Without seeing the preflop action, we caught up with this one on a low flop of 5♣ 8♦ 10♣ just in time to see an all in push. Paolo Mendez was on the receiving end but made the call with his overpair of pocket kings.
But Mendez’s heart sank when he saw the all in player’s pocket fives for a flopped set. The turn J♣ was no help but a miracle K♥ on the river gave Mendez the pot and brought his stack up to 73,000.
As we are currently having technical difficulties with our system, below are the chip counts for level 9′s chip leaders:
| Place | Name | Chips |
| 1 | Sarge Lazier | 110,000 |
| 2 | Richard Mari | 100,000 |
| 3 | Anton Diva | 90,000 |
| 4 | Luis Asistio | 70,000 |
| 5 | Win Carlos | 67,000 |
| 6 | Anthony Tacda | 65,000 |
| 7 | Eric Sia | 55,000 |
| 8 | Wingard Brillo | 53,000 |
| 9 | Marco Franco | 50,000 |
| 10 | Edmund Uy | 47,000 |
| 11 | Paolo Mendez | 45,000 |
| 12 | John Ang | 42,000 |
| 13 | Francis Baliran | 40,000 |
| 14 | Almond Cabral | 35,000 |
| 15 | Nick Galan | 33,000 |
| 16 | Alan Escano | 28,000 |
Anthony Tacda
On table 7, Anthony Tacda had a player move all in under the gun before he looked down and saw his ladies. After making the call, he was no doubt happy to see the pocket jacks of his opponent up against his dominating queens.
The board came down K♥ 9♣ 2♠ 5♥ 3♦ and Tacda rakes in over 60,000 in chips.
Butch Dalisay has won a number of awards for fiction, nonfiction, drama and screenplay for his writing. He might as well write about this next hand.
Preflop, Dalisay went all-in for his final 22,000. Little did he know however, that the man from the small blind, Rommel Amiscaray, was holding pocket rockets. Of course, the latter made the call and we have a showdown.
Dalisay flipped over a dominated 5♠ 5♥
The flop 3♦ 6♠ 9♦ did not change anything but the turn 5♣ completed the set for Dalisay and the river 7♠ officially gave him the double-up.
Dalisay survives and is now up to over 45,000 chips. And oh, with around 16 Palanca awards as well.
With the board of K♠ 4♥ 5♥ 2♦ already on the table, Alex Cheung went all-in with his final 17,000.
Glenn Garcia made the call showing 10♥ 3♥ for was what a flush and straight draw. Cheung flipped pocket sixes and was ahead at this point.
However, the river brought the K♥ sending Cheung to the rail. Garcia’s stack roams around the 40,000-mark.
Sarge Lazier
Raising from one-off under the gun, Sarge Lazier gets a customer in the player from the big blind. The flop produces 6♥ 6♣ Q♥.
Lazier bets the flop and gets called.
Lazier bets the turn 7♥ and gets called.
Lazier then moves all in for 30,000 on the 7♦ river and gets called.
His opponent turns over A♥ K♥ for a flush. But Lazier has rivered a full house holding 10♠ 6♠. The bold – and somewhat fortunate – move has delivered a pot of around 100,000 to Lazier.
With a board of J♦ 6♥ K♠ Q♠, short-stacked Adel Bautista pushed all of his chips worth around 6,000. Manny Solenan made the call putting Bautista’s tournament life at risk.
Bautista: K♥ 8♥
Solenan: 10♣ Q♥
Ahead, Bautista was feeling very good about his chances of doubling up until the river 10♥ came to the board! Yet another player is busted out and we are down to 80 players.
