Event 7 Champion: Jeffrey Cormier

Event 7 in the Playground Poker Spring Classic presented by partypoker.net was a new addition to the series, as it took our regular 50/50 Bounty format and super-sized the buy-in, making it a $500 + $100 + $500 NL Hold’em Bounty Event. Every knockout was worth $500 cash, and players were evidently out on the hunt for these precious chips, generating a ton of action on the tables.

The “Bounty-Hunter” of the day was Daniel Hughes, who cashed in 10 Bounty chips along with placing 8th place on the final table, although Jeffrey Cormier was close with 9 of his own.

Once the tournament reached the final table, play somewhat tightened up as the top prize of $20,000 was well worth playing your best for. Jeffrey got hit with the deck in the early stages of the final table, and amassed a massive chip-lead stack after getting paid on back-to-back hands with pockets kings in the hole. He carried his chip lead into 5-way action, where Brian Morgan took over as top stack. Once play fell 3-handed, the chip lead was shifted to Daniel Whalen, and at this point the final 3 negotiated an ICM based chip-chop. Daniel took home the larger share of the chop, but all three players were well-compensated for their deep-run. The tournament required an extra $1,700 to be set aside along with the Playground Poker Spring Classic Champion’s Trophy, and so play continued after the agreement.

Brian was quickly eliminated, and heads-up play between Daniel and Jeffrey went on for almost 2 levels of play. Although they started even in chips, Daniel chipped his way into a 2-to-1 lead before seeing the stacks flip when he ran his into Jeffrey’s . Jeffrey then began applying pressure on his opponent, until finally Daniel open-shoved with , to get called by . Daniel couldn’t improve on the board, and Jeffrey was crowned our Event 7 Champion!