Brent Hanks Wins WSOP Event #2; Brit JP Kelly Finishes Eighth
The early action was fast and furious thanks to JP Kelly's desire to chip up from the off; a plan that just did not work out for the popular Brit.
Prior to this tournament the Las Vegas-based poker pro by the name of Brent Hanks had managed to reach three final tables in World Series of Poker event but had failed in his quest to secure one of poker's most sought after jewellery pieces. But now Hanks has some poker bling on his wrist after he took down Event #2 of the 2012 WSOP earlier today.
The third and final day started with 15 players but within the first two hours the final table was set after the eliminations of Kenneth Strickland, Kwinsee Khoa Tran, Todd Keikoan, Neil Willerson, Joseph Cino and Kennii Nguyen. With these players out of the way the nine-handed final table lined us like this:
Seat 1: Vanessa Selbst - 1,327,000 chips
Seat 2: Brent Hanks - 1,558,000
Seat 3: JP Kelly - 610,000
Seat 4: Andrew Badecker - 1,553,000
Seat 5: Abdel Konjuhi - 388,000
Seat 6: Ryan Schmidt - 1,200,000
Seat 7: Jacob Bazeley - 1,960,000
Seat 8: Richard Park - 383,000
Seat 9: Michael Kaufman - 437,000
The early action was fast and furious thanks to JP Kelly's desire to chip up from the off; a plan that just did not work out for the popular Brit. Within 20-minutes Kelly found himself as the table's short-stack and he never recovered from his early losses.
He was initially left with just six big blinds after Jacob Bazeley min-raised to 40,000 from under the gun, Vanessa Selbst made the call in middle position and Kelly decided to move all-in with what turned out to be As-Qs from the cutoff for around 600,000. Abdel Konjuhi was in the small blind and he moved all-in for 380,000 and when Bazeley and Selbst both got out of the way Konjuhi showed his pair of red kings; which held, to leave Kelly with just 120,000 chips.
The very next hand Kelly got his stack in with Kd-Qd only to run into another big pair, this time a pair of aces of Andrew Badecker. Amazingly the board ran out 6s-Qs-Qh-2d-Kc earning Kelly a brief reprieve - though he was still very short.
Kelly's Rollercoaster Ride Continues
Another half hour passed and Kelly lost another pot to leave himself with less than a solitary big blind. He'd made a move with Ts-9s and ran into another pair of red kings, this time they belonged to Michael Kaufman and again the cowboys emerged victorious. This left Kelly with just 10,000, which found their way into the middle holding 5c-4s and found themselves at risk against Richard Park's Ag-7s. The Poker Gods were not about to let Kelly go as they put the 2s-6c-3h flop out to gift him an unlikely straight and to push him up to 57,000 chips!
This little boost in chips allowed Kelly to jump up a pay level because Park busted out almost immediately after Kelly flopped gin. Park saw Badecker open and decided to move all-in with Ad-Qc only for Badecker to turn over another pair of aces! A board reading Kh-5c-3h-Jc-8d was enough to bust Park and see Kelly and everyone else lock up an extra $11,000.
Kelly busted out as soon as Park had exited the feature table. Hanks set him all-in with As-Qs - ironically the hand that crippled Kelly at the start of the final table - and Kelly took his chances with Jd-4h. Kelly flopped a straight draw but ultimately the board ran out 6c-7s-3s-10s-7d to end Kelly's dreams of winning his third WSOP bracelet. No doubt he will have many more deep runs this year.
It took another hour for the table to lose its next player, Kaufman eventually becoming that player. He entered a raising war with Selbst that resulted in him being all-in with a pair of tens against the Big Slick of Selbst. The latter spiked an ace on the flop but Kaufman flopped a set and it looked like he was going to double up through the dangerous Selbst. That was until the Qd landed on the turn followed by the Js on the river to gift Selbst an ace-high straight and send Kaufman home in seventh place with a hell of a bad beat story!
Two hours later and six became five with the elimination of Konjuhi. He found himself at risk of busting out with his Ah-2h running into Hanks' As-Kc and bust out he did after neither player paired their hole cards and Hanks' king-kicker came into play.
Schmidt Does Not Believe Badecker
Konjuhi was joined on the sidelines 30-minutes later by Ryan Schmidt who called off all of his chips after not believing a story told to him by Badecker. The latter opened to 85,000 in the cutoff and Schmidt made the call from the button. The duo shared a flop reading Qh-6d-8d, Badecker continued with a 90,000 bet and then called as Schmidt raised to 195,000. The Ac turn saw Badecker fire again, setting the price to play at 240,000 and Schmidt paid that price. The 2h river was met with a shove from Badecker and Schmidt just did not believe him and he called off his stack with king-queen for top pair, only to be shown Ah-8h for two pair. Those sort of calls look great when they come off but you are more often than not left with proverbial egg on your face.
Just 10-minutes later and Selbst's tournament came to an abrupt end. She found herself down to 630,000 chips (less than 15 big blinds) so when she found Kd-7d in the hole she moved all-in with it. Unfortunately for her, Badecker woke up with a dominating Kc-Qd and when he caught a queen on the turn Selbst was drawing dead; fourth place was hers.
Badecker was the next to go in a relative cooler of a hand. When play is three-handed any pair is a strong hand so Badecker must have been thanking his lucky stars when he managed to get his stack in with 10c-10d against Hanks. But those stars were not so lucky because Hanks turned over Qc-Qs to crush Badecker. No ten or straight on the five community cards and heads-up was set.
Hanks held a 5,325,000 to 4,120,000 chip advantage of Bazeley and that difference in chip stacks hardly fluctuated over the next couple of hours. That was until Hanks opened to 160,000, Bazeley three-bet to 420,000 and Hanks responded by making it 780,000. Bazeley then moved all-in and Hanks made the call! Bazeley turned over a pair of black nines to Hanks' ace-eight offsuit, not the hands one would have expected after how the one-on-one battle had played out. Hanks' rail begged for an ace and as if by magic one appeared on the Ac-7s-6h flop, catapulting Hanks' into the lead and leaving Bazeley drawing to two outs. The 6d on the river was not one of them and neither was the 4s on the river and with that Hanks had become the champion of the 2012 WSOP Event #2.
Event #2 Final Table Results
1st: Brent Hanks - $517,725
2nd: Jacob Bazeley - $322,294
3rd: Andrew Badecker - $224,029
4th: Vanessa Selbst - $161,345
5th: Ryan Schmidt - $177,921
6th: Adbyl Konjuhi - $87,231
7th: Michael Kaufman - $65,377
8th: JP Kelly - $49,621
9th: Richard Park - $38,106
Prices quoted in copy are correct at time of publication but liable to change.
