Exactly 400 players put up $5,000 each creating a massive $1,880,000 prize pool in Event #41. This was a six handed PLO event and many high stakes pro’s were right there gunning for the $488,817 first place prize. After three days of play only 7 were left, playing down to the final 6 and this was the unofficial final table:
Seat 1 Timo Pfutzenreuter 1,618,000
Seat 2 Joseph Leung 621,000
Seat 3 Nader Arfai 517,000
Seat 4 Yevgeniy Timoshenko 890,000
Seat 5 Lee Goldman 1,370,000
Seat 6 Steve Gross 510,000
Seat 7 Salman Behbehani 508,000
Perhaps the most accomplished player in this group was Yevgeniy Timoshenko, winner of WPT and APT events and overall one of the best tournament players on the planet. With a comfortable stack it seemed that Yevgeniy was poised to make a run for a bracelet which he narrowly missed finishing 2nd in the 2011 $25,000 No Limit Hold’em Heads-Up Championship. However, this time luck would not go his way as he lost a couple of key pots early on that cut his stack nearly in half.
Coming back from the dinner break Evgeniy was no doubt thinking of making a comeback run but things went wrong for him very early. In fact in the very first hand after the break, Timo Pfutzenreuter opened the action to 60,000 from under the gun and got re-raised by Evgeniy to 210,000 from the small blind. Timo called and players saw a A 
Q 
J 
flop. Evgeny moved his remaining chips over line but was instacalled by Timo who flopped the nuts with A K T 7 . Evgeny was completely dominated with K K Q 4 and only had 3 outs to a chop. The 7 on the turn only made the situation worse and another 7 on the river sealed the deal. Just like that Yevgeniy Timoshenko became the final table bubble boy and hit the rail in 7th place with $44,574.
Official final table:
Timo Pfutzenreuter 1,970,000
Lee Goldman 1,185,000
Joseph Leung 855,000
Salman Behbehani 745,000
Nader Arfai 660,000
Steve Gross 590,000
Timo Pfutzenreuter was the dominant chip leader starting the official final table but at the start it did not seem so as action was mostly between other players at the table.
In hand 11 the two shortstacks Nader Arfai and Steve Gross collided with an elimination as a result. Nader Arfai limped in from the button, Steve Gross also called from the small blind, and Lee Goldman checked from the big blind. Gross led out for 50,000 on a J 5 2 flop. Goldman got out of the way but Nader put in a raise to 150,000 which was called by Gross. Steve checked the 4 
turn and Nader shoved all in for his last 385,000. Steve called the all in and showed A 6 4 3 for a turned straight. Nader was behind with J 5 5 9 , but not dead as he was hoping to improve to a full house. Unfortunately for him, the Q hit on the river and Nader Arfai was eliminated in 6th place, taking home $61,739.
After a few more hours Steve Gross continued to pick up speed and in hand 59 another elimination took place. Gross opened to 85,000 from under the gun and Lee Goldman re-raised it to 315,000 from the cut off. Action folded back to Gross and he re-raised pot, effectively putting Goldman all in. Goldman called without much hesitation and revealed A A 4 3 . Steve was behind with A K Q J but by no means dead. A J 8 7 flop was favorable to Goldman who now had a flush draw as well as still being ahead with the aces. The turn, however, brought the Q , giving Steve the lead in the hand and the 9 on the river did not help Lee Goldman as he was eliminated in 5th place, earning $87,890 for his efforts.
The beauty of PLO is similar to No Limit Holdem, when the blinds get high enough – anything can happen at any time. In this case right after the elimination of Lee Goldman, the very next hand another elimination took place and again Steve Gross was at the center of the action. Joseph Leung raised pot from early position and Steven re-raised enough from the big blind to put Joseph all in. Joseph called and showed A J T 6 which was not ideal against Steve’s A A Q 7 . The board ran out Q 8 3 J Q and Steve Gross now topped the leaderboard, scoring another elimination. Joseph Leung was gone in 4th place and received a nice $128,742 payday for his efforts.
Continuing to steamroll the final table, Steve Gross now had his sights on the former chip leader Timo Pfutzenreuter. Steve opened the action with a 100,000 raise from the button and Timo called from the big blind. Both players checked the J 4 3 flop and saw a 7 peel off on the turn. Timo bet 150,000 and Steve called. The river brought the 6 and Timo put in another bet for 175,000. Gross thought about it for a while and made it 800,000, leaving Timo with just a handful of chips should he have called and lost. After some consideration Timo decided to make a stand and pushed in the rest of his chips. Unfortunately for him his J J T 8 was second best to Steve’s 8 6 5 5 which gave him a straight. Timo’s 3rd place run was good for $194,147.
Going into heads up play Steve Gross had the monster chip lead over Salman Behbehani having scored all the final table elimination thus far. As play went on Steve continued with his momentum and finally reached his goal in hand 123. With Salman’s stack getting ever shorter Steve raised to 180,000 from the button. Salman pushed all in for his last 380,000 and was called by Steve with T 8 7 4 . With K Q 3 3 it seemed like a coin flip situation, but the flop tilted the odds is Steve’s favor as A 9 7 rolled out, giving him the lead with bottom pair. A 5 on the turn and a 2 on the river did not improve Salman Behbehani’s hand and he was eliminated in 2nd place, earning $301,965.
With a stunning comeback from shortstack to massive chip leader, Steve Gross earned himself an impressive $488,817 and of course, a WSOP bracelet!
Steve Gross
Final table payout:
1 Steve Gross $488,817
2 Salman Behbehani $301,965
3 Timo Pfutzenreuter $194,147
4 Joseph Leung $128,742
5 Lee Goldman $87,890
6 Nader Arfai $61,739