End of day 3.
852 players remain (from a starting field of 6,865).
Three former Main Event champs remain in the hunt (Berry Johnston, Phil Hellmuth and Robert Varkonyi).
Two players have passed the 1 million chip mark (players start with 30,000 chips).
So Phil Hellmuth has taken 2nd three times this year? Wow. And he’s still in the mix for the big one.
Is the future Ms. etv78 (Maria Ho) still in?
they just played through the bubble. Some guy was bubble boy when his top pair lost to Quad Queens.
Phil Hellmuth busted about an hour prior to the bubble. Ben Lamb has will have to beat a flock of players to beat Phil Hellmuth for the WSoP Player of the Year. I think he has to finish about 120th or higher. Ben Lamb is one of the baaaaaddest players at the WSoP right now as his chip stack is 9th according to PokerNews live reporting.
Negreanu made the money, but he just lost a big pot. Severe short stack @ 35K. and the antes and blinds are at 500/2500/5000.
They are dropping like flies now that they have passed the bubble.
Negreanu bouncing back, now has 335k in chips.
All previous Main Event winners are now gonskies.
Negreanu has busted. about 215th place. Ben Lamb looks to be a lock to be the WSoP PotY. One of the chip leaders as of 5:30 vegas time.
After day 5 last year, they were down to 205 places. They are already down to ~200 players with about 6 hours of play left in the day. They should be around 160 players by the end of the day. It is going to be some short days on day 7 or day 8 at this rate.
I’m not answering any questions about my future wife at this time. Thank you for the concern though.
For fans of other pro-level games, pro Magic: the Gathering player Gabriel Nassif finished 189th. Pro Starcraft 2 player Jonathan “Kiwikaki” Garneau finished 210th. Both earned 47 grand for their troubles.
She is quite pretty, but I wish she had not team with Tiffany Michelle in the Amazing Race. Tiffany is a little skanky “Pokah Playa” as Joan Rivers might say. FTR, Maria and I share a birthday although she is exactly 22 yrs younger than me.
173 players left at the dinner break. 205 players at the end of day 5 last year. (Last year, they got to 78 players at the end of day 6, and 27 at the end of day 8 and 9 players at the end of day 9.
They are at level 21 right now, antes and blinds 2k/8k/16k. and they got to level 21 at 10 pm on Day 5. they started level 21 at 5:30 pm, so they squeezed in some extra levels on the earlier days. Probably a good thing. It might be a really short day tomorrow.
The feature table on ESPN2 in 30 minutes will feature Ben Lamb. the guy that is probably going to overtake Hellmuth in the WSoP Player of the Year. Ironically, Hellmuth is doing the commentary on ESPN2.
I thought Antonio Esfandairi did a good job the last two nights and Phil was not bad himself earlier. Insightful analysis and well spoken. Much better than Norm (I love Beef Jerky) Chad.
@ESPN_Poker jsut tweeted:
so it looks like they are going to break early tonight, quitting in 2 hrs and 20 minutes which would be about 11 pm Vegas time. Wonder how many more players they will lose in 2.33 hrs? About 40?
I watched some Saturday. Very enjoyable, when Norm Chad is not around.
I don’t might Norm Chad, but Antonio and Hellmuth were so much better. and pretty good with the reads. Hellmuth did say that he not Jean Robert was bluffing on that big pot before one of the breaks, but that was after the fact. Everyone is a good Monday morning Quarterback. I am disappointment that there is no coverage until very late tonight.
90 players left.
“TV notables” Allen Cunningham and Erick Lindgren remain in the field.
Tony Hachem, brother of 2005 Main Event champ Joe Hachem, is also still alive.
Seriously. Same “jokes” about his ex-wife and his golf game for years now and they weren’t even funny in the first place.
Phil Gordon got a ton of credit when he hosted Celebrity Poker Showdown years ago and I haven’t seen him reprise his role since.
So is Norm Chad out all together? I hope so. I couldn’t stand his commentary.
“Ex-wives”
Not funny now, not funny ever.
And I’d love to see Phil Gordon do commentary again.
I heard them talkng about the regular tuesday night telecasts. Will they pick up from here and show weekly shows with the remaining players?
Or willl they telecast the most interesting parts from the entire tournament?
I gotta say that ALL weekend with almost nonstop poker got a bit tedious, and they really seemed disjointed at times. However I was extremely surprised with Helmuth, His commentary seemed thoughtfull and to the point. Not self serving like I imagined it would be.
I put the whole thing on DVR 'cause the wife asked me to PLEASE watch something else for a bit. So I watched the british open for a couple hours. I caught her in the kitchen making a garrot at one point.
Mensa: You almost called it thursday night. Ben Lamb is kickin some ASS! Had it not been for that one big pot he lost late saturday evening he would likey be chip leader right now.
What did I say? Because I say so much that eventually something has to stick. 
down to 57 players and Ben Lamb is #2 chip leader. Erick Lindgren is probably the most well known name still left in the tournament. One female still left, as is her boyfriend who were at the featured table for awhile late last night.
The avg stack is 3.6 Million chips and they ended the night at 5k/25k/50K antes and blinds. Avg stack ended the level at 70 BB. the play has been much more aggressive than previous years, or they are actually playing a faster pace. (which is still obnoxiously slow). There is no way that a player should take any longer than one minute to make a decision.
She went out on Day 2. 