A
Five-Minute Crash Course in Power Poker:
Latest WSOP champion gets ‘a little
help from his friends’ and grabs
seven-card stud championship
Some
stories are almost too incredible to believe.
Consider the case of a 39-year-old semi-retired
stockbroker from New York named Cliff
Jospehy -- a.k.a. “Bax.”
Bax
flew out to Las Vegas to play in two tournaments,
both of the no-limit hold’em events held
at this week at the World Series. Unfortunately,
the first tournament was a disaster. Bax
was knocked out “by a horrible beat,”
as he described. That left Bax with nothing
to do on a Thursday afternoon.
There
happened to be a $1,500 buy-in seven-card
stud event played on this day. There was
only one problem. Bax had never
played in a stud tournament before. Milling
around the hallways at the Rio Pavilion,
Bax ran into a few friends. These friends
just so happened to be Scott Fischman
and Brett Jungblut, who have won three
gold bracelets between them.
“I
didn’t even look at the stud event,” Bax
said later as his shining gold bracelet
was snapped onto his left wrist. I came
here to play hold’em…..I ran into (my
friends) and told them I wanted to play
stud, and could they give me some pointers.
Each one gave me about five minutes, and
the things they were telling me were not
about playing my hand, but playing my
opponent’s hand – things like that.”
Whatever
Jungblut and Fischman said -- in addition
to Mark Dickstein, Eric S. and an online
player known simply as ‘Gigabet’ -- must
have worked. Bax survived the first day,
returned for Day Two and ended up sitting
down at the final table second in chips.
Five hours later, he was a world champion.
There
were 472 entries in this year’s first
seven-card stud event – each paying $1,500
to enter. The total prize pool amounted
$651,360. Just before making it down to
the final eight players, former top-ranked
tennis pro Yevgeny Kafelnikov (winner
of 26 singles titles in tennis, including
over $26 million in lifetime prize money)
busted out in 9th place. After retiring
from tennis, Kafelnikov converted to playing
poker professionally last year and is
now showing he may have what it takes
to win at the tables, as well as on the
court. The final table composition included
one former gold bracelet winner (two-time
winner Minh Nguyen). The early chip leader
was Abe Almalhi:
THE
FINAL TABLE:
SEAT
1: Kirill Gerasimov 84,500
SEAT 2: Ardell Willis 58,000
SEAT 3: Abe Almalhi 135,000
SEAT 4: Cliff Josephy 130,500
SEAT 5: Dr. Mark Burtman 33,000
SEAT 6: Greg Mascio 122,000
SEAT 7: Minh Nguyen 60,500
SEAT 8: Murray Reinhart 86,000
Players
were eliminated as follows:
8th
Place – Not much went right for
Murray Reinhart once he sat down amongst
the final eight. He was gone a short time
into the finale. Reinhart is a Canadian-born
businessman who now lives in Los Angeles.
Eighth-place paid $17,585.
7th
Place – Two-time champ Minh Nguyen
was never able to establish the kind of
control he needed to pick up a trifecta
in gold bracelets. The Vietnamese-born
poker pro now living in southern California
exited in 7th place – good for $24,750.
6th
Place – Ardell Willis is a 64-year-old
retiree from Florida. He formally worked
in the golf business and now plays poker.
He busted out in 6th place and took $31,265
back to ‘the sunshine state.’
5th
Place – Adding to the international
flavor of the final table, Jerusalem-born
poker pro Abe Almalhi hoped to win his
first WSOP title. He came up short, finishing
5th. Busting out as the early chip leader
is always a mixed blessing, and Almalhi
was no exception. He collected $39,735,
but was disappointed he wasn’t able to
seize victory.
4th Place –
Greg Mascio, a professional poker player
from Fullerton, CA was a runner-up at
the final table in the 2002 WSOP Omaha
High-Low championship. The former sportswriter
took 4th place in this event, winning
$48,200.
3rd
Place – Dr. Mark Burtman is a medical
doctor from Mississippi. He is also a
poker author (“A Girl in the Game”) and
writes regularly for pokerpages.com. Burtman
took a small stack and survived several
hours before finally expiring in 3rd place.
Burtman’s cut of the tournament loot amounted
to $63,180.
2nd Place –
Kirill Gerasimov is accustomed to winning,
not finishing second. He won the 2002
‘World Heads-Up Poker Championship.’ At
one point, it looked as if the final table
might be a party for two Russians – (9th-place
finisher Yevgeny Kafelnikov and Gerasimov).
Gerasimov happens to be Kafelnikov’s poker
coach. But in the end, it was the coaching
of Bax’s friends that was far more valuable.
Gerasimov drew to within 2 to 1 in chips
at one point, but from the start of the
duel, Bax’s chip lead was never seriously
jeopardized. On the final hand of the
night, Bax made two-pair (aces up) and
dragged Gerasimov’s final chip. The runner
up, who lives in Moscow, Russia, collected
$108,775.
1st Place –
Cliff ‘Bax’ Josephy is a married father
of three. He has done well enough in the
stock market to take time off and devote
himself to his latest passion – poker.
Incredibly, Bax has only been playing
poker seriously for 14 months. He plays
mostly online, where he has enjoyed enormous
success, particularly in tournaments and
satellites.
“When
I get passionate about something, I really
devote myself to it,” Bax said just as
$192,150 in cash was about to be paid
out as the top prize. “At least with this
vice (poker), there is a chance for me
to make money at it, as opposed to the
others vices some people have.”
Afterward,
the reality of winning a World Series
championship began to set in. “I never
would have dreamed I could win this event,”
Bax said. “Stud is made up of good players.
It’s not like hold’em where you raise
with all your chips and some donkey calls
you down with a 10-3 of diamonds. People
who enter stud tournaments – most of them
know how to play…..except me, of course.”
There
was extraordinary irony in Bax’s final
statement. A player who had never played
in such an event before, and who never
anticipated entering the tournament was
completely transformed. Killing time was
never so much fun, so memorable, nor so
profitable.
Official Report
by Nolan Dalla – World Series of
Poker Media Director
World
Series of Poker Circuit Director of Operations
– Ken Lambert
World Series of Poker Tournament Director
– John Grooms
Rio Poker Room Manager – Michael
Matts
Rio Poker Tournament Director – Robert
Daily
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