Poker From The Rail
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Posted by AlCantHang | Filed under Bloggers on the Rail
Big time poker games are unpredictable and rarely run on a schedule as witnessed over the short, volatile history of the durrrr Challenge 2 between Tom Dwan and Dan “jungleman12″ Cates. I missed the session played last week while cruising the friendly skies at 35,000 feet and would have missed this one in Nevernever Land had I not checked twitter before calling it a night. Dwan threw out a casual tweet about another session starting and sent the forum monkey world all a-twitter. Before long they were both loaded up across four tables of $200/$400 Heads Up NLHE tables firing away.
Action began fast with an all-in on the very first hand and there was plenty of action for the railbirds to enjoy. 1,400 hands later Dwan was able to book another small win against Cates to the tune of ~$25,000 but the graph is still firmly planted on the side of “jungleman12″. If the tide hasn’t shifted towards Dwan, he has at least stopped the hemorrhaging that was seen early on. Still over 37,000 left to play in the challenge so plenty of room for both sides to make strides. You can check out the durrrr 2 Challenge Stat page for the current numbers and some hand replays.
Session hands: 1,399
Session winnings: Tom Dwan $24,436
Table 9: 56 hands, Dwan $16,996
Table 10: 311 hands, Dwan $17,974
Table 11: 298 hands, Cates $42,120
Table 12: 266 hands, Dwan $125,366
Table 13: 288 hands, Cates $74,264
Table 14: 58 hands, Cates $11,206
Table 15: 61 hands, Cates $2,004
Table 16: 61 hands, Cates $6,306
Below are some of the big hands which occurred over the session.
Neither wasted any time getting all the chips in the middle, on the very first hand they shipped ‘em in with a good old fashion coin flip. Big Slick off for Cates and two red Queens for Dwan with it run twice. Cates won the first but also lost an out for the second run with the unnecessary rivered trip Kings. The second board ran clean and our first hand was big but anti-climatic.
The action didn’t slow down as they build big pots early for the massive pots later. The very next hand on Table 10 created another $80,000 pot but this time it was not chopped. Cates opened with the standard min-raise on the button which Dwan called to see a 7c 2s 5d flop. A series of raises had both players once again putting everything in the middle but “jungleman12″ was drawing thin even with the run it twice option holding top pair versus the top two of Dwan. Dwan drew first blood.
Table 10 produced one more big hand during the session and a nice cooler in Cates favor. Cates once again min-raised his button then re-raised Dwan’s 3-bet to produce a pot over $12,000. The 7-high flop brought a series of bets getting all the money in with Dwan’s 99 way behind the JJ of Cates. Running it twice did not allow Dwan to hit a two outer and Cates picked up over $114,000.
Table 11 started off fairly innocent but finally produced a huge pot. Dwan started things off with a pot sized raise on the button which Cates called. The flop was Ts 2h 9d and Cates check-raised Dwan’s bet only to see him come back over the top with a 3-bet which Cates just called. The pot was over $37,000 with Dwan having only $29,000 behind, Cates insta-shoved the 8d turn having Dwan covered by nearly $100,000. Dwan called with a decent chance of being ahead holding tens up and the flush draw but was up against Cates bigger two pair. Running the river twice did not help Dwan hit his 3/1 dog and another big hand shipped towards “jungleman12″.
The biggest pot on Table 11 was pushed Dwan’s way but could have been a little bigger. Dwan’s standard pot-sized button raise was called again by Cates ahead of a Jack-high two club flop. Cates check-raised Dwan’s bet according to the script but the turn Ace slowed Dwan down with flat calls on the last two streets. When the cards were tabled we saw Cates missed his club flush draw versus the Kings of Dwan.
Finally, yet another cooler laid at the feet of “jungleman12″ early in play on Table 13. It started off like many other hands with Cates min-raising his button and Dwan hitting the pot button. They took their time getting everything in the middle since both were holding heads up monsters. Cates was looking for a miracle during one of the two runs but couldn’t find anything to help his Queens crack Kings.
Tags: AlCantHang, Bloggers on the Rail, durrrr, durrrr Challenge, jungleman12, Tom Dwan
Posted by AlCantHang | Filed under Bloggers on the Rail
After what seemed like endless delays, the durrrr Challenge 2 picked back up this past Friday between Tom Dwan and Dan “jungleman12″ Cates. Challenge 2 stormed out of the gates at the beginning but hit a string of logistical snags over the last few months including a few small tournaments in Europe (2010 World Series of Poker Europe) as well as some promotional obligations for Dwan. Out of the blue on Friday twitter exploded with exclamations they were at it again. I fired up the old poker engine to rail along with the rest of the world and here is what I witnessed.
The two players faced off across four tables of No Limit Hold’em heads up at $200/$400 blinds. Just over 2,000 hands were played in two different sessions with a short break in between. There were a handful of 6 digit pots but most of them were chopped up courtesy of the “run it twice” option meant to reduce variance but instead providing a ton of “oh well” hands so far. jungleman12 came out ahead in the first, durrrr stormed back in the second to put a tiny dent in the huge lead from late in the summer. Still less than 20% of the 50,000 hands have been played with jungleman12 ahead by nearly $650,000. Below are some of the big hands we saw throughout the day.
You can stay up to date with the results at the durrrr 2 Challenge stats page.
One of the biggest hands left everyone shaking their heads with both players trying to get tricky. jungleman12 was the small blind on the button and fired out a min-raise to 800 only to watch durrrr 3-bet the pot. All pretty standard action until jungleman12 4-bet up to $5,200 generating a flat call from durrrr and building a +$10,000 pot preflop. Things slowed down on the 3h 6s 6d flop with Dwan check calling Cates less than 50% pot bet. The 9s on the turn saw another check-call from Dwan leaving Cates with under $40,000 and the pot just under $50,000. The 3 of clubs hit the river and Dwan once again check-called the less than pot shove from Cates.
When the cards were tabled, all anyone could say was “that was a good flop for your hand“.
The joys of the “run it twice” option were evident in the biggest hand of the session which saw $170,000 sitting in the middle with two cards to come. The action started in a similar fashion to the hand above, Cates min-raising out of the small blind and Dwan popping it up. This time around Cates just called and they saw a Js 5d 8s flop. After a series of raises all the chips ended up in the middle creating a pot just under $170,000. Cates was holding 75s for bottom pair with the flush draw and Dwan was holding two black Kings. It was a virtual coin flip and running it twice produced a split pot. Cates rivered a spade in the first run and airballed the second.
The numbers:
Cards – %win
7s5s – 52.53
KcKd – 47.47
The only hand of the session which was all-in preflop, perhaps the players will have a weird aversion to pocket Kings when playing heads up. They built a $118,000 pot before the board was dealt with Cates all-in with 99 against Dwan’s KK. Running it twice gave the extra shot of binking his two outs which is exactly what happened. I am already prepared for the wingnut conspiracy folks with their doom-switch talk in the comments.
The second biggest pot of the session was once again chopped up between the two players but plenty of action to get us there. The money finally made it’s way to the center on the turn with the board reading Td 5h 9d 3h. Cates having Dwan covered and the pot was just south of $168,000. Cates was ahead with the almighty T8o versus the KQh of Dwan for a flush draw, gut shot straight draw, and two overs. They ran it twice with Dwan rivering the flush on the first run and whiffing the second for another huge, but chopped, pot.
By the end of the two sessions of the day, Dwan managed to pull back just ~$13,000 and is still facing a huge deficient with more than 80% of the challenge remaining. Everyone is waiting for the next big session between these two monsters and things look to be heating back up. The durrrr Challenge 2 stats page has all the information you need and will let you know when they are back running.
Tags: AlCantHang, Bloggers on the Rail, durrrr, durrrr Challenge, jungleman12, Tom Dwan
Posted by AlCantHang | Filed under Bloggers on the Rail
It was another crazy week around the halls of Full Tilt this week as things kept coming at us one after another. Emails were coming in on a regular basis with news and updates faster than we could keep up. The two biggest stories this week were obviously the latest “durrrr Challenge” as well as the Open Letter to the Commerce Casino but there were other bits that didn’t make the cut. This weekend brings the latest edition of Sit n Go Madness, the Big Little Tournament ($2 buyin, $100,000 prizepool), and non-stop satellites running for MiniFTOPS XVII.
Here are 5 of the top stories that grabbed my attention, details after the jump.
1. “durrrr Challenge 2″ is underway between Tom Dwan and Daniel “jungleman12″ Cates. We have all the details and a short interview with Dwan.
2. Howard Lederer and other top players release an open letter to the Commerce Casino voicing their displeasure over the casino’s stance on HR 2267.
3. Episode 3 of the Doubles Poker Championship airs this weekend on GSN.
4. Full Tilt’s Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi appears on ESPN’s Poker Edge podcast.
5. The Full Tilt Merit Cyprus Classic comes to an end, Gloria Balding and Fillipo Candio take a flying leap.
Tags: AlCantHang, Bloggers on the Rail, durrrr, durrrr Challenge, ESPN, Lacey Jones, Michael Mizrachi, Tom Dwan
Posted by AlCantHang | Filed under Bloggers on the Rail
The poker world became a little more interesting in the spring of 2009 when Tom Dwan announced the “durrrr Challenge”. It was big news when he said he would play anyone (except Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond) for 50,000 hands of $200/$400 heads up PLO or NLHE across four tables. His propostion was $1.5m of his money versus his opponents $500k, whoever was ahead after 50,000 hands would collect the prop bet. There were other restrictions placed on the bet but those are the basic nuts and bolts. Full Tilt’s Patrik Antonius was the first to step up and everyone gathered around the tables in anticpation.
After a slight pause in the action for the 2009 WSOP, a little player named “Isildur1″ soon had everyone’s attention including both Dwan and Antonius. While the “durrrr Challenge” was an entertaining concept, it was far more interesting for the players to climb in levels for a chance to eat some “Swedish fish”. While the nosebleed action has slowed down while “Isildur1″ licks his wounds, other things continued to cause a delay in the action between Dwan and Antonius. Dwan leads the first Challenge with +10,000 hands remaining before it is officially decided and Dwan’s lead sitting over $2,000,000.
Recently word began circulating about other players taking up the challenge versus Dwan with “durrrr” himself indicating in a Bluff article he would be playing Brian Townsend next. Rumors began flying about when/where/who would be the next player to sit down with Dwan. We now have the who and when. Next up with be Daniel “Jungleman12″ Cates and we can expect the games to kick off at any time. The tables are now ready to roll.
I had a chance to sit down for a few minutes with Dwan on Wednesday to get an update and he thought there was a great chance play in the next challenge would begin sometime on Thursday, August 26th.
There are still a few thousand hands remaining againt Patrik Antonius, how do you feel about your play against him?
Patrik’s a really good player and I definitely got pretty lucky versus him overall. I’m happy I’m up so much and obviously I’m a big favorite to win and I hope I do, but he’s still a super good player and there are a few hands left play, I’m not a lock by any means. I felt like I played pretty well and ran pretty well and that’s a good combo.
It was originally reported Brian Townsend would be your next Challenger. Will you be playing both Townsend and Jungleman12 at the same time?
I wanted to work out playing both of them but was busy the last few weeks so I think I’m just going to play Jungleman12 on 6 tables and hopefully crank out a bunch of hands. And then if Townsend wants to play, I can play him then.
Are you playing the same stakes and same level ($200/$400)? (Edit: they are playing NLHE instead of PLO)
Yeah, need to do 4 tables minimum. It’s his choice if he wants to do more, I’ll definitely do up to 6 (tables) and probably do 8. He said he thinks he’ll only want to do 6 so I’m fine with that.
Have you played much against Jungleman12? Any strategy difference between him and Antonius?
No, not too much at all. We played some. I saw somewhere online that it was 15,000 hands or something like that which seems like way more than I remember playing him but maybe. I have some idea how he plays, hopefully I’ll have a better idea in a little bit and a little more money too.
A quick internet search tells me Daniel “Jungleman12″ Cates is an economics student at the University of Maryland. He quickly moved up in stakes until he was soon battling in the biggest games on the site and survived losing ~$600,000 to “Isildur1″. He seems to employ an aggressive style of bankroll management but will play anyone at anytime. Looking over the small sample size of hands, the match seems pretty even on paper.
While the Antonius battle has drug on for over 18 months, Dwan believes the battle versus Jungleman12 will be done quickly with both ready to grind away the hands on as many as 8 tables at a time. Standby for updates and stats.
Edit: Until the official stats page is completed, we are tracking his results here at durrrr Challenge 2: durrrr vs. Jungleman12
You can see who’s online from Team Full Tilt here.
Tags: AlCantHang, Bloggers on the Rail, durrrr, durrrr Challenge, Tom Dwan
Posted by AlCantHang | Filed under Bloggers on the Rail
Your PFR crew is finally starting to recover from our WSOP hangover just in time to get ready for the build up to the 2010 November Nine. The work has begun on our efforts to handicap the final players as well as some profiling and interviews. We still have some great guest posts around from those two months of the summer to share with you. Here’s one of them.
As I documented during the WSOP, 2010 saw an explosion of smartphones in the field along with most of your favorite poker players reaching out to their fans via social networking. One of our favorite guest bloggers, Michele Lewis, took some time running around the Amazon and Pavilion Rooms snapping pictures of different folks typing/twittering/texting away on their phones.
Enjoy
Phone a friend
by Michele Lewis
It’s a good thing we see less WSOP jackets with “Player” on the back than we see smart phones at the table. No doubt, the 2010 WSOP has far more tweeting going on than 2007, especially with easily used apps for that. Tiffany Michelle and Maria Ho, who are usually attached at the hip, use SMS for hot guy alerts and to keep up with chip counts.
Joe Sebok is always working…on his phone. Always.
Al Can’t Hang roams around the room. A lot. In fact, he knows when pizza is delivered to the Full Tilt Suite, except for today. When he wanders over to the ESPN featured table it’s always fun to send him a text telling him something like… “Hey, Lacey Jones is watching the featured table and looking for you.” It makes for a good pic when he starts to look for Ms. Jones.
During Tom “Durrrr” Dwan’s final table there was a rumor that BJ Nemeth and Pauly had a million dollar bet to see who was faster at tweeting Durrrr’s chip count. Turns out, it was only a rumor but if it were true… then this is what Tom “Durrrr” Dwan would look like if he were sweating a million dollar bet.
Joe “King of Twitter” Sebok typing away, then catching Michele and her camera
Yours truly walking the Amazon Room, caught on camera
WSOP media legends Dr. Pauly and BJ Nemeth
Tom “durrrr” Dwan spent a lot of time in 2010 working his phone
Tags: 2010 World Series of Poker, AlCantHang, Bloggers on the Rail, Guest Posts, Michele Lewis, Tom Dwan, WSOP
Posted by AlCantHang | Filed under Bloggers on the Rail
It’s Shark Week on the Discovery Channel here in the states (I’m too lazy to see if the Discovery Channel and Shark Week are available outside the lower 48) and appropriately enough the huge cash games on Full Tilt Poker began hitting up at the same time. The “durrrr” Challenge resumed after a summer hiatus, Ivey stomped some mud-holes, and other big games were running on a regular basis. The poker sharks have come out to play.
After a short pause for the WSOP, Tom “durrrr” Dwan and Patrik Antonius put a jolt back in their heads up challenge by playing a few hands over the last two days. Antonius came out on the wrong side of both sessions with Dwan taking several huge 6-digit pots yesterday alone. The lead for Dwan has been stretched to over $2,000,000 making Antonius a long shot to come out on top. The Challenge is nearly 80% and just over 10,000 hands remain to be played before someone has to pay off their bet. You can track the Challenge stats, replay hands, and get updates on the “durrrr” Challenge Stats page.
I first noticed things were going to pick up on the big games this week when Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond tweeted on Monday “Making the same mistake I’ve made time and time again… Playing Ivey”. He may have underestimated his chances playing Heads Up $500/$1,000 Pot Limit Omaha ($40,000 cap) because he finished the day taking a decent chunk of cash from Ivey. On the other hand we had several players (Luukie21 and IHateJuice) who would take Galfond’s spot at the table and proceed to dust off over $1,000,000 back to Ivey.
Those were just a few of the games running. Dwan seems to be constantly sitting at empty tables waiting for competitors, at the time of this post he is playing games from$50/$100 HU PLO, $200/$400 6-max PLO, $500/$1,000 HU PLO, and $1,500/$3,000 7-game mix. With several weeks of big-time online poker tournament about to kick off, it seems the cash games may explode at the same time. Railbirds should have the Full Tilt client fired up and keep an eye on the biggest online cash games in existence.
You can find out quickly whether they are playing the “durrrr” Challenge by checking the top of the “durrrr” Challenge stats page and check which of your favorite members of Team Full Tilt are online by clicking on the “Full Tilt See Who’s Online” link.
Tom “durrrr” Dwan Challenge progress chart
Tags: AlCantHang, Bloggers on the Rail, durrrr, durrrr Challenge, OMGClayAiken, Phil Galfond, Phil Ivey, Tom Dwan
Posted by AlCantHang | Filed under Bloggers on the Rail
Tom “durrrr” Dwan had one of the bigger rails, until he busted out
They say you can’t win the WSOP on the first day but you can certainly lose it. I’m not sure who “they” are but they say it a lot. It was definitely the case over the four Day 1 flights as many big names dusted off their stack and called it a series. Still, there are plenty of names still alive and continue their campaign here on Day 2a in a packed Amazon Room (and another 100 tables in the Pavilion Room). The floor staff was on hand early this morning to make sure the chip bags were correctly disbursed, find any minor problems, and make sure everyone is on the same page.
The final official numbers for the 2010 World Series of Poker Main Event work out to the second largest field ever. Only the “Jamie Gold pre-UIEGA” field was bigger as this year drew 7,319 players creating a first place prize just under $9,000,000. It is a significant increase over the last few years and the poker pundits will have fun trying to interpret the cause/effect. Here is how the payouts for the November Nine will look:
1st – $8,944,138
2nd – $5,545,855
3rd – $4,129,979
4th – $3,092,497
5th – $2,332,960
6th – $1,772,939
7th – $1,356,708
8th – $1,045,738
9th – $811,823
Day 2a will start today at noon with the remaining players from Day 1a and 1c. Over 2,400 players return to battle it out over just 4 levels but there are quite a few shortstacks who will need to make an early move. Poker legend Johnny Chan begins the day near the top of the leaderboard along with Full Tilt and Hendon Mobster Barny Boatman. One of the interesting stories we will be tracking over the next two days will be the status of the Brothers Mizrachi. All four brothers have made their way into Day 2 (on separate days). Michael, Robert, Eric, and Daniel all have decent stacks and will be looking to make history. Other old school players near the top including Barry Shulman, Hoyt Corkins, and Will Failla. Chris Moneymaker will be sporting a major stack and Billy “FiveTreySoooted” Kopp will be looking to move onto Day 3. Some notable chip stacks to begin the day:
Johnny Chan – 163,700
Lauren Kling – 149,650
Barny Boatman – 144,050
Mike “The Grinder” Mizrachi – 142,500
David Williams – 112,225
Chris Moneymaker – 107,425
Isaac Baron – 99,150
Maria Ho – 90,700
Theo Tran – 88,150
Amanda “Mandy B” Baker – 81,575
Dwyte Pilgrim – 68,775
Lacey Jones – 67,600
Joe Cada – 67,150
We will be back at noon to bring you 8 hours worth of live updates.
The rest of the Day 2a live updates can be found after the jump:
Tags: 2010 World Series of Poker, AlCantHang, Bloggers on the Rail, Tom Dwan, WSOP
Posted by Dave McCarthy | Filed under Uncategorized
Tom “durrrr” Dwan entered the final day of Event #55: $10,000 PLO with a huge chip lead. He quickly lost 70% of his chips before a near triple-up put him back at the top of the leaderboard. Thinking this might be another epic run at a bracelet with the biggest names in poker sweating (literally), I spent some time on his rail.
Unfortunately, Durrrr didn’t make the final table, but there were still a few interesting sights and sounds from the rail.
Posted by AlCantHang | Filed under Bloggers on the Rail
After going through about 10 days of the doldrums here in the Rio I finally feel the buzz back in the hallways. Each year it’s tough moving through the last week of preliminary events with the Main Event on the horizon but still just seeing the same schedule of mid-buyin festivals of push and pray poker. We no longer have any new open events except for the big one on Monday but we will see a room full of celebrities today for the Ante Up for Africa charity game. Fans and spectators have packed the Rio hallways between the Amazon and Pavilion Room searching for the favorite actor/player/athlete for an autograph. The buzz is definitely back.
It may also have something to do with one of our final events, Tom “durrrr” Dwan begins Day 3 of the $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha event with a nice size chip lead over second place but the remaining field of 33 is stacked from top to bottom with top players. The plan is to play down to a winner which will likely take until sunrise tomorrow. Some of those remaining outside the top ten are Phill Helmuth, Michael Binger, John Racener, “Devilfish” Ulliott, Daniel Alaei, Leandro Pimentel, Fabrice Soulier, Tony Cousineau, Ben “benba” Lamb, and Nenad Medic. The table to watch will have Dwan, Hellmuth, Jason Mercier, John Racener, and Jordan Smith.
We could find ourselves in another situation where the big bankroll players in Vegas begin trickling in during the day to (literally) sweat Dwan in another deep run. If we’ve learned anything this summer, anything can happen.
$10,000 Pot Limit Omaha Championship top ten chip counts:
1 – Tom “durrrr” Dwan – 910,000
2 – Danny Wong – 563,000
3 – Julio Marines – 539,000
4 – Ludovic Lacay – 528,000
5 – Seamus Cahill – 495,000
6 – Daniel Harmetz – 490,000
7 – Miguel Proulx – 468,000
8 – Dmitry Stelmak – 448,000
9 – Alessio Isaia – 443,000
10 – Ville Mattila – 416,000
The other big story today is Frank Kassela vitually putting his stamp on the 2010 Player of the Year title as he goes for his 3rd WSOP bracelet with a $25,000 NLH 6-handed final table appearance this afternoon. He comes in 2nd in chips behind Dan “djk123″ Kelly and his massive chip lead. It won’t be an easy path for his 3rd victory but each place higher will put him one more step in front of John Juanda and the rest. That final table can be viewed live on ESPN3.com throughout the entire run.
$25,000 No Limit Hold’em 6-handed final table:
1 – Dan “djk123″ Kelly – 5,895,000
2 – Frank Kassela – 2,610,000
3 – Shawn Buchanan – 2,110,000
4 – Jason Somerville – 1,665,000
5 – Mikael Thuritz – 1,535,000
6 – Eugene Katchalov – 475,000
Tags: 2010 World Series of Poker, AlCantHang, Bloggers on the Rail, durrrr, Tom Dwan, WSOP
Posted by Dave McCarthy | Filed under Uncategorized
Poker fans with a fondness for social media will be happy to learn that Tom “durrrr” Dwan has now joined the ranks of active Tweeters. Durrrr’s Twitter page is twitter.com/Tom_Dwan. There were previously a lot of fake Tom Dwan Twitter pages. This one is real.
The Full Tilt WSOP coverage site collects durrrr and other Full Tilt pros’ tweets, so you can go to one place to find 140 character updates from the likes of Durrrr, Annette Obrestad, John Juanda, Andy Bloch, Howard Lederer, Erik Seidel, and others.
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