Grafton and Polk Highlight Main Event Day 2 PokerGO Stream

Day 2A/B of the World Series of Poker $10,000 World Championship Main Event returned 2,219 for the start of play. Players were segregated by flights by room with Day 1A players spread across the Miranda and Brasilia Rooms and Day 1B players were all in the Amazon Room. Five levels of play trimmed the field to 1,023 survivors and only Lawrence Bayley and Mickey Craft cracked the 600,000-chip mark.

“Is that right? That’s a good sign,” Craft said after bagging and learning he was near the lead. “The first two hours were terrible but then I went on a three-hour streak and it never seemed to end.”

“I was getting hit by the deck and was all in three times,” he added. “I had aces against kings – which was a nice cooler for 145,000 chips. You don’t run across those types of hands very often in tournaments – it was awesome.”

“This is my first Main Event,” he said. “I planned on playing it the whole time – out of nine bracelet events. I cashed in three of eight and I’m hoping to go four for nine.”

The 2A field advanced 267 players, the 2B field had 756 surviving players for a total of 1,023 players moving on to Day 3 on Tuesday.

Jared Hamby, Thomas Muehloecker, Andrew Barber, Marvin Rettenmaier and Mike Gorodinsky all finished in the top portion of the leader board well above the average stack. 

Sam Grafton and Doug Polk earned a lot of TV time at the Feature Table on PokerGO. Grafton played a key hand against David Gutfreund.

Always a sweat but can the pocket aces hold? #WSOPMainEvent pic.twitter.com/ollZyiicCG

— PokerGO (@PokerGO) July 12, 2017

Mike Matusow, Chris Hunichen, 2017 Super High Roller Bowl Winner Christoph Vogelsang, Mark Radoja and Peter Jetten finished near the middle of the pack.

Seven former Main Event champions returned to play with Robert Varkonyi, Joe Hachem, Jonathan Duhamel, Greg Raymer, Tom McEvoy, Martin Jacobson and Qui Nguyen. Jacobson, Nguyen and Varkonyi didn’t survive the day.

The champ always returns with a target on his back and the river bullseye against @Nguyenpoker #WSOPMainEvent pic.twitter.com/6xTcGtAood

— PokerGO (@PokerGO) July 11, 2017

Gaelle Baumann, Christian Harder, Layne Flack, Phil Laak, Ronnie Bardah and Layne Flack busted during the day’s action.

Wednesday’s Day 2C resumes an hour later than normal at noon with the broadcast live on PokerGO on 12:30 pm PT. 

Tuesday began with Barstool Sports’ Nate and Smitty on the Poker Central Podcast about their WSOP Main Event experience. Both played Day 1C and advanced to Day 2C with 228,500 and 90,000 respectively.

Tom Marchese won millions in poker tournaments but cashed in the Main Event for the first time in 2016 when he finished in 14th place. He shared some strategy for players on the bottom part of the leader board that are starting to feel the pressure.

Three-time Super Bowl champion Richard Seymour played in the Brasilia Room Tuesday. He saw the similarities between the Main Event and NFL season, with the Final Table a long way off.

Brandon Adams published his fourth book “Personal Organization for Degenerates” – a light take on organization for poker players. Adams’ experience from economics Harvard, as poker player and writer gives him a unique viewpoint of the game.

The 2017 WSOP Main Event was the largest field and prize pool since 2010 and PhD economics student Andrew Barber took a look inside the numbers and what they mean.

Army vet and poker pro Tim Burt cashed the past three Main Events in a row – improving each time. He’s got his eyes set on the final table and might be the only player in the field that played poker while in a war zone.