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Poker Tournament Results

38th Annual World Series of Poker

Event #4 - WSOP Pot Limit Hold'em

June 3, 2007 at 12:00 PM
Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino
Tournament Schedule

Buy-In	$1,500
Prize Pool	$1,171,500
Entries	781
Report Available

Michael Spiegel

Place	Name	Prize
1	Michael Spiegel AKA "durango" (Lighthouse Point, FL, USA)	$251,957
2	Gavin Smith (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$155,446
3	Jon Friedberg (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$101,147
4	William Hill (Silver Spring, MI, USA)	$67,076
5	Tom Savitsky (Randolph, NJ, USA)	$47,912
6	Bruce Van Horn (Ada, OK, USA)	$36,732
7	Eric Lynch (Olathe, KS, USA)	$27,682
8	Jeff Langdon (Santa Fe, NM, USA)	$20,229
9	Marco Traniello (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$14,906
10	John "Spyder" McCarthy (Jersey City, NJ, USA)	$10,128
11	Nick Binger (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$10,115
12	Tony Basille (Toronto, ON, Canada)	$10,115
13	Stephen Jones (Church Hill, MD, USA)	$9,050
14	Bill McNamara (Fairfield, CT, USA)	$9,050
15	Robert Gerstenzang (New York, NY, USA)	$9,050
16	Javad Navran (CA, USA)	$7,985
17	Steve Mills (UK)	$7,985
18	Ken Koski (Howell, MI, USA)	$7,985
19	Mark Wilds (Biloxi, MS, USA)	$6,921
20	Josh Patterson	$6,921
21	Jean-Robert Bellande (Los Angeles, CA, USA)	$6,921
22	Graham Wheldon (UK)	$6,921
23	Cody Slaubaugh AKA "Thugmoneymkr" (Rugby, ND, USA)	$6,921
24	Frank Margolis	$6,921
25	Robert Zipf	$6,921
26	Eugene Todd (Brooklyn, NY, USA)	$6,921
27	Jameson Hughes	$6,921
28	Robert Thies AKA "Rob" (Debary, FL, USA)	$5,962
29	Francois Safieddine (Denver, CO, USA)	$5,962
30	Bart Wetsteijn (Middelburg, Netherlands)	$5,962
31	David Roepke (Troy, TX)	$5,962
32	Robert Ellis (Houston, TX, USA)	$5,962
33	Kenny Chi Wu AKA "Buddha" (Long Beach, CA, USA)	$5,962
34	Andrew Webking (Seattle, WA, USA)	$5,962
35	Nhan Le (Orange County, CA, USA)	$5,962
36	Shannon Puskarich	$5,962
37	Matthew Shepsky (Stokie, IL, USA)	$5,111
38	Shane Beckham (Melbourne, Australia)	$5,111
39	Zorn Venture (USA)	$5,111
40	Nick Andricopulos (Chicago, IL, USA)	$5,111
41	Gilbert Salas	$5,111
42	Ed Giron (Jacksonville, CA, USA)	$5,111
43	Mark Smith AKA "Pegasus" (Georgetown, KY, USA)	$5,111
44	Unknown	$5,111
45	Freddy Deeb (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$5,111
46	Keith Tilston (Austin, TX, USA)	$4,365
47	Kirke Rivkin (Deerfield, IL, USA)	$4,365
48	Archibald van Horn (Ada, OK, USA)	$4,365
49	Wallace Darling (Golden, CO, USA)	$4,365
50	Colin Shattock	$4,365
51	Danny Ciaramella AKA "Lish" (Masontown, PA, USA)	$4,365
52	Scott Bohlman (Horner Glen, IL, USA)	$4,365
53	Robert Firestone (Santa Barbara, CA, USA)	$4,365
54	Dan Alspach AKA "Dan A" (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$4,365
55	David Hipperson	$3,567
56	Jan Christoph Von Halle AKA "50outs" (Hamburg, Germany)	$3,567
57	Larry Vickers (Winter Garden, FL, USA)	$3,567
58	Kenneth Auker (Rock Island, IL, USA)	$3,567
59	Joe Lazaro (Carson City, NV, USA)	$3,567
60	Jesse Jamison (Phoenix, AZ, USA)	$3,567
61	Ben Sarnoff (San Francisco, CA, USA)	$3,567
62	Katja Thater AKA "Miss Slick" (Hamburg, Germany)	$3,567
63	Ishak Noyan (Sodertalje, Sweden)	$3,567
64	David "C4" Plastik (Las Vegas, NV, USA)	$2,981
65	Nicholas Rosenberger (Sacramento, CA, USA)	$2,981
66	Le Kun	$2,981
67	Nesbitt Coburn AKA "Nez" (Minneapolis, MN, USA)	$2,981
68	Derek Tamamoto	$2,981
69	Jonathan Snyder (USA)	$2,981
70	Kevin Manley (Arlington Heights, IL, USA)	$2,981
71	Mark Lowe	$2,981
72	Arias Jorge	$2,981

Tournament Report

Michael Spegal won $252,290 for first place. He overcame a decisive chip advantage. He was arrived sixth in the chip count going into the final table, versus several top pros. He overcame the odds and won his first gold bracelet in what was his first-ever cash at the WSOP. This is his third year to play at the WSOP.
On this night of his victory, Michael Spegal was celebrating his ninth wedding anniversary. His wife Jeanne sat at ringside and celebrated their win. "She can have the prize money. I'll take the bracelet," Spegal joked. ESPN commentator Norman Chad ribbed Spegal during the post-tournament interview, noting "You are the only married man I know of who gets to play poker on his anniversary."
Spegal is 39-year-old former United States Marine. He was born in Newton, IA. He owns an equipment rental and UPS store in southeast Georgia.
Spegal's poker nickname is "Bob Cat Spegal."
The final table lasted approximately five hours. The star-studded field generated a full house, which was packed inside the ESPN poker arena at the Rio.
Among the players who came up short were former WSOP gold bracelet winner Jon Freidberg and tournament pro Gavin Smith.
Gavin Smith was the runner up. He battled with Spegal for the win, but ended up with a frustrating second-place showing. Smith is widely considered to be one of the best tournament players NOT to have yet won a WSOP gold bracelet. During the heads-up battle with Spegal, Smith delivered the line of the night when he said to his opponent, "Why don't you start playing like a business man and not like a poker player. Stop it!"
The ninth-place finisher Marco Traniello has the somewhat shadowy status of being married to one of the best poker players in the world, wife Jennifer Harman. However, it is Traniello who has outperformed just about everyone at WSOP over the past two years. Traniello cashed a whopping seven times at the 2005 World Series. He cashed four times in 2006. Now with a cash in this event, Traniello has a combined total of 12 WSOP cashes dating back to the start of the 2005 WSOP. No other poker player has more in this time frame.
The sixth-place finisher Dr. Bruce Van Horn is a physician (pathologist) from Ada, Oklahoma. He is most famous for being the runner-up in the 1996 main event to Huck Seed. Dr. Van Horn's son also played in this event and cashed. His son Archie took 48th place.
The most popular area inside the tournament room appears to be the Milwaukee 's Best Light beer garden set up over the poker arena. Spectators can visit the elevated deck and see action on both sides of the room. With tables and chairs for spectators, it may be the only vantage spot in the room to actually watch six tournaments going on all at once, which is what was taking place on this day – two final tables, two Day Twos, and two start-up events.
This was the third WSOP poker event this year to be recorded for broadcast by ESPN. The show is expected to debut sometime in July.
by Nolan Dalla