Gold - Helmuth Prop Bets with a Bonus Anna
Over at Pauly's blog...he wrote this:
Gold sat at one of the most difficult starting tables that I had ever witnessed live. The Poker Shrink and I dubbed it the Champions Table which included: Tony Cousineau, Abe Mosseri, Hoyt Corkins (2003 WPT Foxwoods Champion), Maureen Feduniak, Adam Weinraub (2007 WPT Invitational Champion), Tuan Le (2005 WPT World Champion), Jamie Gold (2006 WSOP Champion), Francois Safieddine, and Scott Clements (2006 WSOP bracelet winner). England's John Duthie, the EPT creator and first player to ever win $1 million on a televised poker tournament, was moved to the table late in the afternoon along with 2004 WPT Champion Martin de Knijff.
If his table was not tough enough, Tuan Le drew a nightmare assignment as he sat to Gold's immediate right. Le's hellacious day began with the big bluff from Gold. It was still the first level, not even an hour in with the blinds at 25-50 as the players began with 50K in chips each. Both players had a penchant for playing any two cards. Known as a cagey and unpredictable player, I was surprised to see Le check on a board of 2s-2c-Jh-7d-4c. There must have been five or six thousand in the pot and Gold looked down at his stack and announced all in. Le sat and stared at the flop for several minutes as a panicked look blanketed his face. He said he had K-K but we'll never know for sure. I put him on A-7 or a small pair like 6-6 or 5-5 because he thought for a long time as Gold stood up. At that point, a wall of media reps surrounded the table. Camera crews fought for position as Gold paced back and forth behind the table.
"Will I be the first player out?" Gold asked the media.
When he was told that no one had been busted out yet, he turned to Le and said, "I've got a huge hand. I don't know, if it's taking you this long maybe you have a huge hand, too. If you do have me beat it'll be an amazing call."
Le must have put Gold on trip 2s if he actually held pocket Cowboys. Like I said, we'll never know what he really had. Le reluctantly tossed his cards into the muck as Gold flipped over 6c-3s for the bluff. Gold flashed a crooked politican's smile as he stacked up the pot. A stunned Le sat there as he resembled a man who just crapped his pants.
"He was about a minute away from sending me home. It wasn't looking good," Gold said to no one in particular.
Once Hellmuth got wind of the bluff, he challenged Gold to a prop bet. Gold gave Hellmuth 3 to 1 odds. If Gold advanced to Day 2, Hellmuth would give him $5K. If he busted out, he would have to give Hellmuth $15K. Hellmuth tossed him a Bellagio $5K chip to hold on to.
"I expect to get that back plus 15 more," he barked.
The two kept on trash talking for several minutes when Hellmuth announced, "You're the only one in the room who had the balls to bluff Tuan Le. Every hand that I'm in with Tuan, I make sure I have the nuts. But you pulled off a bluff. Every time you bluff Tuan, I'm going to give you $500. Cash."
Gold accepted the bounty and within a few minutes he called Hellmuth over. He successfully bluffed Le and Hellmuth forked over five one hundred dollar bills. Hellmuth said he'd up the bounty to $1,000. But then he got gun shy.
"I didn't think anyone could outplay Tuan. I have to scale that back down to $500," said Hellmuth as Gold shrugged his shoulders.
Twenty minutes later Gold shouted, "Phil, you owe me another $500."
Hellmuth tossed Gold $500 more in cash as Le sat there like a sullen muppet. Dejected and on mega tilt, he'd bust out towards the end of the day when he ran into Hoyt Corkin's pocket aces.
Although at one point, Hellmuth apologized to everyone at his table about his constant whining, he eventually continued his verbal diarrhea as he shit all over his opponents.
"You throw away A-K and this donkey shows you 5-6 off suit. They think it's a good play. They don't know how bad that is," he scolded one player.
After he flopped a set with J-J and turned a boat, he took a nice chunk of one of his opponents stacks as he admitted, "I was setting you up all day for that hand and you walked right into it. That's why I broke all those records at the World Series. I know my customers."
While Hellmuth and Jamie Gold put on a show for everyone in the Fontana Room, along the other wall everyone had their eyes on Anna Wroblewski. The 21-year old came out of nowhere to win an event at the Bellagio a week earlier. As the story goes, the nymph-like Wroblewski grew up in Chicago and moved to Las Vegas when she was 19 to play poker for a living. She played around town illegally before she went broke and headed back home. She returned to Sin City after she was finally legal but lost her bankroll again. Determined to stay in Las Vegas, she found a job in the service industry grinding out a $10/hr salary. Her first paycheck was $300. Grubby would have been proud, because she cashed it and headed for the Bellagio. She bought into a satellite for a $3K NL event and won a seat. Then she managed to win the entire event collecting a free seat into the WPT Championship and $337K in cash for a first place prize.
Anna Wroblewski
(Photo courtesy of Flipchip)
Wroblewski bounced all over the room and out to the veranda a couple of times. At one point, Tiffany spotted her double fisting beers while she incessantly talked as the rest of her table sat in silence
"Why isn't anyone else talking?" she asked.
"Because we were waiting for you to stop," answered Irish pro Padraig Parkison.
The guys at the adjacent table had a 50K prop bet going on Wroblewski's weight. The over/under was set at 90 pounds.
She played with a ton of confidence as she became the first player past the 100K mark. She sent Jeff Madsen packing early after she flopped a set of 2's against the two-time WSOP bracelet winner. She added more chips after she scooped a hefty pot with just Ace high.
"Don't you hate it that I keep doing the right thing? They said I was a calling station," Wrobleski joked as her opponent tried to bluff at a pot with the Varkonyi and lost.
Around 8pm, Wrobleski passed the 200K mark and she ended Day 1a as the chipleader with 211K.
"Anna who?" one pro mentioned when he asked us who the chipleader was.
Exactly. |
