First Player to Hit the 1 Million Mark in WSOP-12 Main Event: Ben Alcober
Things were expected to be red hot right from the word go at the World Series of Poker 2012 main event, but that was not to be. Players were expected to rake in by the million, but it took fourteen playing levels distributed over a period of 6 days for a player to reach the elusive 1 million mark. Ben Alcober finally did it in the final hour of the fourteenth level. He is the first and the only player who is currently holding that amount and will go into the subsequent level with a handsome chip lead. If you want some statistics, he will have 250 big blinds going into the next level which is in itself, an achievement.
Talking Does the Trick for Will Failla
Will Failla talked all the way to a double up and ensured that he had a good chance of going ahead in the main event. The pot already had 40,000 and the board was showing a 7-5-3. Will Failla made a bold and aggressive move by going all-in with his remaining 26,100. The other player was a little rustled by this move and responded with some banter by saying that he had no intentions of doubling Failla up. Failla was not the one to back down and responded by saying that he could look through the back of his cards and was seeing an ace-queen combo. His opponent had a decent 8-7 combo but Failla was one step ahead with a pair of eights. A Q came up on the turn and the river was an inconsequential A. Failla was all smiles as he gathered his double up which took his tally to 110,000.
Faraz Jaka Sent Home By Neil Van Alphen on Level 14
Neil Van Alphen had Faraz Jaka’s number on level 14 as he sent the latter packing. Jaka had a stupendous run on his way to level 14, starting out Day 1 with a huge stack win. He rode on those winnings till the end of the third day and the stack was also around the same range. But on that particular hand, Jaka seemed to have bitten off more than he could chew.
A player in the mid position made a raise to 7,500. Jaka responded with a three bet from hijack all the way up to 17,500. The subsequent players folded until the baton stopped at Van Alphen who four betted and increased the tally to 45,000. This again initiated a series of folding and the token stopped at Jaka again. Jaka went all-in for 120,000. Although Jaka was suffocating with an A-Q against Van Alphen’s A-K, he forced some bravado into his demeanor.
The flop was a 6-6-4 but Val Alphen was up with a flush draw. A 9 came out on the turn and the river was an 8. Jaka literally had no play and was sent packing when the total number of players in the event just came down to under 1000 players.
The Platinum Bracelet event, which was one of the high stakes events in all the WSOP-12 events, was won by Antonio Esfandiari. Click here to know more about it.