Jean-Robert Bellande survives the day as a short stack with just under 700k in chips

And then there were 9 tables.  78 players remain in the World Series of Poker Main Event, and 8 tables separate our hopefuls that are dreaming of just 1 table, the final table, and the November 9.  We began the day with 204 players, and lost some excellent names along the way. One of the most notables was certainly 10-time WSOP Bracelet winner, and 2-time WSOP Main Event Champion, Johnny Chan. 

Despite entering the day among the chip leaders, Chan ran KK into AA early, and never really recovered.  His exit was met with a solemn groan from among the fans and the media in the Amazon room, and a collective disappointment for what could have been.  While the run was certainly impressive, the question of “what could have been” has to be asked, as Chan is a fan favorite and a true champion.

Also finding the rail at the end of the day was Phil Galfond, Tristan Wade, Rob Mizrachi, and the last woman standing in the field, Breeze Zuckerman who was eliminated when she made a move with KT, and ran into Eric Baldwin’s pocket aces.  The remainder of eliminations included a virtual sea of unknown players who had their main event dreams of November and beyond fall short by just a couple days. 

But there were plenty of good stories to end the day as well, including the story of Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi.  The last remaining Mizrachi of the 4 brothers (all of whom cashed in this year’s main event), soared up the leaderboard chip counts in the middle of the day, and never let it go.  At the end of the day, Grinder bagged up 7.7 million chips, good for 2^nd in the chip counts, trailing only Theo Jorgensen who tallied a whopping 8.45 million in chips to end the day as the tournament leader. 

The top 5 chip counts were rounded out by John Racener (7.25 million), Russian Phenom Alexander Kostritsyn (6.96 million), and Jonathan Driscoll (6.2 million).  Notable big stacks include Matt Affleck (5.315 million), Bryn Kenney (4.050 million), and Matthew Berkey (3.7 million).

Others notables surviving the day and hopeful to move up the leaderboard include David Baker (2.48 Million), Adam Levy (2.29 million), Scott Clements (2.1 million), Eric Baldwin (1.89 million), David Benyamine (1.75 million), Johnny Lodden (1.7 million), Tony Dunst (1.6 million), and the ever affable Jean-Robert Bellande, who survived the day with just 625,000 chips.

Day 7 of the Main Event begins tomorrow at noon, and the play will take us all the way down to just 3 tables, or 27 players.  From there, the final day will take us till November, and the shot at being crowned Poker’s next world champion.  We’ll return to the Rio tomorrow for more updates and pics from the floor.

Related posts:

1. 2010 WSOP Main Even – Day 5 Recap
2. 2010 WSOP Main Event – Day 3 recap
3. 2010 WSOP Main Event – Day 4 Recap
4. 2010 WSOP – Day 2a recap
5. WSOP Day 4 Recap