2016 WSOP: Ryan Laplante Wins Bracelet in $565 Pot-Limit Omaha, Rep Porter Collects Third Bracelet in $1,500 Seven Card Razz

It was an action-packed day, as Indian players stormed Event 14 – $1,500 Millionaire Maker, which saw a total entry-field of 7,190 players. Jagdeep Singh, Samay Parikh and Raghav Bansal were among those who played Day 1B, but none were able to survive to Day 2. Sumit Sapra, who busted Day 1A, made a valiant effort on Day 1B, but it was not a happening day for him either.

This leaves only Team PokerStars Pro Aditya Agarwal, as the sole Indian player in the event. He made Day 2 with 106,300 on the first entry flight, at 20^th place on the chip counts.

After the appearance of Chris “Jesus” Ferguson, it was now the turn of his partner, Howard Lederer to finally emerge at the 2016 WSOP. Lederer played Event 16 – $10,000, 2-7 Single Draw Championship and is among the 34 survivors to Day 2, as the second smallest stack with 20,600.

Two more winners were found as Ryan Laplante took down Event 12 – $565 Pot-Limit Omaha for $190,328 and his first bracelet, while Event 13 – $1,500 Seven Card Razz was claimed by Rep Porter for his third WSOP bracelet and prize money of $142,624.

Currently Event 15 – $1,500 Eight Game Mix (6-Handed) and Event 16 – $10,000 2-7 Draw Lowball Championship (No-Limit) are underway.

Event #12: $565 Pot-Limit Omaha

The final table began with Sean Shah leading the nine survivors with 2,875,000, while ultimate winner Ryan Laplante was somewhere in the middle with 1,105,000 in chips.

However, a series of eliminations later, mostly taken by Shah, Laplante tripled up to setup a heads up match between the two. Laplante was leading with 6,910,000 against Shah’s 5,530,000. About an hour later, it was over, with Laplante gaining all the way and a final hand that saw him make two pair to win the title and $190,328 in prize money. Sean Shah made second place for $117,531. The event drew 2,483 entries and generated a prize pool of $1,241,500.

Among our Indian challengers, Sumit Sapra played the event, but was busted on the first day.

Event #13: $1500 Seven Card Razz

Rep Porter outlasted a player-field of 461 to collect the title, his third bracelet and the winning prize of $142,624 in Event 13 – $1500 Seven Card Razz.

The tough heads up match between Porter and Michael Gathy lasted almost two hours and had both opponents, with two prior WSOP bracelets each. Finally, Michael Gathy settled for runner-up finish, taking home $88,146.

Event #14: $1500 Millionaire Maker No-Limit Hold’em

Day 1B, drew a whopping 4,102 runners, taking the total number of entries in Event 14 – $1,500 Millionaire Maker to 7,190, with 3,088 entries on Day 1A.

Shalev Halfa will lead the survivors of Day 1B with 250,700 chips. Peter Eichhardt, fresh from winning his first bracelet in Event 6: $1,500 No-Limit Hold`em is among the Top 10 counts at seventh place, with 152,700.

Day 2 will see 1,172 players, the combined 505 from Day 1A and 667 from Day 1B battle to reach the money bubble, with 1,079 making a min-cash of $2,250.

This year, the event has been tweaked to award both the first and second place finishers a seven-figure payout, while all the final table finishers will get at least $96,000.

Aditya Agarwal was the only Indian to survive on Day 1A with 106,300.

On Day 1B, Team India`s Jagdeep Singh, Samay Parikh, Raghav Bansal and Sumit Sapra played the event, but all were eliminated before the end of play.

Jagdeep busted with pocket Tens against a villains King-Ten.

Sapra had a bad time on Day 1A, but bravely rode in again on Day 1B, but failed to make it through. He posted his progress on his Facebook page,

“Busto KK<AA, aipf”

“Lost a big pot AQcc vs Q9hh on 962cc board, all in on the flop, down to 4500”

“13k at 2nd break, let’s build it up from here! Millionaire Maker #‎WSOP2016”

“Back for a 2nd shot at becoming a Millionaire! #‎WSOP2016”

Raghav Bansal lived dangerously on his second bullet. He had grinded up to a big stack but moved down to 33K, when he lost a 30K pot on a coin flip with Ace-King vs pocket Jacks. He further improved to 50 big blinds before losing most of his stack with Ace-King. Bansal was looked up by pocket queens and pocket aces. No king on the board and he was down to 5,100 in chips.

A chip and chair as they say, he folded big and small blind with just 3.5 big blinds on the money bubble. “They were 2-3 people in the hand and I had super junk”.

Bansal then got it in with pocket sevens against sixes and held to get a double up and reached almost 8 big blinds. But just when it was looking like he may sneak onto Day 2, he busted on the last hand of the day. “Folded around to me, I shove 6 bigs with Q4o. Sb vs BB,” he said describing his last hand.

Event #15: $1500 Eight Game Mix (6-Handed)

Event 15 – $1,500 Eight Game Mix (6-Handed) began with 491 hopefuls and at the end of Day 2, only 11 survived. Leading them on Day 3, will be Paul Volpe, who bagged 586,500.

Several notables failed to make the money, including Phil Hellmuth, Anthony Zinno, Mike Leah, and Eli Elezra, all who busted early.

Jason Mercier, Jason Somerville, Barry Greenstein and David Bach were among those, who cashed, even as they were eliminated late on Day 2.

The event has a prize pool of $662,850 and the champion will collect $149,943 and the bracelet.

Event #16: $10,000 2-7 Draw Lowball Championship (No-Limit)

100 players signed up for Event 16 – $10,000 2-7 Draw lowball Championship (No-Limit) creating a prize pool of $940,000.

Of these only 34 remain for Day 2, led by Alex Luneau, who has 454,000 in chips.

Mike Matusow (367,600), George Danzer (343,800), Brian Hastings (290,600), and Herezel Zalewski (204,800) are the other top stacks.

Howard Lederer, co-founder Full Tilt came in to play the event, marking it his first public appearance at a poker tournament since the company was indicted for misappropriation of funds, post-Black Friday. A few days ago, Chris Ferguson, Lederer’s partner in Full Tilt had appeared at WSOP creating a stir.

In any case, Lederer’s apology letter released through Daniel Negreanu’s blog had already lead many to believe that it was his gambit at re-entering the public poker world, after his self-imposed exile since 2011. Lederer refused to give any comments to the press, stating that he had come just to “play poker”.

For the record, Lederer is among the survivors to Day 2, with 20,600, though he is the second smallest stack amidst the remaining 34 players.

Several notable have survived to Day 2 and these include former WSOP ‘Players of the Year’ Frank Kassela (173,900), Daniel Negreanu (172,100), Jason Mercier (126,600), Anthony Zinno (71,000), and two-time winner of this event Nick Schulman (42,000).

Shaun Deeb, Eli Elezra, Erik Sagstrom, soccer player Max Kruse, recent bracelet winner Robert Mizrachi, Todd Brunson, Brandon Shack-Harris, Matthew Ashton, Brian Rast, Phil Hellmuth, and lowball legend Billy Baxter had no luck and hit the rails on the opening day.

Do stay with us in the coming days, as we bring you all the updates from the 2016 WSOP!