Friday, 29th March 2024 11:39
Home / Uncategorized / Watte No Longer: Watte takes down Sunday Warm-Up

This maybe a bold prediction, but the Sunday Warm-up may become the Sunday Warm-up Million by the end of the year with more and more players entering this “early” $215 buy-in tournament. Tonight 4,394 players lined up to take their shot at a six figure score, creating a $878,800.00 prize pool (easily crushing the $750,000 guarantee), of which 630 players carved out a piece for themselves. The final table treated themselves to the below amounts:

1. $113,365.20
2. $79,092.00
3. $52,728.00
4. $43,940.00
5. $35,152.00
6. $26,364.00
7. $17,576.00
8. $10,985.00
9. $7,118.28

With about 100 players left, Kevin “BeL0WaB0Ve” Saul held the overall chip lead with the 2nd in chips sitting on his immediate right. Both players held nearly 1.5 million in chips when par was set at 400,000 and the set up hand of pockets aces for Saul in the small blind and pocket queens for Wargos got it all in preflop. After a bland 3s-6c-6h-9s-Th board, Saul had assumed the chip lead by nearly two million chips. Saul, who is coming off a big cash (8th place for $234,000 see PCA coverage here) at the recent PokerStars Caribbean Adventure, is hoping to take that chip lead to the final table.

Sadly, his tourney did not end there with the top spot, but rather in 19th place when Saul got tangled up in a game of post flop chicken with Hasie65. Hasie65 would make a gut twisting call of a 2.5 million chip shove by Saul with the board reading 4s-8d-2h-Js holding just ace high with AKo. Saul turned over the bluff with Qd-Td and missed the gutshot straight draw and pair draws to exit in 19th, while Hasie65 took a quick road to the chip lead with that 6.8 million chip pot.

Hasie65’s stack would take more dives and climbs then a rough trading day on the New York Stock Exchange floor and end up in 11th place after a preflop KK vs. AA for Watte cooler that shipped Watte the chip lead. Immediately after Hasie65 took his last bow, kamizen and dom0424 knotted up for a 2.7 million chip preflop coinflip. kamizen with pocket eights and As-Qd for dom0424 and with dom’s tournament life on the line the board 5h-9d-Td-3s-2d found no pair and set our final table below:

SunWarmUp020809.jpg

(Click for larger image)

Seat 1: KrownKickin (1615080 in chips)
Seat 2: D1rtyR1v3r (5250753 in chips)
Seat 3: wynnkid (1718985 in chips)
Seat 4: cballs25 (4588974 in chips)
Seat 5: Big4aday (9744156 in chips)
Seat 6: kamizen (5616954 in chips)
Seat 7: pro-tilt77 (4156500 in chips)
Seat 8: bergeroo (2818914 in chips)
Seat 9: Watte (8429684 in chips)

D1rtyR1v3r returned to the Sunday Warm-up final table tonight with hopes on improving his third place finish good for $46,788.00 in December (read the final table write up here). With blinds starting at 100,000/200,000 ante 20,000 Big4day enjoys the starting big stack courtesy of the winning side of a ten million chip pot from Hasie65 but is closely followed by Watte who also took a few a chips off the aggressive German as shown above.

Bang! Bang! Big4aday got huge after a three-way all-in preflop involving bergeroo who pushed for 2.2 million from UTG+2, called by wynnkid for 1.4 million in the cutoff, and both were called by the chip leader Big4aday in the small blind.

Big4aday: As-Jc
bergeroo: Ac-Qd
wynnkid: Ah-Kd

wynnkid was looking great for a much needed triple up, until the flop rained down 5s-Js-7h giving Big4aday top pair. 3d and Ts on the turn and river and the first big pot of 6.4 million was shipped to Big4aday as wynnkid received $7,118.28 for ninth and eighth for bergeroo ($10,985.00).

Five hands later, KrownKickin tried kick starting his small stack of 1.5 million chips with a preflop shove from the cutoff with As-2c. But, unfortunately D1rtyR1v3r also wanted those 440,000 chips sitting in the blinds and called leaving 1.9 million behind with pocket sixes (6h-6s). No kick start to his heart or chip stack would come down the Qh-9c-7d-Th-4c board and the 3.5 million chip pot belonged to D1rtyR1v3r who rebounded since losing a sizable pot to kamizen to 5.4 million in chips. More then $1,000 an hour made tonight by KrownKickin in seventh place, just slightly more than my wages here to bring you the action as he takes home $17,576.00 tonight.

kamizen would dodge a huge bullet fired by Big4aday when he was facing elimination after all his chips got into the middle with the board showing 3c-5s-4h and holding pocket tens to Big4aday’s pocket rockets. The 16 million chip pot was further locked for Big4aday on the 2c turn giving him a wheel and leaving six outs to a chop. The Ah river gave kamizen life again as they chopped it up. Five hands later he would use that resurgence to take down D1rtyR1v3r. D1rtyR1v3r would start the hand raising to 600,000 with blinds at 150,000/300,000 ante 30,000 and was met with a re-raise by kamizen on the button to 1.25 million. Back to D1rtyR1v3r and his response was “all-in” for 5.8 million more, insta-call by kamizen holding black pocket aces to make a 13.3 million chip pot. D1rtyR1v3r held Kc-Qd for two semi-live cards but neither one connected on the 6c-Js-8d-5d-2h board to shift the chip lead from Big4aday to kamizen and prevent the Supernova D1rtyR1v3r from improving on his previous Sunday Warm-up finish. Sixth place tonight for D1rtyR1v3r and another $26,364.00 tacked onto his bankroll.

When the blinds bumped up to 200,000/400,000 ante 40,000 play slowed down for the players as pro-tilt77 and cballs25 shook their small stacks for as much as possible preflop with their pushes clearing the remaining players for the blinds and antes as both had under ten big blinds in their stacks. But, having the short stack means you open up any two cards to call by the big stacks. Big4aday had those two cards as pro-tilt77 pushed from the cutoff for his remaining 2.2 million chips and was called by Big4aday in the big blind holding Th-4h. pro-tilt77 was leading with Kd-9h and looked good for a double up with the board showing Ad-8h-3d-3c by the turn. The Td river hit for Big4day with a pair, good enough to rake in the 4.8 million chip pot and send pro-tilt77 off on river tilt with $35,152.00 in fifth place.

Ah, pocket kings. They sparkle in the sun, but can provide some dark days when they don’t hold up as the case when cballs25 shoved his remaining 2.6 million into the pot from the button with Kh-Ks. He was called by kamizen in the big blind who easily covered and held Ah-8s. The sunset would come early as the flop 9h-Ad-Td sent kamizen into the lead and left cballs25 clinging for a runner straight or a third king. Neither would drop on the 9d turn and 3c river as kamizen would nearly catch up to Big4aday’s 20 million chip stack holding 18.6 million after raking in the pot. cballs25 would need to “settle” for fourth place and the tidy $43,940.00 that came with it.

Shortly after cballs25’s departure, it was Watte’s turn to make a move, doubling up off of Big4aday in a race, then taking a 13.4 million chip pot off kamizen when he rivered a four to eight straight. This was the beginning of the end for kamizen as his chips went into the middle on the good side against Big4aday. With blinds at 250,000/500,000 ante 50,000 holding just 3.5 million, kamizen got his chips into the middle preflop with As-Jh dominating Big4aday’s Ad-7h. kamizen’s luck ran out on this hand however as the door card was a seven as was the river on the board of 7d-3s-8s-3h-7c giving Big4aday a full house, sending $52,728.00 to kamizen’s PokerStars account in third place.

Immediate Watte and Big4aday engaged in a short negotiation with the help of HostAlex and agreed with the chip chop counts from the PokerStars staff member:

Big4aday: $95,778.65
Watte: $86,678.55

Agree.

Agree.

Play on for $10K to the winner.

Here’s how our final two looked going into heads-up play:

Big4aday: 30,206,614 in chips
Watte: 13,733,386 in chips

First blood belonged to Watte as he turned a flush versus Big4adays’ flopped top pair and took over the chip lead. He would increase that chip lead two hands later after flopping trip fives value betting his way to a 17 million chip pot.

This tidal wave of chips would rush Watte into a huge 40 million to 4 million chip lead, but Big4aday was not done as he caught a little luck while pushing Kd-9d into the middle preflop against the red pocket queens of Watte who could taste victory when the flop came down Jd-3d-2h but the flush came with the 6d on the turn and extended Big4aday’s tournament for another hand as the contestants went on a brief break.

Very brief break, as the next hand saw Watte calling a push by Big4aday holding a big pocket pair once again. This time it was pocket aces for Watte (Ac-Ad) versus the ducks of Big4aday (2h-2s). And unlike the last hand the preflop favorite would have no bumps on the road to receiving the riches. 9d-Qc-Ks-3s-Td shipped the remaining 17.4 million chips to Watte who now held 43,940,000 in tournament chips which translate to the $10,000.00 the Sunday Warm-up Champion receives after a deal!

02-08-09 Sunday Warm-up Results
(*Based on two-way chip chop deal)

1. Watte *$96,678.55
2. Big4aday *$95,778.65
3. kamizen $52,728.00
4. cballs25 $43,940.00
5. pro-tilt77 $35,152.00
6. D1rtyR1v3r $26,364.00
7. KrownKickin $17,576.00
8. bergeroo $10,985.00
9. wynnkid $7,118.28

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