2008 NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship Field Nears Completion

[drunkguy]

2008 NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship Field Nears Completion | Poker News

February 24, 2008
Haley Hintze

With the addition of two qualifiers from Caesars Palace qualifiers and a couple of replacements in the original announced list of invitations, the 64-player lineup for the upcoming 2008 NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship is nearly complete.

60 of 61 "invitation" slots had been announced in early January, and of those 60, only poker-player/comedian Brad Garrett was unable to attend. The 60th and 61st invitations then went to Andy Bloch and Chris Moneymaker. The 61 invitees were then joined by the two winners from the Caesars play-ins, Tom Kelly and Hooman Nikzad. This leaves only the 64th spot to be filled by the winner of a recent PokerStars.net satellite, to be announced shortly. The lineup to date:

1. Alexander, Jason
2. Antonius, Patrik
3. Bellande, Jean-Robert
4. Benyamine, David
5. Bloch, Andy
6. Brown, Chad
7. Brunson, Doyle
8. Brunson, Todd
9. Chan, Johnny
10. Cheadle, Don
11. Clements, Scott
12. Cloutier, T.J.
13. Cunningham, Allen
14. Deeb, Freddy
15. Duke, Annie
16. Dwan, Tom
17. Edler, Bill
18. Elezra, Eli
19. Elizabeth, Shannon
20. Esfandiari, Antonio
21. Farha, Sam
22. Ferguson, Chris
23. Fischman, Scott
24. Forrest, Ted
25. Gold, Jamie
26. Gowen, Clonie
27. Greenstein, Barry
28. Grizzle, Sam
29. Hachem, Joe
30. Hansen, Gus
31. Harman, Jennifer
32. Hellmuth, Phil
33. Hershiser, Orel
34. Ivey, Phil
35. Juanda, John
36. Kaplan, Gabe
37. Kelly, Tom
38. Laak, Phil
39. Lederer, Howard
40. Lindgren, Erick
41. Little, Jonathan
42. Matusow, Mike
43. Mizrachi, Michael
44. Moneymaker, Chris
45. Negreanu, Daniel
46. Nikzad, Hooman
47. Nguyen, Scotty
48. Pham, David
49. Raymer, Greg
50. Rousso, Vanessa
51. Schneider, Tom
52. Schreiber, Daniel
53. Seed, Huck
54. Seidel, Erik
55. Singer, David
56. Smith, Gavin
57. Tilly, Jennifer
58. Townsend, Brian
59. Tran, J.C.
60. Tran, Kenny
61. Wasicka, Paul
62. Williams, David
63. Yang, Jerry
64. PokerStars.net qualifier (to be announced)

The drawing party for the tourney will be held on Feb. 28th at Pure nightclub at Caesars, adjacent to the room used for the NBC Heads-Up event. Play runs through March 2nd.

NBC has also announced the TV schedule and official prize pool for the event:

April 13: Noon - 2PM ET/Check local listings for PT
April 20: Noon - 1PM ET/Check local listings for PT
April 27: Noon - 2PM ET/Check local listings for PT
May 4: Noon - 2PM ET/Check local listings for PT
May 11: Noon - 2PM ET/Check local listings for PT
May 18: Noon - 3PM ET/Check local listings for PT

Complete prize purse breakdown:

Places 9-16: $25,000
Places 5-8: $75,000
Places 3-4: $125,000
2nd place: $250,000
1st place: $500,000

Total purse: $1,500,000

[drunkguy]

2008 NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship: Ferguson and Bloch Make Finals | Poker News


2008 NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship: Ferguson and Bloch Make Finals
March 02, 2008
Amy Calistri
Of the elite eight players in the 2008 NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship, two had advanced from the quarterfinal round in previous years: former WSOP champions Huck Seed and Chris Ferguson. Orel Hershiser and Jonathan "FieryJustice" Little made it to today's quarterfinals in their NBC Heads-Up debuts. Spectator favorite Hershiser was eliminated early in today's action, though only after defeating a world-class lineup of Ted Forrest, Allen Cunningham and Freddy Deeb. While the crowd was disappointed, Hershiser has to feel good about his performance in this event. As Hershiser handed an autographed baseball over to his vanquisher, the rest of the field vied for a chance at the final four on their road
Duplicate Poker
to the championship. Players eliminated in the quarterfinals took home $75,000, while players eliminated in the semis collected $125,000.

Quarterfinals

Huck Seed was the first player to advance into the semifinal round when David Benyamine, believing his pocket nines were good, moved all in on a board of 2-3-7-3-5. Seed, however, called with pocket twos for the boat. In 2006, Seed advanced to the NBC Heads-Up semifinals but was then defeated by Chris Ferguson.

Understandably, the feature table for the Hearts and Diamonds bracket hosted the match between Orel Hershiser and Andy Bloch. Bloch was able to gain a sizable advantage in the early going, but Hershiser pulled ahead when his all in with A-5 bested Bloch's Q-J. The crowd erupted on the A-Q-8 flop. Although Hershiser was ahead, any queen or jack would give Bloch the edge. Bloch was also quick to point out, "A ten on the turn gives me a lot of outs." The rest of the board filled in with running sixes and the game resumed. They seesawed back and forth until Bloch was finally able to put an end to Hershiser's run. Bloch raised all in pre-flop with A-9 and got called by Hershiser with J-T. The board of 9-7-6-6-2 gave Bloch unneeded assistance and Hershiser signed his ball over to Bloch. While I'm sure there are many that have autographed baseballs by Hershiser, the provenance of this particular ball has to be the envy of any collector.

Perhaps the most intense quarterfinal battle was that between Chris Ferguson and Jonathan Little. Ferguson had advanced to the semifinal round in two out of the last three NBC Heads-Up events. This was Little's first appearance in this event. It looked like an upset in the making when Little got off to an early lead and continued to extend it to a 6-to-1 advantage. Ferguson battled back, managing to execute two double-ups. The first double-up found Little with the (9-Spades)(8-Spades) against Ferguson's (A-Diamonds)(3-Clubs). The (K-Diamonds)(Q-Spades)(10-Hearts) flop gave both players the gutshot draw to a jack, but Ferguson's would be the higher of the two potential straights. A (3-Spades) paired Ferguson but gave Little the flush draw. The (10-Clubs) on the river pushed the pot to Ferguson. Ferguson's pocket nines held against Little's pocket fours for the subsequent double-up. Finally, at a slight chip disadvantage, Little pushed with a suited T-7 only to run into Ferguson's pocket nines, which held for the win.

Phil Ivey had been chipping away at Gus Hansen for much of their match, gaining about a 2-to-1 chip lead. Hansen shoved all his chips in the middle on a (9-Hearts)(6-Hearts)(3-Hearts) flop, only to have Ivey call and flip over (K-Hearts)(Q-Hearts). Hanson grimaced as he turned over (10-Hearts)(3-Diamonds) with only a runner-runner straight flush hope for survival. An (8-Clubs) on the turn left Hansen drawing dead and sent Ivey into the semis.

Semifinals

Off to a slow start, Chris Ferguson was able to eek out a slight advantage against Phil Ivey. About forty minutes into their match, Ivey pushed all in on a board of (9-Diamonds)(5-Diamonds)(4-Hearts)(3-Clubs). Ferguson went into the tank for well over a minute but subsequently called with pocket eights; Ivey turned over pocket sixes. Ivey had outs to a set and straight but the (Q-Hearts) fell, sending Ferguson to the semifinals for an unprecedented third time.

An hour into their match, Andy Bloch and Huck Seed were still virtually neck and neck. Bloch was finally able to get an edge on Seed before their final hand, where Bloch pushed all in with A-Q and got called by Seed with pocket nines. Bloch had to wait until the river for the ace that would send him through to the finals.

The finals between Chris Ferguson and Andy Bloch have begun as this report runs. Coincidently, back in the late 1990's Bloch and Ferguson discovered that they had run the same computer simulations to determine a rank of hands for heads-up play.

[drunkguy]

Chris 'Jesus' Ferguson Captures 2008 NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship | Poker News

Chris 'Jesus' Ferguson Captures 2008 NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship

March 03, 2008
Amy Calistri

After finishing as runner-up in 2005 and 2006, Chris Ferguson finally took down the 2008 NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship, winning a best two-of-three finals against Andy Bloch. Before the finals began, Bloch said, "I'm the Paul Wasicka of this year." Wasicka was a last-minute substitute in 2007 when Doyle Brunson was unable to attend, who then went on to win the event. This year, Andy Bloch was the last-minute substitute when comedian/actor Brad Garrett was called back to work following the resolution of the Hollywood writers' strike. Ferguson had to come from behind to prevent Bloch from fulfilling the substitute prophecy and to avoid the bridesmaid's fate once again.

Many of
Mansion
this year's earlier matches were marked by the difference between players. But as the final round was about to begin, it was the similarity between these two opponents that was striking. Both Bloch and Ferguson are professional players associated with the Full Tilt poker site. Both finalists play with a strong mathematical bias. In fact, in the early 1990s, both Bloch and Ferguson separately developed a rank of all possible hands using a computer simulation based on identical assumptions. Both players hold advanced degrees from prestigious universities. And both players are clearly "all hat and no cattle."

[StarnetGypsy]

I'm glad he finally won, DG. I watched a few years ago when Hellmuth beat him, then the following year when Ted Forrest beat him. Was beginning to wonder if he'd ever win ...