Playground Poker

Jean-François Stoycheff, who’s had a great run today, went all-in with . He was up against Carl Gagné-Lizotte, who outchipped him and was holding .

When he saw the flop, Jean-François knew he was in big trouble: . At this point, even a jack was pretty useless unless it came with it’s twin on the river. Unfortunately for JF, a came on the turn and a on the river, thus turning him into the bubble, in 19th place.

So the remaining 18 players are now in the money, and there are now only 3 tables left.

Chip leader Tony Capone is in the middle of a dry spell. In only a few hands, he’s seen almost half of his chips exit stage right, and left, and center. Moreover, he seems to be attracting rockets at every turn. But unfortunately not in HIS hand.

Paul El-khouri’s chance was perfectly timed. Holding rockets, he wasted no time going all-in preflop for 42,500. He got called by both Tony and Nirvair Sanhu.

The flop came out: . First to act, Tony went all-in and Nirvair snap-called. Tony threw open his hand: , and so did Nirvair: . Not good for Tony, nor Paul, who had opened . With a brick on the turn: , the on the river was a welcome sight for Paul. Just the right time for him to triple-up. He seemed just as happy about scooping up the chips, than the fact that we were there to capture the moment.

A few hands later, Capone was once again pushed up against the ropes by aces. He went all-in preflop holding and got one single call. This time from Nirvair, who snap-called and tabled, you guessed it: . “Sheesh, wassup with all them aces?”, said capone. Once again, the community cards brought him no reprieve: ; giving a higher boat to Nirvair. So Tony had to watch another 50,000 of his chips relocate.

“That’s poker!”, he said.

With only 22 palyers left, the players will be on the money bubble soon.

The chips are flying, the stacks are climbing and the numbers are falling. With only 32 players left in the tournament, everyone is keeping an eye on the board, hoping to be in the money.

Play will be suspended and go into “hand per hand” mode when there are 19 players left in the field.

In the meantime, here are some pictures from the last few levels.

Tony Capone has managed to make his chips soar and has amassed over three times the chip average, and is now sitting on 334,000 chips. Only two other players have more than 200K chips. Dan Vigderhous, with 224,000, followed closely by Nicholas Soller with 222,500.

The elimination rate is off the chart as the players take every opportunity to grab chips, and, of course, the coveted bounty chips. Only 20 cuts left before the players are in the money.

Table #28 was already short with only 4 players and the action was on. Claude Perrault had just shoved all-in after a small raise from Tony Capone. Vincent Gosselin was already all-in, and Claude’s all-in was 34,600. That left Tony with, what seemed to be a hard decision.

Talking to himself, and mostly whispering, “I’m probably so behind with this”, and tapping his cards on the table, he really seemed undecided. Charan Malhotra, the only uncommited player at the table, was smiling and looking back and forth at all the faces. Then, with an air of playful nonchalance, Tony quickly made up his mind and threw in a few chips to signal a call. At once Charan said, “Of course you call, look at all the chips you have!”, comically pointing at the considerable stack already in front of Tony, “you’re on fire!” The friendly banter between the two colorful players at Playground is nothing new, but always entertaining.

The three players tabled their hands.

Tony:

Vincent:

Claude:

While the dealer was setting up the cards around the table and getting ready to reveal the community cards, Charan exclaimed, “And you’re ahead!”. The flop came out, with a huge window for Tony: . The on the turn gave some renewed hope to Vincent, but a on the river sealed the hand, and sent Vincent and Claude to the rail.

Now with only two players left at the table, the tournament director has instructed the dealer to stop, and they will proceeded to close a table.

The boards are now showing the prize pool. With 143 entries, the total prize pool is a very respectable $20,592. The top 18 places will be paid according to the following table:

Here are a few more photos of the players in action.