Eric Mizrachi Survives the Bubble, Ready For a Comeback

When the bubble burst with three players all in at different tables (but only Ali Eslami actually busting), Eric Mizrachi was clinging to just 3,100 in chips, and he’s been extremely short-stacked since before the money bubble.

Earlier on the bubble, when Johnny Chan was all in, and his opponent tanked for several minutes, Mizrachi laid down his head on the table as if he was taking a nap. Nobody really thought anything about it, but Antonio Esfandiari figured it out — Mizrachi didn’t want the players from other tables (particularly the other short stacks) to realize he was a few hands away from blinding out.

The first hand after the bubble burst, Mizrachi was the big blind, putting out 3,000 and left with a single 100 chip behind. Another player raised from middle position to 10,000, and Mizrachi called without looking at his cards.

Mizrachi took a brief moment to dramatically flip one of his cards face up, and the table cheered when they saw he had the [Ah]. But then his opponent showed he had the [Ad]. Mizrachi asked what his kicker was, and his opponent said he didn’t know — he had only looked at his first card, and raised when he saw it was an ace.

His opponent flipped over his other card, giving him [Ad7c]. The other players at the table said Mizrachi should be able to beat that, and then he flipped over his other card to show [AhQs]. Mizrachi was a dominant favorite to double up in chips.

But the board came [8d8s5h5c2s], and with two pair on the board, it was a chopped pot because they each held an ace. Mizrachi said, "Even though we chopped, I still doubled in chips."

Eric Mizrachi  –  5,500  (2 bb)

Shortly after that, Mizrachi was all in again, and had another dominant ace with A-7 over A-5. There was a 5 on the flop, and it looked like Mizrachi would be going home, but then he spiked a 7 on the river to double up.

Eric Mizrachi  –  15,000  (5 bb)

The field is still a long way from the final table, but Eric Mizrachi is in a good mood and talking about turning this into a historic comeback.