Saturday, April 10, 2010

Hand of the Tournament

Strubel & 360,000

When you get a text, "come to my table NOW!" you don't dawdle. Table 2 is where arguable "the hand" of the entire tournament takes place, a bold statement considering we're only on Level 9 (500/1000/100 ante) of Day 1A.

The hand starts with an under the gun raise to 2,700 and gets 5 callers. The big blind shoves all-in for 11,900 more and all 6 remaining players call, creating a pre-flop pot of more than 100k.

The flop is 10 J 6 and the parade of posers all check for a free card.

The turn is 9♠ and after a bet of 20k, Scott Strubel (Woodbridge, NJ), one of the tournament big stacks makes it 75k to go, putting Joseph Capalbi (Brooklyn, NY) and his 100k, in the tank.

After the internal debate, Capalbi folds, as do two others. The action is on seat 7, who re-pops for another 30k and is all-in.

After another fold, Strubel makes the call, putting the pot at nearly 325k.

Strubel open up and shows Q J, seat 7 has 8 10 and the original all-in player has K 3 and needs a queen for a straight to take the main pot.

For the side pot, Strubel is ahead of seat 7 who has only 6 outs (2 tens, 4 sevens), including a gut shot straight flush draw.

The river is 5 and Strubel takes it all to eliminate two players. "I'm playing on feel," he says while taking his stack to 360k. "I'm like a tarot card reader or something. I felt it was coming."

As for the bystanders, Capalbi claims he folded the "sucker straight" with the 7 8. "I'm not putting my tournament on the line in that spot," he says after turning the jack high straight. "I have to fade too many outs. I lose to king, queen and I have to assume there are flush draws."

Thanks to cub reporter Rich Lipson (Feasterville, PA) for alerting Media Row that things were brewing.

Lipson & Capalbi

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