Fil scored his second 1st place finish of the season after, as Rob might want to call it, sucking out with a runner runner straight!  Isn’t poker awesome!  It was down to the final three when Carmine raised from the button, Fil reraised and Rob shoved with his AA.  Carmine folded and Fil called the 4bet shove with KQ off.  The flop was a Jxx.  The turn was a 10, river a 9.   Ouch!!!  Carmine came in second after using speech play earlier to distract the table and get some knockouts.

By Speech play I mean Carmine started talking about food.  Really delicious food.  Before long the whole table was discussing various area restaurants and delicious meals they have had.  Dugg mentioned the Steak Tartare at Council Oak and  Carmine mentioned a delicious Italian place on 66th Street.  Many other area restaurants were discussed as well as wine.  Some players hadn’t really eaten much since lunch and before long poker didn’t seem as important as getting a good meal.  Andra was first to go after starting well and getting a decent stack.   Blinds were 300/600 when she bet 1200 with AJcc in an early position.  After two calls Carmine reraised to 6K on the button with AKoff.  Andra, hungry and suspicious, called while the other two players in the pot folded quickly.  The flop gave Andra a backdoor flush and straight draw.  It gave Carmine another K.  Andra bet 6K on the flop and Carmine shoved.  Andra, starving by now thinking of Italian food as well as steak called.  And that was the end of Andra.  Later as she waited for her car she saw Dugg leaving as well. It is unknown if Carmine’s restauant speech play got to him too.

 

Steve was out early again this week when his luck ran out. His pocket Queens were no good when Andra would not let go of her J7 suited after flopping a flush draw/straight draw and the straight hit on the river.  Later Steve was knocked out by Dave Bennett. Steve had JQss while Dave had pocket 5s.  They got it all in on a flop of KJ5ssx. The turn was a spade to give Steve the flush.  Dave rivered a FH with a J for the knockout.  There really should be a bounty on Steve on this point, we’ll have to consider that for the next 7 weeks so good going Dave!  I mean, sorry to see you out early Steve, better luck next week!

The top five shuffled again this week with Barry moving into 2nd place.   Steve is 10 points ahead of second but the gap is closing.  New faces in the top ten are John Gordon and Rob Benford.  SuperDave Kaucher needs another hot streak to get back in the top 10 after dropping down this week.  With Seven weeks left there are still 112 points available – that’s 7 weeks X 16 points for first.  Anyone can still win first place- if they lock Steve in a closet.  If we get 24 players a week there will be 5 Main Event packages plus additional smaller packages so lots of prizes still available to everyone who keeps playing the remaining 7 weeks.  It’s very important to show up every week, attendance and those final tables really count!

The final table for week 15:

1. Fil
2. Carmine
3. Rob Benford
4. John Gordon
5. Allen Wiseman
6. Tony Antonios
7. Sherry Wiseman
8. Barry Jacobs
9. Reno
10. Bob Scholz