The thirteenth event of the 2009 World Series of Poker began on Friday, June 5, with 1,088 players. With each player buying in for $2,500, that sent the prize pool soaring to $2,502,400 with an amazing $506,786 set aside for the ultimate champion.
Day 1 saw the field dwindle to only 175 players, meaning that the money bubble was not burst on the first day of action. Day 2 found that bubble, and the remaining 117 players cashed in the event. Technically, since two players left on the bubble, they split 117th place money and left the last 116 standing to cash for their full amounts. Though the goal of the day was to hit the final table nine, it was not in the cards, as 20 players were left at the 3:00am cut-off time.
Those 20 players returned to the Rio in Las Vegas on Sunday, June 7 and began to work their way to the final table nine and eventual winner. It started with Jochen Dickinger taking 20th place, followed by Alan Keating in 19th. The extreme short stack, Phil Ivey, came in and doubled up right away but finally succumbed to the larger stacks and finished in 18th place. Kirill Gerasimov ended his run in 17th, and Philip Sousa and Roland de Wolfe went out next. Brett Switzer took 14th place, Qinghai Pan 13th, Jeff Tunkel 12th, and Romeo Piro 11th.
The last ten players were seated at one table, but only nine would make up the official final table. That happened when Garrett Beckman pushed preflop with 
and Shawn Glines called with pocket tens. The board came 
, and Beckman took $35,584 for tenth place.
The final table was set with the following chip counts:
Bahador Ahmadi 1,786,000
Angel Guillen 1,500,000
Keven Stammen 1,400,000
Shawn Glines 1,092,000
Gregg Merkow 495,000
Oktay Altinbas 480,000
Antoine Berube 477,000
Torrey Reily 380,000
Matthew Lynn 348,000
The table was prepared to play out faster than most other NLHE events thus far, and likely most of the ones to come during the WSOP. Action was solid, and there were rarely lulls in the action.
There were several short stacks ready to move, and Merkow was one of them, calling all-in with his pocket sevens on a 
board after Stammen reraised all-in. Stammen had his opponent covered and showed pocket tens. When the 
came on the turn, it solidified the result, and the 
on the river made it official. Gregg Merkow left in ninth place with $41,439.
Lynn was the next to move, doing it from the big blind with 
. Ahmadi called with 
, and the two followed the board as it ran out 
. Matthew Lynn’s pair of tens was no good, and he was eliminated in eighth place with $48,621.
Guillen and Altinbas engaged in a preflop raising war that ended with Altinbas calling all-in with pocket tens. Guillen showed pocket jacks, and the dealer gave them 
to end Oktay Altinbas’ tournament in seventh place, which was worth $59,356.
Antoine Berube was the next to risk his tournament life with a preflop all-in play with 
. Glines called with pocket nines. The board ran out 
, and Berube left the table in sixth place with $75,547.
Just as quickly as this recap made it seem, the tournament was down to five players in only 33 hands. Stammen and Guillen were fighting for the chip lead, and Ahmadi was not far behind. It was Glines with 1.425 million and Torrey Reily on the short stack with only 380K who would needed to make moves. And as the tournament progressed, Stammen extended his lead while Ahmadi sunk to the lower end of the leaderboard.
They were fresh off the dinner break when Ahmadi put Reily to the test with an all-in reraise preflop. Reily called all-in with 
, and Ahmadi showed his 
. The board ran out 
, and the best hand turned into a flush for Ahmadi. Torrey Reily accepted $100,446 for the fifth place finish.
Ahmadi got in on the action again, next time with Guillen. Ahmadi was the all-in reraiser with pocket fours, and Guillen was all-in with . The board came 
to give Guillen the pot double-up and hurt Ahmadi, who pushed all-in on the very next hand with pocket fives. Stammen was the caller that time with 
, and the board again did not help the low pocket pair when it showed 
. Bahador Ahmadi was eliminated in fourth place with $139,934.
Stammen was leading but Glines was not prepared to give up. After a raise from Stammen, reraise from Glines, and all-in pop from Stammen, Glines called with . But Stammen was there with pocket kings, and Glines had only a few outs. The board did not cooperate with the shorter stack when it produced 
to eliminate Shawn Glines in third place, which was worth $202,694.
Heads-up action began with the following counts:
Keven Stammen 5,800,000
Angel Guillen 2,400,000
Heads-up lasted a short while, as Guillen made a serious push to obtain chips. Ultimately, it came down to one hand.
Stammen started the hand with a raise, and Guillen simply called to see the flop show . Stammen bet out, and Guillen check-raised. Stammen came over the top with an all-in reraise, and Guillen called all-in for the remainder of his chips. Stammen showed pocket jacks, and Guillen turned over the . The turn came the but the river brought a , ending the night for Guillen, who claimed $312,800 for the second place finish.
Keven Stammen won Event 13 at the 2009 WSOP, which was good for $506,786 and a coveted gold bracelet.