On Saturday night, the third round of action from the Full Tilt Doubles Poker Championship aired on GSN. A total of four rounds of regular season action will occur before the playoffs begin. Thirty-two players entered, coughing up $50,000 each, and the top 16 will advance to the post-season. The show airs every Saturday at 8:00pm ET on GSN.
The first four-handed match featured UB.com pro Phil Hellmuth teaming with old nemesis Toto Leonidas, Annette Obrestad pairing with Annie Duke, Phil Laak teaming with Phil Ivey, and Jennifer Harman teaming with Phil Gordon. It marked the first time that two women were paired with each other and the match featured a whopping four people named Phil. Partners are randomly assigned and players alternate action by street.
Harman and Gordon doubled up early on through Obrestad and Duke after making a flush against the nut straight. Following the bad beat, Obrestad and Duke were the first team relegated to the rails after running Q-10 into Gordon and Harman’s pocket 10s. The board ran out 5-5-7-7-4 and that was all she wrote for the all-female team. Duke and Obrestad picked up zero points for the regular season standings, likely leaving Duke shut out of the post-season.
Hellmuth and Leonidas were the next to go after their A-K could not hold up against Laak and Ivey’s A-Q. Laak and Ivey flopped top two pair and no king came on the turn or river to save the day. Hellmuth and Leonidas each received four points for the regular season. In the match’s final hand, Ivey and Laak were all-in with pocket threes up against Harman and Gordon’s pocket jacks. The board ran out 10-5-6-7-8 and Gordon and Harman notched the win and received 20 regular season points apiece.
Through three matches, Gordon stands at 44 points, while Ivey and Obrestad each have 31. Doubles Poker Championship announcer Brandon Adams believes that 35 will be the cutoff for the upcoming playoffs.
In the second match of the one-hour episode, Huck Seed paired with Carlos Mortensen, Mike Matusow teamed with Allen Cunningham, PartyPoker’s Tony G teamed with Johnny Chan, and Tom Dwan joined forces with Antonio Esfandiari. Seed and Mortensen, who spoke exclusively in Spanish during a team time out, landed in fourth place when their K-3 could not draw out on Matusow and Cunningham’s pocket eights. Only English is allowed at the table, but away from the felt, Español is fair game.
On a flop of 8-8-4 with two diamonds, Tony G bet 8,000 with pocket nines and Dwan moved all-in over-the-top with J-10 of diamonds for a flush draw and two overcards. Tony G made the call and the turn was the nine of clubs, giving Tony G and Johnny Chan a full house. In a stunning turn of events, Esfandiari and Dwan went from being 49% to win after the flop to drawing dead to the river. Dwan tossed a $5,000 real money chip to Matusow and exited stage right with Esfandiari.
Then, Matusow moved all-in with K-2 and Tony G made the call with pocket sixes. The better pre-flop hand held and Tony G and Johnny Chan took down the match. It marked Chan’s third straight win, giving him 60 points in the standings, tops in the field. Seed stood at 40 points and is seemingly a lock for the playoffs. On his performance, Tony G told Doubles Poker Championship floor reporter Lacey Jones, “I really tried to play tight for me. I tried to learn something from Johnny and enjoy myself.”
Catch the Full Tilt Doubles Poker Championship every Saturday at 9:00pm ET on GSN. Visit Full Tilt Poker, a Mac-friendly online poker site, to play with the pros today.
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