7/Hi-Lo
a Breeze for Scotty
Relaxed, confident, a big chip lead
at the final table. Just another day at
the office for 1998 World Champion Scotty
Nguyen as he breezed to an easy win in
the sixth event of Bicycle Casino’s
Legends of Poker, $300 7-card stud hi-lo.
He arrived with $54,700, by far the largest
stack, and just kept moving on up from
there. When he got heads-up with Hieu
“Tony” Ma, he had about $113,000
of the $160,000 in play. He offered a
deal and Tony accepted.
Final table stakes were $1,500 and $3,000
with $200 antes and a $500 low card bring-in,
9:41 remaining. Second chip leader was
David Ho with $36,700.
On the second hand, Minh Ngoc Tran was
all in with just two fives. Nguyen made
a low but announced two aces. “He
almost threw up,” Scotty laughed
sadistically.
Hank Castillo, a former police officer
who is now an auto sales fleet manager,
lasted four hands. He started with split
kings and made two pair. On the river
he was looking at David Ho’s board
of 4s-8s-10s-4h and, figuring he’d
have to call anyway, bet his last chips.
Ho showed him a flush.
Two hands later, Chae Shin had all his
chips in but had a ton of outs on sixth
street. He started with (4c-5c)Ac and
picked up a fourth club and a deuce. But
the best he could do was to pair his deuce.
He got picked off and ended up in seventh
place when Nobuo Hamamoto made a spade
flush on the river.
Limits on the next hand rose to 2-4k,
with $500 antes and a $1,000 bring-in.
Hamamoto went all in and survived for
the first of five times when he made a
flush and escaped the clutches of Nguyen,
who made trip sixes. On hand 15, Minh
Tran tangled with Nguyen and John Tran.
He started with split aces and made aces
and kings, but busted out of action when
John Tran made 10s-full, while Nguyen
grabbed the low end with an eight.
By the time limits went to 3-6k with $500
antes and a $1,000 bring-in, Ho had managed
to take over the chip lead, but that state
of affairs did not last long. On the first
hand at that level, Nguyen showed a board
of 7-J-6-A. With a pair of kings, Hamamoto
admittedly made a “big mistake”
by misreading Nguyen for low and going
up against him. When Scotty turned up
aces and sixes, Hamamoto was down to one
chip. He hung on for a while, first with
a chop and then by scooping in three-way
action with a 7-5 low and small pair.
Then, on hand 28, he was committed after
starting with three babies, but caught
a bunch of bricks as Ma knocked him out
with a set of sixes.
Now Scotty moved into high gear. First
he finished off John Tran by making jacks-up.
Tran had two queens and loudly called
for another one, but nobody heard him.
Three hands after that, Nguyen scooped
with trip fives and an eight-low to Ho’s
jacks up, and as his chip count neared
the 100k mark, he seemed close to locking
up the tournament. Ho tried to close the
gap a bit later with draws to a wheel
and flush, but just split when he made
the flush and Scotty took low.
By
hand 38 the end was very near. Ho’s
open cards were 9-8-10-3, while Nguyen
showed 2-6-2-A. Scotty bet, Ho folded
and Scotty moved close to 115k. On the
next and final hand, Ho started with some
low cards but ended up with just two fives,
while Ma scooped him away with a six-low
and a pair of sixes. A deal was made and
it was over.
BIOGRAPHY
Scotty
Nguyen, whose poker triumphs include a
couple of World Series bracelets and a
pair of World Poker Open titles at Foxwoods
(including one championship event worth
$300,000), is continuing to have another
good year. In the current Card Player
standings, he is ranked 14th overall,
third in Omaha high and third in final
table appearances. The affable champ plays
all games, and always seems to enjoy himself
as he laughs and jokes all the way through,
no matter what.
Tonight, he said, he had the chip lead
pretty much all the way. “That’s
how Scotty plays,” he laughed. “And
when I get to the final table, it’s
all over, baby.” Nguyen estimates
he has something like an 80 percent win
rate once he arrives. “I’ve
been there so many times,” he said.
“I’m relaxed, I know the players
and I know what to do.” And, he adds,
he works hard.
Max Shapiro
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