia and most recently booked a 4th place finish in a $1K event in Charlottetown, PEI. - Derek Wolters (63bb)
Derek is an experienced professional player with published live results going back to 2010. He’s still looking for a big championship score. - David Peters (61bb)
David is one of the most superbly experienced players on the world poker scene today. With 6-figure scores dating back to 2008 and over $18M in lifetime earnings, Peters’ resume needs little burnishing – but a WPT Championship would certainly add to his renown. - Alex Keating (53bb)
Alex is famous for his excellent banter and terrific beard – but none of that should distract from the fact that he’s a tremendously experienced and successful poker pro with almost $1.5M in lifetime live earnings… and a 13th place finish in this very event last year. He’s also looking to improve on his best-ever WPT Championship finish, which was a 3rd place finish in the 2016 WPT LA Poker Classic. - Brendan Baksh (43bb)
Brendan hails from California and while he hasn’t had a huge live score, he is an experienced player with published results from events in Las Vegas and LA. - Feizal Satchu (32bb)
Feizal is a very experienced player from Toronto who has been playing big event poker for almost a decade and booked a 21st place finish in the 2016 WPT Montreal. He has already improved on that finish – we’ll see how deep he can run this year. - Mohammad Abu-Hadbah (31bb)
We weren’t able to find a lot of information about Mohammad’s poker career online, but there is at least one mention of him in a tournament at the Emperors Palace Hotel and Casino in South Africa. - Brady Hinnegan (29bb)
Brady is a regular visitor at Playground Poker Club for big events, and managed to book a big win in the Card Player Poker Tour event here in 2016. He has published results going back to 2009. - Patrick Quinn (23bb)
Patrick comes from Toronto and has published results from events in Las Vegas, Atlantic City, and Florida. - Justin Liberto (23bb)
Justin is one of the more experienced players in the field at this point, with published results going back to 2009 and a WSOP Bracelet on his resume. He has almost $2.5M in lifetime live earnings and though he starts with a relatively short stack, no one would do well to overlook this player as they try to move ahead in the event. - Adam Shannon (17bb)
Adam starts the day with the short stack in the tournament, and little in the way of published results.