Only six players remain out of 361 participants in the $5,000 buy-in World Poker Tour (WPT) Best Bet Scramble Championship. One of them will take home $347,850 on Tuesday.
The tournament reached its prize pool during the second day's session on Sunday, with 18 players making it through the day. Those players will return on Monday to advance to the final table, which will be streamed live on WPT's YouTube and Twitch channels.
History could be made at the final table. Eric Afriat enters play with a sizable chip lead. If he maintains this lead and wins the tournament, he will win his fourth WPT title, matching Darren Elias' record. Elias set this record in 2018 and has held it ever since.
WPT Bestbet Scramble Final Table Chip Count
PlacePlayer Chip Stack 1 Eric Afriat 6,570,000 2 Nick Funaro 3,680,000 3 Joe Jordan 2,795,000 4 Nick Younis 2,690,000 5 Yungyu Song 1,335,000 6 Dion Jagroo 1,035,000
Day 3 action
Song Yoongyu
Several world-class poker pros made it to the final 18, including 2015 World Champion Joe McKeehen. Among them was 17th place with $16,800. World Poker Tour commentator and three-time World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet winner Tony Dunst entered day three with the smallest stack. But he still had 18 big blinds and enough chips to spin and win his second WPT title. However, that didn't happen as he was eliminated one spot after McKeehen and also won $16,800 in prize money.
The tournament was played deep at the 90-minute level on day three, with the average stack staying above 60 big blinds throughout the session. When there were 10 players on the field, the oldest remaining player, 82-year-old Ray Leone, had about 15 big blinds and pocket kings when his opponent Yung-Kyu Song turned over his pocket aces. I found myself in a cruel situation.
Leone placed 10th with $33,500 in prize money. The field was then concentrated on one table and Vimal Reddy was next, but he did not get a salary jump as he earned the same payout as Leone.
Francis Anderson, who has more than $3.2 million in live tournament winnings, finished eighth with $42,500 and the tournament was eliminated on the final table bubble, according to The Hendon Mob. The day came to a close when Song and Afriat played a monster 70-big blind pot and the latter scooped the pot with an overpair against an unknown hand.
This reduced Song, who won the WPT Prime Playground title last month, to just 17 big blinds. But instead of going away quietly, he shook off his defeat and fought back. Not only that, two hours after Anderson busted, TK Miles moved his last nine big blinds middle preflop with A♣Q♠ and lost to Jordan's K♠J♠ when the board ran out. made it to the final table. ♦4♥7♠8♣Q♣.
Miles finished seventh, earning $55,000, and the session ended. The remaining six players are guaranteed a minimum of $71,000 in prize money, while the top four take home six-figure prizes.
Afriat has a 6,570,000 chip lead at the start of the final table with blinds of 25,000/50,000, but his path to his fourth WPT title will not be easy. The Canadian will face stiff competition, but all of his opponents have plenty of chips to contend with. That includes Nick Funaro, the younger brother of poker pro Frank Funaro.
Funaro, who won more than $400,000 at January's Borgata Winter Poker Open event, is not far off Afriat's pace with $3,680,000, the equivalent of 74 big blinds. With all six players having over 20 big blinds, the final table should be fiercely competitive.
The game will resume at 2pm ET on Tuesday in Jacksonville.
Eric Afriat traces the history of the World Poker Tour
*Image courtesy of Katerina Lucina/World Poker Tour.
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