FTOPS XI continued yesterday night with Event #17, the 6-max rebuy and addon tournament. The tournament had a guaranteed prize pool of $1,000,000 and with a great turnout and lots of rebuys, it managed to surpass that by over $175,000. There were 1,091 entrants to the tournament, 27 of which were Full Tilt pros. During the rebuy period and first break, there was a total of 2100 rebuys and 737 addons, which helped push the prize pool past its guarantee.
After one hour of play, just over 200 players had already been eliminated, leaving 868 left to continue the battle. It was paigowpro who jumped out to the early lead, accruing 34k in chips throughout the hour. Following close behind him was well known online tournament pro Jon ‘sketchy1’ Eaton, who was sitting in sixth place with just over 22k chips. Four of the Full Tilt pros sat in the top 100 players after one hour, with Marco Traniello leading the way in 24th place with a 15k chipstack. Not too far behind Marco was Vivek Rajkumar, whose 13k in chips was good enough for 52nd place. Also, TheWacoKidd and SorenKongsgaard were sitting in 79th and 80th place respectively with around 12k in chips after the first hour.
After three hours of play, it was past FTOPS event winner imabigkidnow (winner of FTOPS X Event #14) who was sitting atop the leaderboard with 71k in chips. Two different Full Tilt pros had made a move by this time, as Isaac Baron was holding onto 30th place with 36k in chips, while Jordan Morgan was trailing slightly behind in 33rd with a thousand less. Other notable players hanging near the top at this point in time were stevie444 (currently ranked in the top 200 on Full Tilt and top 100 on PokerStars) and USCPhildo (ranked in the top 200 on PokerStars and 20th on Full Tilt).
Isaac Baron would end up topping all other Full Tilt pro’s in this event, placing in 19th for $6,363. Other Full Tilt pros who made deep runs were Brian Hastings (56th for $2,710) and Jordan Morgan (81st for $2,356). Coming into the final table the stacks looked like this:
Seat 1: mikey34222 (919,026)
Seat 2: fisheater111 (1,037,318)
Seat 3: UFman2 (817,321)
Seat 4: imabigkidnow (2,229,626)
Seat 5: GirlsCantPlay (676,502)
Seat 6: jordankickz (580,707)
The well designed structure gave everybody a decent amount of wiggle room at the table, and with the chip lead, imabigkidnow would have to be the favorite to win this tournament. He has already shown he has what it takes to close out an FTOPS event when he took down Event#14 of FTOPS X. Another big threat would have to be UFman2 who took down the monthly million dollar guarantee tournament on Full Tilt in December for over $200,000.
fisheater111 would be the first to depart after getting all in on the flop with 9 high. UFMan2 made an easy call with AA and would pick up the knock out and bring it down to five players. For the sixth place finish, fisheater111 would pick up just over $40,000.
The bigger stacks would continue to knock the smaller ones around, as next it would be GirlsCantPlay to get Ad4d in preflop against imabigkidnow’s 8s9s. The flop would come with an 8 and a 9 and GirlsCantPlay wouldn’t be able to catch up, exiting the tournament in fifth place for $62,455.
Once again, it would be UFman2’s AK that had mikey34222’s AT dominated. With an ace and a jack on the flop, and a king on the turn, mikey would need to catch a queen on the river to double up through UFman2. Unfortunately it came a ten and mikey34222 would go out in fourth place, taking home a little over $87k.
Play was just three-handed now, and jordankickz would put it all on the line with 22 against UFman2’s AQ. Sadly for jordankickz, the flop came JQK and UFMan2 would be far in the lead. An ace on the turn had jordankickz just one card away from elimination, but a ten came on the river which made a straight on the board and both players would split the nearly two million chip pot. jordankickz would once again risk it all, but this time it would be against imabigkidnow. After the stacks were put in preflop it would be imabigkidnow’s AJ that had jordankickz’s ATs dominated. The flop came 7KQ and imabigkidnow remained in the lead. A nine and a jack on the turn and river however would complete a huge suckout for jordankickz, as he made a straight and crippled imabigkidnow. After that hand, imabigkidnow would get disconnected and end up being blinded down to nothing over the next couple hands. Eventually he would be knocked out in third place and receive $116,661.
The heads up match to decide the winner was a back and forth battle, but as the tournament neared the 12 hour mark, it all would be decided on a coin flip. Both players would get all the chips in the middle preflop and it would be jordankickz’s AQs against UFman2’s JJ. The cards wouldn’t fall jordankickz’s way this time though as he wouldn’t be able to catch a pair, making UFman2 the champion of Event #17. For his second place performance, jordankickz collected just over $160k. To go along with his gold jersey, UFman2 would receive $245,696.40.
Full Tilt Poker FTOPS XI Event #17 $1,000,000 Guaranteed 6-max Rebuy
1091 entrants, 2100 rebuys, 737 addons, $1,178,400 prize pool
1. UFman2 – $245,696.40
2. jordankickz – $163,797.60
3. imabigkidnow – $116,661.60
4. mikey34222 – $87,201.60
5. GirlsCantPlay – $62,455.20
6. fisheater111 – $40,065.60