Finally, the point that everyone has been waiting for in the 2011 World Series of Poker Main Event is here– the bubble has burst, and all of the remaining players have now entered the realm of the money finish. Since game play started on Friday, not only were the 853 players who made it this far whittled down, with 159 of them leaving without having anything to show for their time and effort, but the players with cash finishes moved quickly through five levels of pay amounts before the day was over.
The bubble boy distinction this year went to Reza Kashani of Irvine, CA– he was the last person to hit the rail without taking home money. According to World Series of Poker tradition, he will have free entry into the main event next year, something for which he’s probably very grateful (or he will be when the sting of this year wears off), given that he bought his way in to the WSOP this year. Also in the unfortunate minority of the day who leave empty-handed are Phil Hellmuth and Berry Johnston. 378 players remain, one of them Ben Lamb in 21st place with 1,268,000, who will take the lead spot in the Player of the Year race away from Phil Hellmuth if he manages to finish in the top 138. After the Main Event finishes, only the seven WSOP Europe events remain to determine the Player of the Year. Hellmuth, who was determined to capture a twelfth bracelet this year but failed, doesn’t seem worried about Lamb’s position right on his tail– he spent the rest of the day getting full spa treatment at the Aria Hotels Spa, then went to dinner and a movie with Mike Matusow.
Manoj Viswanathan captured the most chips at the end of Day 4, becoming the only player so far in the Main Event to amass over two million chips. He sits comfortable with 2,115,000, while Sam Barnhart is not far behind him with 1,925,000. Rounding out the rest of the top nine are Pius Heinz (1,887,000), Stephane Albertini (1,867,000), Daryl Jace (1,849,000), Lars Bonding (1,813,000), Kyle Johnson (1,761,000), Matthew Kay (1,756,000), and Mazin Khoury (1,707,000). Resting in tenth place is German Max Heinzelmann, who made news the day before by taking Shaun Deeb’s chips on a bad beat.
Other noteworthy players still in the running are Bryan Devonshire, JP Kelly, Sebastian Ruthenberg, Peter Feldman, Mark Newhouse, and Amanda Musumeci, all with over a million chips each. Joe Tehan, Joseph Cheong, Eli Elezra, Kevin Saul, Sorel Mizzi, Allen Cunningham, and Sami “LarsLuzak” Kelopuro have over 500k chips, as does Daniel Negreanu, who turned the 35k in chips he had at one point into over 600k by the close of Day 4.
The Main event of the 2011 World Series of Poker is slowly drawing to a close. One of the 378 players who remain will be the next champion, but it’s still anyone’s guess who that winner will be. There’s a lot of great talent still in the game and more still yet to be discovered– tune in tomorrow for the next installment in the WSOP 2011 saga.