The Commerce Casino in Los Angeles always attracts a large and stellar field for its poker tournaments, though it must be said that this time around even the Commerce was taking by surprise by the number of players vying for a spot at the tables. The tournament directors had to erect an impromptu tent to accommodate the extra tables, and even impinged into the hallowed high stakes area of the casino.
You might have thought that with such a massive field the poker room would be full of unfamiliar faces, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. Practically every table was packed with top pros; one Day One table featured Phil Laak, Eli Elezra, Clonie Gowen and Weikai Chang, another saw Mike Matusow, Layne Flack, Amnon Filippi and Michael Binger squeezed together, while yet another struggled to contain the talents of Gavin Smith, Alex Jacob, Jason Strasser and David Williams.
It was no surprise then that Day One saw the end of a number of high profile pros, including Daniel Negreanu, Huck Seed, Dan Harrington, Antonio Esfandiari, Gus Hansen and the 2006 LA Poker Classic winner Alan Goehring. The early leader was Joe Seebok, who ran his stack up to $205,000 by the end of the day, which gave him a great chance of winning his last-longer side bet with Gavin Smith, and thus avoiding having to tattoo the Canadian’s initials on his bum cheeks.
On Day Two Joe Seebok achieved his main objective, as Gavin Smith crashed out with A-T v K-K, but failed to advance any further in his quest for a WPT title, crashing out of the tournament when J.C. Tran caught a full house on the river and moved all-in over the top of Seebok’s bet. Seebok made a reluctant call with the second nut flush, but could console himself with thoughts of Gavin Smith in a tattoo parlour.
That win put the in-form J.C. Tran into the chip lead, a position he consolidated in the final hours of the day, to end with $543,700, more than $200,000 ahead of second-placed Mike Carsson. Tran will thus be installed as the early favourite to win the WPT’s biggest payout outside the championship event, though with the likes of Joe Tehan, Can Kim Hua, Jason Strasser, Nam Le, Paul Wasicka, Bill Edler, Chau Giang, Kristy Gazes, Ed “Boliva” Moncada and Jeff Cabinallas all inside the top 20 there is plenty of play left in this tournament yet.