Phil Ivey Advances to Day 3 as Overall Chip Leader; Hellmuth, Cada and Hachem Fall
On Wednesday, the 2014 World Series of Poker Main Event continued as 2,571 players returned to the Rio All-Suite Casino for Day 2c action. After five two-hour levels of play, the field was cut down considerably with Phil Ivey and his stack of 505,500 leading the way. That’s more than Tim Stansifer, who finished as the Day 2a/b chip leader with 481,500.
Ivey, who began the day second in chips and overtook start-of-the-day chip leader Eric Tracy early on when notched a double elimination. There was no looking back for the 10-time bracelet winner after that.
Others who finished the night with big stacks were Raul Mestre (477,900), Michael Aron (468,000), Peter Neff (389,000), Isaac Baron (387,200), Steve Tripp (380,400), and Horacio Chaves Cortes (350,200).
Eliminations were steady all day as a stream of players flowed out of the Amazon, Pavilion and Brasilia Rooms. Former New England Patriots and Oakland Raiders defensive lineman Richard Seymour was eliminated by Raj Vohra in the first level of play, and then a nasty river card put an end to Eric "basebaldy" Baldwin's 2014 WSOP one level later.
Doug "WCGRider" Polk began the day on a short stack but managed to spin it up a bit in the first two levels of play. Unfortunately for the online star who won a bracelet this summer, his Main Event came to an end when his pocket nines failed to win a race against Yun Fan's big slick. Likewise, Gus Hansen was felled in Level 8 when he got the last of it in with a straight draw on the flop against an opponent who held two pair. Unfortunately, "The Great Dane" failed to get there.
Another player to fall was 2009 WSOP Main Event champ Joe Cada, who was the victim of a rather nasty cooler. Other former Main Event champs who met their end on Day 2c were Berry Johnston, Joe Hachem, Scott Nguyen, and Phil Hellmuth.
Hellmuth's quest for a 14th bracelet came to an end after two disastrous hands. In the first, the player in the cutoff opened, Hellmuth three-bet from the small blind, the player in the cutoff four-bet to 13,100 and Hellmuth called to see a flop of 
. Hellmuth checked, his opponent bet 8,500, Hellmuth check-raised to 22,000 and his opponent called to see the 
turn, which both players checked. The 
river completed the board and Hellmuth bet 33,000. His opponent raised to effectively 45,000 and Hellmuth folded after about 45 seconds.
Down to about 12,000, Hellmuth got his last 12 big blinds in with 
, but failed to improve against 
. Others who failed to make it out of Day 2c with chips were JC Tran, David Benyamine, Marcel Luske, Daniel Idema, Bryan Micon, Jennifer Harman, Howard “Tahoe” Andrew, Matt Salsberg, and the 2014 Big One for One Drop champ Daniel Colman.
While many fell, plenty of notables managed to make it through to Day 3 including NBA superstar Paul Pierce, who survived with 48,600 despite taking a hit after running ace-king into pocket kings. He will be joined by the likes of John Hennigan (342,700), Daniel Alaei (228,300), Haralabos Voulgaris (164,700), John Juanda (133,700), Barry Greenstein (113,500), Ola "no_Ola" Amundsgard (110,100), Jake Cody (80,000), Daniel Negreanu (39,800), and Byron Kaverman (29,000).
The Day 2c survivors will join those from Day 2a/b under the same roof tomorrow at 12 p.m. local time for Day 3 action where they’ll play five more levels. Hundreds more will hit the rail, though the money bubble isn’t expected to hit until Day 4. Of course the PokerNews Live Reporting Team will be there to bring you all the action and eliminations, so be sure to join us then.
While you wait, check out this video of Phil Ivey talking about his great start to the WSOP: