Bodog Beat

Poker pro Andy Bloch is one of the big names at the final table of the $10,000 Pot Limit Holdem World Championship at the 2008 WSOP and also the chip leader. (Bodog Beat Image)

Remember how we've been saying for the past few months how all of the big names have been fizzling out of the major poker tournaments (with the notable exception of Phil Ivey at the WPT LA Poker Classic), leaving us with relatively unexciting news when it came down to those final tables? And then, remember how we said last week that we really, really hoped that it would be different at the 2008 WSOP? Well, all of our dreams have come true for the very first event, the $10,000 World Championship Pot Limit Holdem event.

The final table is packed with star-studded goodness as poker pros Andy Bloch, Phil Laak, Nenad Medic, Kathy Liebert, Patrik Antonius and WPT announcer Mike Sexton are all sitting down this afternoon to battle it out for the $794,112 first-place prize, the first bracelet and the title of "Pot Limit Holdem World Champion."

Bloch goes in with a dominant chip lead of 2.11 million in chips, about 900k over second-place's Medic (1.2 million), who just barely has the edge on Sexton (1.13 million) in third. Those top three have more than half the chips in play as the chip counts drop dramatically once you get past them. Mike Sowers is in fourth and has about half of Sexton's stack at 675,000. He is followed by Amit Makhija (525k), Chris Bell (455k), Laak (425k), Liebert (285k) and Antonius (230k) to round it out.

All of the pros in this event would like to see something come of their position. If Bloch can hold on to this lead and ride it all the way to a victory, he will pick up his first WSOP bracelet in a career that has seen him come so close so many times and rack up $3.2 million in earnings. Laak has also been out of the major tournament spotlight for quite sometime, as is the same with Liebert. Antonius has been getting more publicity recently for his online poker antics and would like to follow up that success with a good live tournament finish.

Final table play gets underway in the Amazon Room's sweet final table set up at 3pm PT, and we'll be sure to go out to the pool, get some sun and then maybe report on the results after we go out and eat some delicious Indian food this evening. What do you want? It's Sunday, sunny and we're hungry. Get off our backs.

By the way, if you got in on Bodog Poker's WSOP prop bets and picked Antonius and Liebert as the couple to win the most money during this year's series, then you are waaaaaay ahead of the game.