Poker Tournament Results

Legends Of Poker WPT Season 2

Frankie O´Dell

Tournament Report

First Legends for O’Dell “I finally broke the ice,” said Frankie O’Dell, as he won his first Legends of Poker tournament, $500 no-limit hold’em. O’Dell has a clutch of other titles including the World Poker Open championship. He took a big chip lead after breaking Jean “Prince” Gaspard and made a deal when he got heads up with a 176-81 lead over Jerrry Poladian, a recreational player from Newport Beach who owns two markets. With 229 players and 305 rebuys, this was a long tournament. As 3 a.m. approached,, with two full tables still left, O’Dell was heard to say, “If I’m not home by 8 a.m. they’ll think I’m in jail.” Negreanu shortened things a bit by knocking out two players at the second table. He made a small investment loose call with 8-5 against one all-in player and a $200 all-in raiser and hit a straight on the river. The nine finalists arrived with antes of $300, blinds of 1-2k. It was a top-notch field that included three Card Player columnists: Negreanu, Warren Karp and Adam Schoenfeld. Schoenfeld, a retired investor, retired quickly. On the second hand he raised 5k with Q-Q, O’Dell popped it for 20k more, Schoenfeld moved in for the rest of his 22k, Frankie flipped up aces and eight were left. Warren Karp keeps busy. Besides playing poker, he’s tournament coordinator at Hustler Casino, ran the evening events at this year’s World Series and is chief operating officer for Professional Sponsorship Group, a management company that searches out sponsorship deals for poker players. Tonight he managed his money until hand five. He raised 5k with A-8. “No choice,” he said, calling when Stan Goldstein put him in for $5,700 more. With A-10, Goldstein was money in the bank, a 98.6 percent favorite when the flop came K-10-5. Joel Fishbein, a poker player and horse handicapper with a stud win at the L.A. Poker Classic, raised to 7k with As-7s on hand 12. Negreanu put him in and broke him with pocket jacks. With $500 antes and $1,500-$3,000 blinds, Goldstein had a close call when he was all in and O’Dell flopped draws to a flush and straight, but Stan’s pocket sevens prevailed. A bit later, there was some choice table talk between the always-entertaining Negreanu and Prince Gaspard, a former basketball player for Northeastern University. First Gaspard raised 6k, and then Negreanu moved all in. Daniel: “You must have a hand, you’re thinking.” Prince: “We all have hands, unless we’re animals.” Daniel: “You’ve been playing pretty good all day. You going to mess it up by calling?” Prince: “In the ghetto where I was raised, that would mean you want action. So I’m gonna fold.” He did, and Daniel showed A-K, the better hand. The next hand was the swing one. O’Dell raised to 10k preflop and Gaspard called. On a flop of J-7-4, Gaspard went all in with Ac-Jc. O’Dell won with pocket queens, confiscated all but $10,500 of Gaspard’s remaining $51,000, and took the lead with about 125k. Possibly upset, Gaspard shoved his remaining 10k in on the next hand with Q-J. Spring Cheong called with As-7s and finished him when an ace turned. It was Goldstein’s turn to be upset when he finished fifth place on a truly bad beat soon after. Goldstein, with numerous titles and WSOP and World Poker Tour final tables, was all in with pocket aces against Poladian’s 9s-9d when four spades gave Poladian a flush. Two hands later, O’Dell raised 10k with 7-7 and Negreanu moved in for 37k more with A-K. Frankie flopped a set and three were left. Two hands later it was over when O’Dell flopped a king to his K-7 to outrun Cheong’s Ah-10h, and the finalists made their deal. –Max Shapiro BIOGRAPHY: After giving his traditional thanks “To my lord and savior for your blessing,” Frankie O'Dell dedicated his first Legends win to his two sons, Brandon and Gabriel. O'Dell is a resident of Denver, Colorado. Besides his World Poker Open championship he has titles from the Hall of Fame and two at the Orleans Open, along with a handful of smaller tournament wins.. He’s also currently listed #1 in Omaha hi-lo in Card Player’s rankings. Tonight, he said, he was in decent chip position all the way through. “When I saw Daniel Negreanu at the table, I knew he was going to be a problem because he doesn’t like to make deals, which isn’t his style. And I knew it was going to be interesting playing with him, because I expected him to bring the game up to par, which he did. After I got him out, it was pretty much smooth sailing,” he added.