Well into the second half of the 2014 Spring Championship of Online Poker, PokerStars offered some interesting tournaments for players. Event 32 was anything but a regular No Limit Hold’em tournament, as it offered Progressive Super Knockout excitement. With a bounty on every player, the action was furious and exciting.
The medium buy-in event in this group was a $100 + $100 + $15, with a $100 bounty on each player and a progressive structure for those knockouts that is best explained by PokerStars:
In a progressive knockout tournament, a percentage of every knockout bounty goes to increasing the bounty of the player who caused the knockout. For example, if a player has a $10 bounty on him and the increase percentage for the tournament is 25%, then the player who knocks him out would win $7.50 and their bounty would increase by $2.50. If a player in the same tournament had increased their own bounty to $20 then the player who knocked them out would get $15 and increase their own bounty by $5.
With that said, let’s get to the numbers for the tournament:
Players: 4,476
Guarantee: $400,000.00
Total prize pool: $895,200.00
Regular prize pool: $447,600.00
Bounty prize pool: $447,600.00
Paid players: 585
Day 1 worked its way into the money, at which point several members of Team PokerStars were still in action. They all exited that night, though, in this order:
Team Online’s Naoya “nkeyno” Kihara: 326th place ($223.80 + $100 bounty)
Team Online’s Grzegorz “DaWarsaw” Mikielewicz: 216th place ($313.32 + $906.25 bounties)
Team Pro Eugene Katchalov: 71st place ($725.11 + $1,087.50 bounties)
Only 31 players made it through the night at the four remaining tables. At that time, the top ten players on the leaderboard were:
1. Maclinic (Chile) 2,384,094
2. Fixel86 (Germany) 1,437,618
3. VibizSbrissa (Brazil) 1,388,340
4. mayer1648 (Hungary) 1,293,569
5. sonmonedas (Argentina) 1,251,726
6. devinr12 (Colombia) 1,124,006
7. RaiseUpBlind (Canada) 1,110,122
8. player0207 (Russia) 939,066
9. deviltmn (Russia) 924,969
10. WhatArunAA (Canada) 856,205
Day 2
Play resumed on May 15 at the start of Level 32, with blinds of 7K/14K and the ante at 1,750.
The tournament quickly moved forward to only two tables, and the second hour of play busted more players to get to hand-for-hand action at the 2.5-hour mark of the day. A few rounds later, runounirob moved all-in with 9♥ 9♦ , but RaiseUpBlind called with J♠J♦ , which stood up to the 5♦ 6♠10♣ 2♠2♦ board. Runounirob left in tenth place with $2,685.60.
Fixel86 fights to keep chip lead
The final table kicked off in Level 39 with 25K/50K blinds and a 6,250 ante. The players and their initial chip counts were as follows:
Seat 1: VibizSbrissa (1,682,836 in chips)
Seat 2: WhatArunAA (1,234,624 in chips)
Seat 3: devinr12 (770,733 in chips)
Seat 4: Fixel86 (6,366,082 in chips)
Seat 5: kawachi1984 (766,723 in chips)
Seat 6: player0207 (1,429,891 in chips)
Seat 7: RaiseUpBlind (6,430,305 in chips)
Seat 8: Eccentric_BG (2,256,549 in chips)
Seat 9: howdollook? (1,442,257 in chips)
Devinr12 doubled through kawachi1984, and the latter became the new short stack.
HowdoIlook? felt the need to move and started with a middle-position raise. VibizSbrissa reraised, and Fixel86 raised from the big blind again. HowdoIlook? reraised all-in, which prompted VibizSbrissa to fold and Fixel86 to call with 8♥ 4♠. HowdoIlook? looked promising with A♣ K♥ , but the board of 9♣ 6♣ 9♦ 8♣ 5♥ gave Fixel86 two pair. HowdoIlook? left in ninth place with $3,580.80 and $2,525.18 in bounties.
Kawachi1984 doubled through player0207, and four hands later, player0207 pushed all-in with 8♥ 8♦ . RaiseUpBlind and Fixel86 each called, and the flop came 5♣ K♠4♠. Fixel86 bet, and RaiseUpBlind folded as Fixel86 showed 9♣ 9♦ . The 5♦ turn and 2♠river ended the hand and eliminated player0207 with $5,595.00 and $3,507.01 in bounties.
WhatArunAA was low but doubled through Fixel86 to stay alive. But during the next round, WhatArunAA risked it all again from the button. Devinr12 reraised all-in, which prompted Fixel86 to fold. Devinr12 showed A♣ A♥ , which looked good against the A♠K♠of WhatArunAA. That pair did hold up to the 10♦ 4♥ J♥ 2♥ 6♣ , and WhatArunAA departed in seventh place with $10,071.00, in addition to bounties of $2,252.33.
VibizSbrissa took a chance with A♣ J♣ against the 6♣ 6♠of Fixel86, but the latter remained ahead as the board displayed 9♦ 10♥ Q♥ 9♠2♥ . VibizSbrissa was gone in sixth place with $14,547.00 and $6,704.06 in bounties.
Kawachi1984 doubled through Fixel86 to stay in the game.
Meanwhile, devinr12 decided to risk it all with J♥ J♣ against the 8♦ 7♥ of Eccentric_BG. But the flop of 5♥ 7♦ 4â™ gave Eccentric_BG a fighting chance, though the 2â™ on the turn didn’t help. Then the 8♣ came on the river to give Eccentric_BG two pair and send devinr12 out in fifth place with $19,023.00 and bounties worth $7,729.64.
While it looked as if Fixel86 was going to run away with the tournament, RaiseUpBlind had other ideas. RaiseUpBlind changed the game with this double-up:
A short time later, kawachi1984 pushed from the small blind with less than 900K chips and 10♠7♠. RaiseUpBlind called from the big blind with K♠9♠and improved to trips on the 5♦ 8♦ K♣ 7♦ K♦ board. Kawachi1984 was gone in fourth place with $25,737.00 and $2,486.71 in bounties.
No ICM for final three
The chip counts when the trio paused for a brief deal discussion – which did not produce a deal – were as follows:
Seat 4: Fixel86 (10,295,603 in chips)
Seat 7: RaiseUpBlind (7,513,768 in chips)
Seat 8: Eccentric_BG (4,570,629 in chips)
After initially losing ground, Eccentirc_BG doubled through Fixel86 to 5.8 million chips. RaiseUpBlind then did the same, closing in on the chip lead:
Several hands later, RaiseUpBlind took a pot worth neary 12.5 million chips from Fixel86 to jump into the chip lead.
Fixel86 was quite low but doubled through Eccentric_BG. And when Eccentric_BG looked to double back, Eccentric_BG did it with 2♦ 2♠. Fixel86 called with A♣ 5♠and hit the straight on the board of J♥ K♠6♣ 10♥ Q♥ . Eccentric_BG was eliminated in third place with $36,927.00, along with $7,596.83 in bounties.
A fight to the finish
The two finalists started their battle with these stacks:
Seat 4: Fixel86 (7,739,877 in chips)
Seat 7: RaiseUpBlind (14,640,123 in chips)
The duo played for some time, which only resulted in RaiseUpBlind gaining even more ground. They did decide to pause for a deal discussion, but it quickly became clear that each player wanted more money than would make a dead feasible.
The tournament resumed.
Fixel86 continued to lose chips but did double up once to 11.5 million chips. But a few hands later, the two got involved in another big hand. Three raises led to the 7♣ 5♥ 3♥ flop, at which point RaiseUpBlind bet and Fixel86 check-called. The A♠on the turn brought another RaiseUpBlind bet, and Fixel86 raised all-in with Q♣ 10♣ . But RaiseUpBlind called with A♣ K♥ for top pair, and Fixel86 had to leave in second place with $52,369.20 and $18,068.80 in bounties.
RaiseUpBlind of Canada captured the SCOOP title and $70,274.64 in prize money, as well as $15,204.68 in bounties. Congrats!
SCOOP – 32M: $215 NLHE Progressive SuperKO
Entrants: 4,476
Prize pool: $895,200.00
Places paid: 585
1. RaiseUpBlind (Canada) $70,274.64 + $15,204.68 bounties
2. Fixel86 (Germany) $52,369.20 + $18,068.80
3. Eccentric_BG (Bulgaria) $36,927.00 + $7,596.83
4. kawachi1984 (Russia) $25,737.00 + $2,486.71 bounties
5. devinr12 (Colombia) $19,023.00 + $7,729.64
6. VibizSbrissa (Brazil) $14,547.00 + $6,704.06 bounties
7. WhatArunAA (Canada) $10,071.00 + $2,252.33 bounties
8. player0207 (Russia) $5,595.00 + $3,507.01 bounties
9. howdoIlook? (Portugal) $3,580.80 + $2,525.18 bounties
Jennifer Newell is a PokerStars freelance contributor.
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