Phil Hellmuth is on fire at his homefield at the WPT Bay 101 Shooting Star, starting the tv table today in 2nd place.


Hellmuth, who lives in Palo Alto, California not far from the Bay 101 casino, started Day 3 in 1st place and stayed near the top the whole way. This is his 4th WPT final table but the title has eluded him so far.

In the lead is Andy Seth, and other players at the tv table include Hasan Habib and Matt Keikoan. The winner will take down $878,500.

Scotty Nguyen went out in 9th place and Brian "tsarrast" rast in 9th. This makes Hellmuth the last bounty player standing. Bounties are worth $5,000.

The Poker Brat managed to get himself steamed up in a hand where most players would have been happy just to drag the pot without a showdown. Blinds were 5k/10k (1k) and Hellmuth raised to 30k in mid position, Scotty Nguyen called from the small blind. Hellmuth had a stack of about 1m, Nguyen had 260k left in his stack and the pot was just under 80k. Flop came 8h 3s 2s, Nhuyen checked, Hellmuth moved all-in, Scotty tanked for a bit before folding Qs Js face up. Hellmuth was instantly tilted and he showed As Ts. The players asked to see the cards in the deck and Hellmuth would have won the pot with the nut flush. "If I bet just 30k, you move all-in and you're out of the tournament!" Hellmuth groaned.

Seat 1: Hasan Habib – 455,000
Seat 2: Phil Hellmuth – 1,433,000
Seat 3: Andy “BKiCe” Seth – 2,164,000
Seat 4: Matt Keikoan – 371,000
Seat 5: Mclean Karr – 1,112,000
Seat 6: Dan O’Brien – 1,129,000

Source: WPT.