Friday, 29th March 2024 08:30
Home / Uncategorized / SCOOP 2012: Foofighterer’s free lesson in Event #4-M ($215 FL Badugi)
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I’ve been blogging about poker for over five years. I’ve covered events in all corners of the world, and have witnessed some of the greatest poker achievements ever seen. I’ve seen Ivey win multiple bracelets, I’ve covered the $50,000 WSOP Player’s Championship and reported on more HORSE and 8-Game tournaments than I’ve probably ever played.

But there was one thing that I’ve never done in poker. And that is, learn the game of Badugi. That is, until today.

It’s a game that is quickly gaining popularity, and my first summation was that it was a little razz and a little triple draw. It was enough to spark my interest, and I was rather pleased that my first exposure to the game came in one of the biggest online poker championships in the world.

The SCOOP Event #4-M FL Badugi event saw 344 players pony up $215 to create a prize pool of $68,800 to nudge past the $50,000 guarantee.

Amongst them were a host of Team PokerStars Pros including Victor Ramdin, Shane Schleger, Eugene Katchalov, Bertrand Grospellier, Anders Berg, Andre Akkari and Bryan Huang. Unfortunately none of those guys made it to the top 48 players and the money, with Germany’s Lumelia bursting the $326.80 bubble in 49th place.

Martin Staszko (37th – $395.60), Dan Kelly (35th – $395.60), Marcin Horecki (31st – $464.40) and George Danzer (21st – $670.80) were among the notable players who made a profit before the elimination of Gämble Time in 9th place set our final table lineup:

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Final table lineup
Seat 1: bamboocha88 (132477 in chips)
Seat 2: ChadBrownPRO (255417 in chips)
Seat 3: risti7 (247761 in chips)
Seat 4: Amke (88553 in chips)
Seat 5: AJSuited16 (293516 in chips)
Seat 6: wizowizo (259240 in chips)
Seat 7: Raff345 (162333 in chips)
Seat 8: Foofighterer (280703 in chips)

The lineup was highlighted by Team PokerStars Pro Chad Brown. With over $3 million in tournament winnings to his name, including a victory in the $2,500 WCOOP HORSE event back in 2006, Brown was going to be a dangerous foe on this final table. But a quick Google search uncovered a couple of other big threats.

Russia’s Amke was a two-time SCOOP winner, and clearly a mixed-game specialist, with a title in the 2009 SCOOP $2,100 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball and the 2011 SCOOP $1,575 Badugi. AJSuited16 was a former Super Tuesday winner, while Ole ‘wizowizo’ Schemion was a young German who won last year’s PokerStars yearly TLB.

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Ole ‘wizowizo’ Schemion in action at a recent European Poker Tour Event

Suddenly I felt more comfortable about my upcoming Badugi lesson.

I discovered that things don’t happen too quickly in limit Badugi, so it took a few orbits for the short-stacked Amke to become our first casualty. After three-betting and getting his last chips in after the first betting round, Amke stood pat throughout, only to see risti7 take three attempts at drawing one card before eventually making 8♥ 4♣ 3♦ Aâ™  for an eight badugi to better Amke’s 2â™  4♦ A♣ 10♥ ten badugi. Amke fell short of a third SCOOP title but took home $1,548 for 8th place.

Raff345 was crippled in a multiway pot when making a nine badugi against the six badugi of Foofighterer. Raff345 couldn’t recover as bamboocha88 finished the job, making a queen badugi, as Raff345’s multiple draws could only catch a three-card three. Raff354 finished in 7th place for $1,892 in prize money.

The pressure shifted to Team PokerStars Pro Chad Brown when he lost the following big hand after running into a five badugi:

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Brown was eliminated shortly after. He drew cards three times as AJSuited16 stood pat with his Q♦ 8♣ 2♠ J♥ for a queen badugi. Brown was clearly drawing to a strong hand, but ultimately could only muster up K♠ A♠ 5♥ 3♣ for a three-card five. Brown will be a little disappointed with 6th place for a $2,580 collect.

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Chad Brown adds another SCOOP final table to his resume

The battle from five to four players, and then again to the final three, was a tough affair. The limit variant tested everyone’s patience as the long day was starting to wear thin on some of the players.

bamboocha88 said, “can we make this a 2 day event?”
risti7 said, “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO”

Risti7 was severely dented after tapping the table three times in a big hand against
Foofighterer who drew one and one, before standing pat on the third draw. Risti7 bet but Foofighterer raised it up and got paid off with 7♦ 8♠ 4♣ 2♥ with an eight badugi good to leave Risti7 on the ropes.

Risti7 found one double up and battled valiantly, but when wizowizo caught a five badgui after the second draw, Risti7 was in a world of hurt as a three-card seven wasn’t enough to survive. Risti7 picked up $3,612 for 5th place.

Four-handed play was dominated by Foofighterer as he built his stack relentlessly – at one stage winning 11 of 14 hands to get his stack up above the million chip mark.
When Foofighterer drew two and then stood pat, wizowizo drew one on each draw to make 7♣ 8♦ 6â™  4♥ but it wasn’t quite enough as Foofighterer showed Aâ™  8♥ 6♦ 2♣ for a narrowly-better eight badugi to take a big pot and eliminate wiziwizo in 4th place for $5,332 in prize money.

With Foofighterer holding a near ten-to-one advantage over AJSuited16, the short stack made one desperate attempt at a deal:

AJSuited16 said, “even chop?”
AJSuited16 said, “i only offer once”
Foofighterer said, “lol”

With deal negotiations squashed, Foofighterer continued on his merry badugi-ing way. He dented bamboocha88 by drawing three times and making a seven badugi, before finishing the job. Foofighterer stood pat all the way with A♣ 3♦ 10â™  Q♥ for a queen badugi as bamboocha88 was disgusted that he drew three times with a 4♣ 2â™  3♥ -X but just couldn’t find a card to improve to become our third place finisher for $7,396 in prize money.

Foofighterer held a massive lead, and despite AJSuited16 fighting hard during heads-up play, he was unable to pull it back. The final hand saw AJSuited16 raise and Footfighterer make the call. Footfighterer drew two to his opponent’s one, but raised it up following a bet. AJSuited16 called and drew one as Footfighterer was happy to stand pat. Another bet saw AJSuited16’s last chips in the middle as he took one more shot at drawing.

“gg,” said AJSuited16 in resignation as he could only make a three-card eight. Foofighterer tabled Kâ™  3♦ 6♥ 8♣ for the king badugi which was enough to take it down. AJSuited16 won $9,804 for a fine tournament as Foofighterer is the badugi king with $13,244 his reward.

Final table results
1st Foofighterer (Germany) – $13,244
2nd AJSuited16 (Costa Rica) – $9,804
3rd bamboocha88 (Germany ) – $7,396
4th Ole ‘wizowizo’ Schemion (Germany) – $5,332
5th risti7 (Estonia) – $3,612
6th Chad Brown (Canada) (Team PokerStars Pro) – $2,580
7th Raff345 (Russia) – $1,892
8th Amke (Russia) – $1,548

Of course, SCOOP is only just beginning with an amazing schedule of events still to come. For more details head to the official SCOOP website for the schedule, satellites, leaderboard, statistics and more.

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