Mike Watson wins WPT Bellagio Cup IV

Short after the WSOP, yet another big poker event was played. The Bellagio Cup IV, part of the World Poker Tour, started with 446 entrants, who were devided over three first days (1A-1C), after which day 2, 3 and 4 were played and we'd have our final table to play at day 4 (which makes it a pretty nice structure, 446 players over 5 days is nothing like we've seen at the WSOP the last month). Unfortunately for Hevad Khan, he didn't make it to the final table when he got knocked out 25th, still good for $38,785 . The total prizepool was almost $6,000,000 !

Final six players started with following chip counts and seats:

Seat 1 - Ralph Perry - 1,635,000
Seat 2 - Luke Staudenmaier - 3,495,000
Seat 3 - John Phan - 3,495,000
Seat 4 - David Benyamine - 4,860,000
Seat 5 - Gabriel Thaler - 1,550,000
Seat 6 - Mike Watson - 5,060,000

Early on in the final table, David Benyamine took a huge hit and lost a pot worht over 1,300,000. However, he managed to rebuild and in the end - he survived up until the final two, when heads-up started between these two players:
David Benyamine – 11,695,000 chips
Mike Watson – 8,410,000 chips

Benyamine was close to winning an amazing prize of $1,673,770, when he moved all-in preflop and Micheal Watson made the call, while being covered by David.
from Benaymine was racing with Watson's for a WPT Bellagion Cup championship title. Unfortunately, ace falls on the river: -- and Watson doubles up, while David is down all the way to just 2,665,000 chips.
Soon after that Benyamine took another hit, when Watson moved all in with and got called by David's . Just three outs were enough, as board run -- and Mike Watson wins the 2008 Bellagio Cup IV!

Final results:

1st: Mike "SirWatts" Watson - $1,673,770
2nd: David Benyamine - $840,295
3rd: Luke Staudenmaier - $452,465
4th: Ralph Perry - $290,900
5th: John "The Razor" Phan - $193,915
6th: Gabe Thaler - $129,275

wow suck out for 800k$, that must leave a mark imo, degenyamine is a sick player tho.

What was the buyin btw?
$14k?

On July 19 2008 05:25 Sheitan wrote: wow suck out for 800k$, that must leave a mark imo, degenyamine is a sick player tho.

uhh. if by suckout you mean win a flip...

lmao id be so pissed, poor david

i'd go fucking postal if i won $840000

On July 20 2008 01:28 BigRed0000 wrote: Show nested quote + On July 19 2008 05:25 Sheitan wrote: wow suck out for 800k$, that must leave a mark imo, degenyamine is a sick player tho. uhh. if by suckout you mean win a flip...

Q9 vs K9 a flip ?

On July 20 2008 16:11 Sheitan wrote: Show nested quote + On July 20 2008 01:28 BigRed0000 wrote:   On July 19 2008 05:25 Sheitan wrote: wow suck out for 800k$, that must leave a mark imo, degenyamine is a sick player tho. uhh. if by suckout you mean win a flip... Q9 vs K9 a flip ?

Technically he's right, the QQ vs AK was for the title and 800k, the Q9 vs K9 was for David to get back from 2.5mln to 5 mln chips, which still means about a 3:1 chiplead for Watson. There was only 1 800k hand in this

It still sucks tho that the WPT prefers a very steep payout. The WSOP seems to be doing much better in that perspective, the nr 3 gets about 1/2 of what the winner gets, nr 5 gets 1/3, which is much better. Although it has been different in the past:

Like 2002:
1st Robert Varkonyi $2,000,000
2nd Julian Gardner $1,100,000
3rd Ralph Perry $550,000
4th Scott Gray $281,480
5th Harley Hall $195,000

compared to 2008:
1st $9,119,517
2nd $5,790,024
3rd $4,503,352
4th $3,763,515
5th $3,088,012

It looks like WPT prefers the "Will you look at that Vince, they're all fighting for the 1.6 MILLION FIRST PRIZE!"-method instead dividing the 6mln more evenly

On July 19 2008 22:54 Joe wrote: What was the buyin btw? $14k?

Buy-in was $15,000 + $400