WPT Mandalay Bay
The Mandalay Bay held their first major poker tournament this week, with the World Poker Tour taping the final table of the Mandalay Bay Poker Challenge. This championship event attracted 349 players, and featured a prizepool worth over $3.3 million. First place would be worth a bit over $1 million, but it included that gorgeous trophy you see at the top of this page. It gets my vote for the best WPT trophy on the tour, and it was just one of many things that the Mandalay Bay did right.
THE EARLY ACTION
It was a five-day tournament, and if you’d like to read more serious recaps of the first four days, I recommend that you read Alex Henriquez’s daily reports at CardPlayer.com: Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, and Day 4. (Note: These links are temporarily broken because I can’t find the daily reports anywhere on CardPlayer.com’s redesigned website. I will redirect the links as soon as I find out where they’ve hidden the recaps.)
Most of the big-name pros were in attendance, just three weeks before the World Series of Poker begins. Tuan Le (pictured here) was one of the early chip leaders on Day One, and in third place at the end of Day Two.
There was one very memorable hand from the first day. Generally speaking, when you hold the ace-high flush on an unpaired board, you’re feeling pretty good. An unknown player held Ac-8c on a board of Qd-Jc-9c-10c-4d. Because he held the 8c (killing two straight-flush possibilities), there was only one possible hand better than his. (Raise your hand if you’ve heard this one before.) 
So the player got all the chips in the middle against Erik Seidel, and was probably ready to brag to his friends that he busted a seven-time WSOP bracelet winner.
Of course, Seidel flipped over the Kc-Qc, giving him the king-high straight flush. Seidel doubled up to survive, and would eventually take 48th place, barely finishing in the money.
JACK McCLELLAND’S END-OF-DAY DRAW
Tournament Director Jack McClelland has implemented an interesting technique for the last 20 minutes of Days One and Two. Traditionally, some players on short stacks would stall, just hoping to survive to the next day regardless of their chip stack. So McClelland stops the clock and has somebody draw a random card to determine how many hands will be played until the end of the day. So if a six were chosen, each table would play six more hands — no more, no less.
Now, rather than stalling the action, players are eager to play quickly, so they can leave for the day as soon as their table finishes the requisite number of hands. It also draws attention to the end-of-day strategy employed by top pros with short stacks who may have, ahem, better things to do. These players will move all in at the end of the day, hoping to either bust out or double their stack. They don’t want to show up for a noon start on Day Two just to bust out 15 minutes later, when they could have been playing golf or something.
Photo: Phil Ivey (left) is all in for the last hand of Day One. Jack McClelland is standing behind him with the bags used to store the players’ chips overnight.
Case in point: Phil Ivey. He had just less than 5,000 in chips at the end of Day One, when the average was over 40,000. So he moved all in (he might have done it blind) on the last hand with K-9. As you can see from the photo above, Ivey didn’t want the blinds and antes — he wanted callers. He got his wish when Andy Miller (not pictured) called from a big stack with A-7. The board improved neither player, and Ivey’s schedule was suddenly free to play some high-stakes golf that week.
THE POKER MEDIA
I no longer travel the country to every major tournament, so it’s always nice to catch up with friends and colleagues in the media when the big tournaments are in Las Vegas.
I obviously didn’t do any live coverage for this event, so I’ll give some credit via photos to some of the people who did.
Photo: The left side of Media Row, from left to right: Jason Kirk from Bluff, Ed Sevillano from Gutshot, and Mike Paulle out of retirement for PokerPages
Unfortunately, I didn’t have photos of everyone. So here’s a shoutout to Jay “WhoJedi” Newnum and Mike Schwartz, who were both reporting for Card Player, and Jen Creason, the best chip counter in the business.
THE ROAD TO THE FINAL TABLE
Three out of the four daily chipleaders would reach the final table. Day One chipleader Nenad Medic was the only one who fell short, finishing in 50th place to become the first post-bubble money finisher. Brad “Yukon” Booth had the chip lead at the end of Day Two, and never fell far from the top. Joe Tehan was second on Day Two, but carried the lead coming out of Day Three. Alex Outhred (a WPT Boot Camp instructor) was in second place on Day Three, and claimed the chip lead as they headed to the final table.
Photo: Brad “Yukon” Booth was first or second in chip counts when this photo was taken late on Day Two. Booth was discussing his play with Michael Gracz, who won a WPT title at the PartyPoker Million IV in 2005.
The other three final tablists took a different route, hovering near the bottom of the chip counts. Al Stonum was actually in last place (56th of 56) at the end of Day Two, and Burt Boutin was in last place (18th out of 18) at the end of Day Three. But they both made the final table, along with Steve Vincent, who was on the wrong side of average most of the tournament.
THE WPT FINAL TABLE
The final table featured six players who had never appeared on the WPT before. But if you assumed that would make a boring final table, you’d be wrong.
Photo: The Mandalay Bay dressed up the entry to the final table with giant cards, giving a boring hallway a beautiful poker theme.
There was Brad “Yukon” Booth in seat 4, who has been called “The Best Unknown Poker Player” by some top pros. He’s a strong young player, and a lot of fun to watch. You also had Brad Boutin in seat 1, who can be a wild card, both with his play and his personality. My personal favorite was Alex Outhred in seat 2. Alex is an instructor for the WPT Boot Camp, and was on a total freeroll in this tournament. (He won a free seat to a $1,000 supersatellite, and parlayed that into entry in this event.) I recognized Alex from traveling on the WPT circuit, and it was great to see him do so well.
I didn’t know much about the other three players, but they were all very nice, personable guys. There was some great banter at the table, and hopefully some of it will make the WPT broadcast.
Above, Left: Burt Boutin (Seat 1) — 1,729,000 in chips
Above, Right: Alex Outhred (Seat 2) — 1,743,000 in chips
Above, Left: Al Stonum (Seat 3) — 263,000 in chips
Above, Right: Brad “Yukon” Booth (Seat 4) — 1,659,000 in chips
Above, Left: Steve Vincent (Seat 5) — 219,000
Above, Right: Joe Tehan (Seat 6) — 1,371,000
As you can see by chip counts, Stonum and Vincent were very shortstacked compared to the others. Sure enough, Steve Vincent was eliminated on the second hand when he moved all in with A-Q, running headfirst into Tehan’s A-K. Vincent earned $94,075 for his sixth-place finish.
Four hands later, Stonum took a shot with A-Q suited — and once again, Tehan had one better with A-K suited. But the flop of Q-J-J gave Stonum a pair for the lead. He barely had a chance to celebrate when a king fell on the turn, and another king hit the river to give Tehan a full house. Al Stonum was out in fifth place, earning $134,390.
Photo: WPT Announcer Linda Johnson (left) and WPT Director Frank (seated, center) go over some last-minute details with the final tablists before play begins. Tournament Director Jack McClelland stands behind them.
Booth had the chip lead at that point, but the remaining stacks were fairly close together, and all four had a shot at the title.
If Alex Outhred could change just one thing, he might have taken a restroom break after Hand #20. In Hand #21, he got in a preflop reraising war with Tehan. Outhred made it 400,000 to go, and Tehan moved all in. Outhred had to let it go, and we’ll have to watch on TV to see what he had. In Hand #22, he tried a 250,000 bluff on the river with the board showing Ac-7h-3d-Kd-9h, but Tehan called with Ah-6d (pair of aces).
That left Outhred as the shortstack, and he made his move in Hand #25 by reraising all in with A-Q. Boutin flipped over pocket jacks, and it was a race situation. But a jack on the flop put Boutin way out in front, and Outhred needed a miracle runner-runner straight to stay alive (both Broadway and a wheel were possible after the flop of J-5-4). The turn card was a king, and Outhred had four outs to stay alive and double up. But the last card paired the board with another king, giving Boutin an unnecessary full house. Alex Outhred would have to settle for fourth place, $184,745, and an exit interview with Sabina.
With three players left, they were again fairly close in chip counts. But Booth started slowly and steadily losing chips until he was the short stack with less than a million in chips. (There was about 7 million in play.) Booth lost another 400,000 in Hands #73-74, and he was just treading water around the half-a-million mark.
Photo: Gavin Smith (left) showed up to cheer for Brad “Yukon” Booth at the final table.
In Hand #94, Booth was first to act and raised to 330,000 from the button, leaving himself a single 10,000 chip. Boutin put him all in, and Booth obviously called with Kc-5c. Boutin showed pocket threes (3d-3h), and Booth was probably pleased to find himself in a race situation. But the board missed him entirely (8d-7s-2h-Jh-Ac), and Brad “Yukon” Booth was eliminated in third place, earning $319,180.
There was a fairly standard money presentation at that point, with Sabina and some other beautiful girls bringing money and the trophy to the final table. Like I said earlier, I think it’s the most beautiful poker trophy I’ve seen yet, and I love that it looks like the casino itself. Nobody should ever have to ask “Where did you win that?”
It was down to Joe Tehan and Burt Boutin. Tehan had a 1.6-to-1 chip lead, with 4.4 million to Boutin’s 2.7 million. For heads-up play, the blinds were at 50,000-100,000 (10,000 ante), and they would increase every 30 minutes.
Photo: Mike Sexton and Vince Van Patten watch from their podium as Joe Tehan (left) and Burt Boutin (right) play heads up for a WPT title.
Boutin managed to battle back to nearly even by the time the blinds increased to 80,000-160,000 (15,000 ante). But the next hand (Hand #112), Tehan picked up a 2.27 million pot when he raised on the turn with the board showing 8h-2h-2s-As. Boutin folded, giving Tehan more than a 2-to-1 chip lead.
Two hands later, Tehan raised to 400,000, Boutin moved all in for 1.89 million, and Tehan called with 9c-8h. Boutin showed Ah-10c, and he was a 1.75-to-1 favorite to double up into the chip lead. But the flop came 10s-9s-9h, giving Tehan trip nines over Boutin’s pair of tens. The turn card was the Ad, giving Boutin two additional outs to win the hand, needing another ace or a ten. But it was Tehan’s night, and the 8c on the river gave him a full house — and the championship.
Photo: Joe Tehan (seated) poses with Mike Sexton, runner-up Burt Boutin, Sabina Gadecki, and Vince Van Patten
Joe Tehan became an instant millionaire ($1,033,440), while Boutin had to settle for $604,765. Tehan also got the coolest poker trophy ever, along with a $25,500 seat into the Season 5 WPT World Championship next spring at Bellagio.
All night long, Tehan had a large group of loyal fans in the stands, wearing t-shirts that read “Joe Tehan Fan Club.” They cheered his every move at the final table, and they deserve some recognition of their own here.
Photo: The Joe Tehan Fan Club
THE LAST WORD
As I mentioned, this was the first major tournament held at Mandalay Bay. Even so, it was better than many tournaments which are more established. First, you had Jack McClelland and his fantastic crew from Bellagio running the tournament action, which is great for the players. (Bellagio and Mandalay Bay are sister properties.) But the Mandalay Bay also showed other casinos a thing or two about hosting a WPT final table. There were plenty of easy-to-follow signs for fans to follow to the TV set in one of the ballrooms. They also put up giant card decorations (seen below), which gave a drab hallway a beautiful poker theme. Kudos to everyone at Mandalay Bay for an excellent tournament.
Photo: Sabina Gadecki indulged me with a quick photoshoot after the final table. Later that night, she would lobby for me to become her official WPT photographer.
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Next Blog: More photos from the nightly parties at Mandalay Bay.
As always, feel free to leave me comments below.
BJ’s Blog: WPT Mandalay Bay
Saturday, June 10, 2006
