Home / Poker News July 2009 / WSOP Main Event – Day 4: Matt Affleck leads the pack
WSOP Main Event – Day 4: Matt Affleck leads the pack
Posted by: James Carter. - Mon, 2009-07-13 03:13
Day 4 of the 2009 WSOP Main Event had just about slowed to a crawl before the elimination of Kia Hamadani, the official bubble boy of the event, who was rewarded with a free trip to next year’s Big Dance by the organizers.
Following his elimination, all hell broke loose. No longer afraid of busting out just short of the money, the remaining players wasted no time in doing whatever they saw fit to make their Main Event run as deep as possible. For many of them, that meant putting their tournament lives on the line and chipping up as fast as possible to catch up with the losses incurred while holding out for the bubble to burst.
This initial flurry of eliminations included players like Alexander Kostritsyn, Kristy Gazes and Surinder Sunar. When the dust settled in the wake of Day 4 action, Matt Affleck stood atop the provisional leader board, followed by Ludovic Lacay.
Chris Ferguson didn’t fare well at all either. He was looking ok until he dropped almost his entire stack to Dariusz Paszkiewicz on one of those perfect hand situations every player dreads. On a flop of K,A,J Ferguson’s K,J hit a seemingly unbeatable two pair. Paszkiewicz had A,K though and Ferguson never managed to catch up. That hit left “Jesus” with 4,000 chips heading into the break. His elimination was a mere formality two hands after the break, as he was all-in on the ante with 9,2o against Sandler Lylloff’s A,6.
Jesper Hougaard was eliminated too, his Ad, 8d no match for an opponent’s Ah, Kh. Justin Bonomo followed him to the rail and so did Mike Sexton, David Williams and Paul Wasicka.
Phil Hellmuth dropped out of contention for his 12th WSOP bracelet too. Ebrahim Mourshaki was mainly responsible for his demise, as he relieved the former champ of the majority of his stack when he flopped a set of Js.
Hellmuth’s fate was eventually sealed in a three way hand in which Kevin Jenkins and Kenny Hsiung took his pocket rockets apart and sent him to the rail. The flop was J,10,5 and Jenkins shoved all-in on it. Hellmuth moved in over the top and Kenny Hsiung made the call.
Jenkins’ 9h, 8h gave him a straight draw, while Hsiung was already ahead of Hellmuth’s pocket rockets with his J,10 which gave him a two pair.
A 7d landed on the turn to put Jenkins into the lead, and the 3s on the river left the situation unaltered as Jenkins picked up the main pot, Hsiung the side one and Hellmuth headed to the rail.
Bertrand Grospellier had begun the day in the chip lead and he’d slipped a tad down in the provisional rankings but still retained a large-enough stack to virtually guarantee himself a deep run on Day 5. Ludovic Lacay had started the day 4th in chips and he managed to finish second behind Matt Affleck who had amassed 1,819 chips for the lead.
James Akenhead finished as another one of the large stacks and so did Jordan Morgan and Tom Lutz.
Other notable Day 4 survivors were: Joe Sebok, Joe Hachem and Lou Diamond Phillips.
