Cosic and Scatragli Lead WPT Baden Day 1B

(Photo: Day 1B Chip Leader Senadin Cosic)

If Day 1B of WPT Baden was a game of cards it would be ‘Dealers Choice’. We really have had eight levels of everything you could imagine. We have had entrances that would have made the Beatles blush, we have had players who go by the names of Attila and FlippetyFlop, we have had players dressed as bums, players dressed so sharp they could severe an artery and we have even had a Royal Flush.

150-players walked through the doors making a combined field size of 254-players (24-people fired two barrels). That created a prize pool of $1,031,041 with $271,258 reserved for the winner. If the tournament was to end today then that money would go to Kimmo Kurko, the Day 1A chip leader as he currently sits at the top of the pile with 149,700 chips. The Day 1B chip leaders were Senadin Cosic (135,800) & Daiele Scatragli (135,700)

Let’s have a look at some of the finer moments of today’s action.

A quick search on the Hendon Mob database draws a blank when we type in the name of Martin Sturc. So we are not dealing with a professional live tournament player. A quick search on the PocketFive database also draws a blank. So we are not dealing with an online phenom either. So the chances are that Martin Sturc is a recreational player. It’s an even bigger probability that taking part in a World Poker Tour (WPT) is a big thing. So he must have been exhilarated when he found pocket aces in the first few minutes of action, and a partner willing to play for stacks holding pocket kings. But even pocket kings wins 17% of the time when up against aces. If you didn’t know that then just ask Sturc. The Kings rivering a flush, and Sturc was the first player eliminated and we hadn’t even gotten started.

But it wasn’t just the recreational players who were suffering from premature exitulation; the pros were at it as well.

When Michael ‘The Grinder’ Mizrachi made his grand entrance we were half expecting Paul, John, Ringo & George to waltz in behind him. His entourage was bigger than a Floyd Mayweather ring party, and there was more camera lights than a Milan catwalk show.

Mizrachi – who was wearing more patches than Michael Schumacher – took his seat and set about his ways. The man who had just become the first player to win WSOP titles on three continents was in a rush.

“He made the table crazy,” Said Sergey Vasilyev who was seated next to the WPT Champions Club member.

Then no sooner had the cameramen packed away their tripods, The Grinder was gone. Daniel Scatragli was the man sat holding his scalp, and it all happened in a three-bet pot with the money going into the middle on a flop of [Ks] [Td] [4s]. The Grinder was holding [Js] [Ts] for the draw and Scatragu was holding the mighty [Tx] [4x] for two-pair.  The spades stayed in the garden shed and The Grinder was gone.

That elimination thrust Daniel Scatragu into the top of the chip counts where Senadin Cosic and Bodo Sbrzesny joined him. You may remember that Sbrzesny was well on course to take down the WPT title the last time we were in Europe. It was during the Prague Poker Festival when an in form Sbrzesny headed into the final six with a dominating chip lead. But one mistimed bluff against Marcin Wydrowski meant a third place finish for our PartyPoker Team Pro.

Sbrzesny found his chips in a three-way pot against Besim Hot and Leon Louis. Two individuals who have found their own unique ways of winning money. Hot has incredibly won nearly $1 million playing $10k high rollers exclusively in the Czech Republic, including our very own in December. Leon Louis is known online as Flippetyflop and is one of the world’s greatest HU Turbo SNG players. But the German doesn’t care about all that old codswallop.  He got his money in good and came out of the other side with 80,000 chips. You can read all about the hand right here.

Hats off to the Casino Baden in terms of the way they are looking after both the players and the media. The food is out of this world and all of the soft drinks are free of charge. So when we resumed after the break the bellies of most of the players were a hell of a lot wider than they were before. That is everyone except Artem Litvinov, who seemingly just vanished. The man responsible for munching away at the Russian’s 180BB stack was Attila Zab, but it did take him two bites – well 180BB is quite a lot of chips to get through in one sitting. You can read all about the demolition job right here.

We also lost Leon ‘FlippetyFlop’ Louis just after dinner. It’s not often you see Louis outside of his four-walls as he is busy trying to make a million dollars. Aren’t we all, you may very well say? But when Louis says he is going to make a million dollars in one year, this boy means it. Louis is one of the world’s greatest heads-up sit n go players, but, as Bodo Sbrzesny so eloquently put it in an interview earlier, “ This isn’t heads-up.” Louis never really recovered from the three way action that saw Sbrzesny build his stack earlier in the day. His exit hand came at the hands of the impressive Italian Paolo Compagno who rivered a straight at the same time that Louis rivered a set. 

We had our usual collection of baseball caps, sunglasses and jeans that showed everyone the colour of people’s underpants, but there was one man who stood out from all the rest. Marcel Luske looked pristine. I swear there wasn’t a hair out of place on the man. It looked like he had been ironed wearing his full suit. He was in fine fettle, but just didn’t find the rub of the green when he needed it. We finally lost him in the final level of play. When his demise came it was two hands that did the damage. The first was against Tom Carpenter that can be read here, and the final nail in the coffin as against Andras Kovacs that can be read here.

So that’s a few snippets of action during Day 1B. 

So get to bed because we certainly are. We’ll see you right back here at 14:00 (CET) when we bring you all of the action from Day Two of WPT Baden.