The 2016 WorldSeries of Poker hosted three final tables Saturday, though only one finished, alongside Day 1 of perhaps the most prestigious tournament of the year and the final two flights of the $888 Crazy Eights wrapped up.

Brandon Shack-Harris Wins Second Bracelet in $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha Championship

Brandon Shack-Harris won his second bracelet in the Pot Limit Omaha Championship for 4,300.
The $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha Championship played its fourth and final day on Saturdya day with six players returning to the final table. Brandon Shack-Harris returned with the lead, defeated Loren Klein heads-up and won his second career gold bracelet at his second final table of the Series.

“This is definitely the most gratifying moment for me in my poker career,” Shack-Harris said after winning. “I had really tough people on my left all the time and they would play back at me. I was having to play out of position all the time.”

Klein won the PLO/NLH Mixed event a week ago and challenged Shack-Harris. “I didn’t want to play Loren heads-up,” he said. “He plays a very unorthodox style. We played some street PLO, he plays great.”

Experience played a factor with the three least experienced players hitting the rail first. Harley Stoffmaker collected just his second WSOP cash ever with his final table run. Mattew Parry nearly tripled his career earnings with his finish and Melad Marji’s cash was almost ten times the largest cash of his career.

Final Table Payouts

  1. Brandon Shack-Harris – $894,300
  2. Loren Klein – $552,713
  3. Tommy Le – $376,667
  4. Melad Marji – $261,652
  5. Matthew Parry – $183,337
  6. Harley Stoffmaker – $133,918
  7. Junayed Khan – $98,748
  8. Dominique Mosley – $74,339

Andrew Lichtenberger and Craig Blight Return Heads-Up in $3,000 No Limit Hold’em

The 31 players returning for Day 3 of the $3,000 No Limit Hold’em event knew they had a tall order in front of them to play to a winner. Ten levels of action left Andrew Lichtenberger a 3-1 chip lead over Craig Blight.

Lichtenberger bagged up 12,765,00 and Blight with 4,100,000 after Chris Johnson busted on the final hand of the night in third place. The pair had the option to play an additional level after Johnson’s bust but they declined to play on.

A trio of former November Niners began Day 3 in the top ten counts but Pierre Neuville (19th), James Akenhead (18th) and Jay Farber (15th) fell short of the final table. Tristan Wade was the first player eliminated on Day 3 and soon John Racener, John Hennigan and Simon Deadman followed him to the rail.

Final Table Payouts

  1. TBD – $569,158
  2. TBD – $351,721
  3. Chris Johnson – $249,336
  4. Mac Shorabhi – $179,015
  5. Linglin Zeng – $130,191
  6. Erhan Iscan – $95,925
  7. Thomas Miller – $71,617
  8. Roger Teska – $54,190
  9. Daniel Wagner – $41,563

Five Players Remain with Gavin Smith Leading $1,500 Omaha Hi-Lo Mix

The $1,500 Omaha Hi-Lo Mixproved to be popular enough that the structure wasn’t quite enough to finish as scheduled. Day 3 saw ten levels of action with 27 players returning and five remained at the end of play with Gavin Smith holding the lead.

Smith holds a considerable lead over Philipp Eirisch and Allan Le – all over one million chips. Cody Crouch and Keith Ferrera return as the short stacks.

The field reached official final table past midnight with Gary Bolden, David Bach and Yuval Bronshtein earning at least $15,059 each but fell short. John Monnette bubbled the final table for his seventh cash of the Series.

Final Five Chip Counts

  1. Gavin Smith – 1,800,000
  2. Philipp Eirisch – 1,175,000
  3. Allan Le – 1,125,000
  4. Cody Crouch – 565,000
  5. Keith Ferrera – 320,000

Scott Seiver Leads $50,000 Poker Players Championship

Many in poker believe the $50,000 Poker Players Championship to be the toughest and most prestigious tournament of the year and 87 of the world’s best entered the event. Registration remains open until the start of Day 2 but for now the prize pool sits at $4.176 million and Scott Seiver leads the field of 84 survivors.

Robert and Michael Mizrachi both finished in the top ten counts, Robert won the Seven Card Stud Championship earlier in the Series and Michael is the only player to win this event twice. Just outside the top stacks are Jason Mercier, Todd Brunson and Dan Smith.

Paul Volpe, Daniel Negreanu, Jesse Martin and Justin Bonomo return with above average stacks. Brian Hastings, George Danzer and Dzmitry Urbanovich return as the short stacks.

Howard Lederer entered the event and bagged up to advance while Stephen Chidwick, Keith Gipson and Abe Mosseri were the three eliminated players on Day 1.

Top Ten Chip Counts

  1. Scott Seiver – 593,000
  2. Timofey Kuznetsov – 557,600
  3. Robert Mizrachi – 500,200
  4. Brian Rast – 463,900
  5. Erik Sagstrom – 457,700
  6. John Monnette – 454,300
  7. Michael Mizrachi – 433,000
  8. William O’Neil – 427,600
  9. Anthony Zinno – 418,000
  10. Talal Shakerchi – 395,100

Flights C & D Push $888 Crazy Eights Field to 6,761 Total Entrants

The final two flights of the $888 Crazy Eights event drew 1,715 for Flight 1C and 2,230 for Flight 1D – bringing the total entrants to 6,761. The early flight advanced 62 survivors, the late flight brings 58 players forward and Day 2 has a total of 206 returning players.

Vlad Darie bagged up 454,000 for the lead in Flight 1C but is second overall behind Andy Spears’ 499,000 form Day 1B. Six players from the final flight snuck into the top ten overall with Steven Tabb and Brandon Ienn both breaking the 400,000-chip mark.

Notables from the 10 am flight include Steve Sung, Darren Rabinowitz, Greg Raymer and John Gale. From the late flight are Sam Stein, Brent Roberts, Matt Vengrin, Vinny Pahuja and Chris Ferguson.

Top Ten Chip Counts, Flights ABCD Combined

  1. Andy Spears – 499,000
  2. Vlad Darie – 454,000
  3. Steven Tabb – 446,000
  4. Brandon Ienn – 429,000
  5. Muhammed Rahim – 395,000
  6. Fabrizio Gonzalez – 383,000
  7. Aaron Johnson – 375,000
  8. Chase Johnson – 368,000
  9. Daniel Fried – 366,000
  10. Joseph Mussat – 362,000

Big Bet Sunday

After a week stretch that included a few new events the WSOP shifts back into more familiar gears on Sunday. A $1,500 No Limit Hold’em event kicks off at 11 am and the $1,500 Pot Limit Omaha HiLo event gets cards in the air at 3 pm.