I sat there for maybe ninety minutes waiting for the bubble to burst so I could get the bubble shot, then my battery almost went out before I could take the shot.They went through the following process to determine the money:
- Each table must have nine or ten players
- Dealer identifies the big blind; when it gets back around, they stop
- Anyone who busts out stands up and is escorted to a table; if they reach the money, they split whatever places have paid
- When it gets back around to the first person in the big blind, the dealer stops and stands up.
The first time they did this, Daniel Negreanu had just announced to everyone around that there were twenty more to get in the cash. There was a palpable buzz in the air as they were pushing closer to the round.
Once dealers started standing up, players started milling around and standing when they weren’t supposed to. When all dealers had stood, the players remaining stood at 876, three from the money. It was brutal, and they started again. A couple tables were broken before they started again.
Jason Strasser sat with $460k as his table broke.
Matt Maroon was moved from the same table, but he had alot fewer chips to carry. Alot fewer chips.
Johan Backfjord saw his chips dwindle from $137k down to this, his last $14k or so. He took five minutes to muck pocket queens in the small blind with a raiser in front of him, then he took another five to move all-in from the button with the same queens. He won the pot after the blinds folded.
These guys decided not to play this round, watching from afar while the others played. Dmitry Nobles took the other approach, raising every hand and taking all the blinds and antes, a nice $54,000 addition to his stack.
When the tournament director announced that there were 865 players, the field erupted with huge applause. I called my brother and let him share in the moment. For some, they’ve now made $4,957 after deducting their buy-in’s. For others, they’re up the whole amount. For someone here, they won’t stop until he (or she) walks away with $12,000,000.