WSOP
Bulgarian Simeon Naydenov bested a field of 1194 to take the WSOP bracelet and $326,440 cash in WSOP event #36, $1,500 No-Limit Holdem Shootout. This was his second final table at a shootout tournament at this year’s WSOP: coming up tenth in that event, he ended up at the opposite end of the final standings taking down the whole thing.
Due to the shootout format of the tournament (as a reminder, players start out at 10-max tables where only one player progresses to the next round), the official final table consisted of ten players. Here are the starting chip counts.
Player Chips
Jake Schwartz 936,000
Mike Watson 829,000
Jan Kropacek 794,000
Salman Behbehani 794,000
Simeon Naydenov 731,000
Tobias Wenker 442,000
Andrew Kloc 316,000
Noah Bronstein 303,000
Nacho Barbero 270,000
Sumanth Reddy 156,000
Sumanth Reddy was the first victim as he suffered a bad beat pushing A
Q
with less than 10 big blinds against A
10 of Kloc. Kloc paired his kicker on the flop and held to see Reddy off to finish in tenth for $18,407.
Twenty hands later, Noah Bronstein reraised all in for his remaining four big blinds in chips to a raise from cutoff by Naydenov. Naydenov insta-called and tabled A
9. Bronstein showed J10 and was in decent shape to double up with a little luck. Alas, the board did not deliver, running out 36889 and he exited in ninth place for $23,259.
It was hand #73 and blind level 5: 10,000-20,000, 3,000 when the next elimination happened. Jake Schwartz came from behind to beat Salman Behbehani’s KK with AQ by spiking A on the turn after the J57 gave Salman a huge 86% lead. When the river bricked 5 Behbehani was sent home pocketing $29,771 for an eight place effort.
On hand #78, Jan Kropacek answered a raise from an early position with a raise all in holding 88. Andrew Kloc moved all in over the top and everyone else folded. Kloc had a higher pocket pair, 1010, which took the pot for him on the 2493A board. Kropacek was eliminated in seventh and collected $38,621.
The third bad beat of the day happened in the battle of pocket pairs when Watson’s QQ succumbed to Naydenov’s 99. Future looked bright for Mike Watson when he called Naydenov’s four-bet all in and dominated after the 4AK flop. Tables turned, however, when 9 showed up on the turn and river J brought Mike no relief. Watson had to split the scene in 6th place but collected a cool $50,774.
Simeon Naydenov
It did not take long for the next elimination to take place when Nacho Barbero, seven hands later, moved all in from the button on Q10 only to be called by Wenker’s AK. The better hand held this time as the glorious K45 flop left Barbero scrambling for runner runner. 85 turn and river was not what Barbero needed and he hit the rail in fifth for a $67,732 payday.
Tobias Wenker ran into a monster when, somewhat inexplicably, he open-shoved his 40 big blinds stack, for just over a million in chips, from small blind into Schwartz. Jake looked at his hand and announced a call immediately, turning over AA. 3, 8, and 4 on the flop gave Wenker little hope of a comeback and 9 on the turn rendered the river meaningless. Wenker busted out, but collected $91,749 for his fourth-place showing.
And then there were three. Kloc was showing a lot of aggression and managed to pack some chips, but had to pack bags when his all in on A9 was snap-called by Naydenov’s AJ. The board spelled doom for Kloc as it would have anyway had the players gone into postflop play since both ended up with a full house: Naydenov having a higher one on the 59JAA board. Schwartz was knocked out in third and $126,250 and the action went into heads-up.
It only took ten hands to prove that luck was totally on Naydenov’s side today when both players found themselves in a pot that neither could get away from. On hand #158, Schwartz raised from the button and got called by Naydenov. The 4A9 flop gave Schwartz the top two pair for his A9, while it gave Naydenov with K8 the nut flush. The players moved all of their chips in the middle after a series of raises and reraises and let the luck decide the rest. Naydenov still had about 20% chance of losing if Schwartz found the outs for a boat. It was not in the cards this time as 7 and 2 secured the pot for him and relegated the WSOP 2013 Event #36 to history books with Naydenov first at $326,440 and Schwartz second at $202,035.