My friend Mike Paulle has given me permission to post his daily reports for each event of the World Series of Poker this year to the ChipBoard! Below is his report on Event #12. Andy - Las Vegas

WORLD SERIES OF POKER 2002

EVENT #12 SEVEN-CARD STUD
Monday, April 29, 2002
$2,500 BUY-IN
$2,500 in chips

YEAR OF THE ROOKIE

So you always thought it would be take years of dedication and many tries to
win a gold bracelet. WRONG!!! This year at the WSOP we've had players come in
for the first time and walk off with a gold bracelet. Sometimes, like yesterday
as an example with Jay Sipelstein and Pot-Limit Hold'em, the player is not only
new to the Series but new also to the tournament game they are playing.
Amazing.

There were 123 entrants in the $2,500 Buy-In, Stud for a total prize pool of
$289,050. Two tables were paid, a total of 16 players.

Want a real challenge? Just in case you are thinking of coming to the Series
and think you can play Seven Card Stud, he's a partial list of the 'name'
players who started today's event and didn't get into the money: Mickey
Appleman, Eli Balas, Don Barton, Brent Carter, John Cernuto, David Chiu, TJ
Cloutier, Chris Ferguson, Ken Flaton, Chau Giang, Phil Hellmuth, Randy Holland,
Phil Ivey, Mel Judah, Daniel Negreanu, Men Nguyen, Max Stern, David Ulliott and
Cyndy Violette. But then if you do beat these people, like our rookie did
today, you know you've beaten the best.

The Final Table was setup Monday night when Bill Gibbs reraised Hassan 'Sam'
Chehab after Sam raised with a Queen up. Gibbs had two split Aces that walked.
Chehab could have waited until Jennifer Harmon, with fewer chips, was forced to
make a move with only $2,900. Instead Sam pushed his Queen high straight draw
all-in then missed.

THE FINAL TABLE: 52 mins left of 75. The ante is $300, bring-in $600, playing
$2,000/$4,000
Player Hometown Chip Count
Seat 1 Tom McCormick Fargo ND $
40,000
Seat 2 Walter Davis Las Vegas NV $
40,500
Seat 3 Alan Boston Las Vegas NV $ 14,100
Seat 4 Jennifer Harmon Las Vegas NV $ 2,900
Seat 5 Rosie Feldman Floral Park NY $ 15,200

Seat 6 Dan Torla Huntington Beach CA $
59,800
Seat 7 Chris Sandrock Boise ID
$ 21,900
Seat 8 Bill Gibbs Tipton IN $113,100

We might have guessed that the pretty and petite Jennifer Harmon wasn't fully
committed to this Final Table. How? She was entered into Tuesday's $3,000 Limit
Hold'em and came to this table while on a lunch break from that game. Jen
started to get antsy when she was still around when the other event resumed.
Either she had to catch fire in the Stud event or get back to the Hold'em
before she was blinded out of that tournament as well.

Harmon's problem was solved when Tom McCormick caught a third Jack that put
both Jennifer and Chris Sandrock out on the same hand. Harmon got 8th place
money because she started the hand with fewer chips than did Sandrock.
Jennifer, who has a bracelet in one of the most unlikely situations, was a
rookie to the game Deuce To Seven Lowball two years ago. She had to ask advice
on how to play the game and she won the event against a world-class field.
Today neither her four-flush or straight draw got there against McCormick and
Jen could go back to her Hold'em tournament.

Chris Sandrock's motivation was unquestionable, but his luck was pretty bad.
Twice Chris got himself heads up against Alan Boston's all-in hands. In both
cases Sandrock started with the best hand and lost. Now it was Chris' turn to
go all-in with Jennifer Harmon against Tom McCormick. Chris was leading for a
minute with Queens, but McCormick spiked a third Jack and The Rock turned to
sand.

Millions of Black Americans play poker, but until recently a very low
percentage came to the World Series. That seems to be changing finally. With
the phenomenal success of Phillip Ivey and the win by Paul Darden two years ago
in this event, a few more players and spectators have participated in the
greatest show in poker. It's great to see increased ethnic diversity in our
sport. Walter Davis started third in chips and seemed determined to play
conservatively, but his best starting hands just wouldn't hold up. Simply put,
it wasn't Walter Davis's day. A crushing hand came when Walter couldn't call a
multi-bet hand against Dan Torla on the river. Playing $3k/$6k on a short stack
isn't a good idea. Davis went all-in against his mimesis Dan Torla only to lose
to a pair of 9's when all of Walter's draws failed.

Rosalie (Rosie) Feldman is a New York character with that accent and attitude.
A lady of advanced age is a delicate way of putting it. Rosie played so few
hands she finished 5th by default. When she finally found a hand to go all-in
on it was only a split pair of 10's. Still, she led against Al Boston until the
river when Boston mercilessly caught a gut shot straight card. No curse of the
Bambino here.

"The Shamrock Kid" Tom McCormick tells us in his pre-game bio his nickname is.
You couldn't tell it by how Tom's day turned out. There was little that was
lucky about it. He started fourth in chips and ended in 4th place. Tom was
fighting back almost from the first hand. He lost half his stack when Dan Torla
had wired 5's and made a full house on 5th St. McCormick had so many Hearts he
had to call to the river. That put Tom behind the eight ball for the rest of
the day. Thinking he might stay alive when he had a pair of 7's and Bill Gibbs
started pounding him with a 7 as a door card, Tom was way wrong. Gibbs made a
straight on 6th St while McCormick's 7's never improved. 'Shamrock,' indeed.
Playing $4k/$8k later Tom couldn't beat Bill Gibbs with 5's and 2's.

A 'Miracle' would best describe Alan Boston's survival. All-in three hands in a
row early, the first with only $1,600, Boston won them all and started
accumulating chips. There was a time that Alan actually had a shot at the
title, but he came from so far back it wasn't possible for him to catch all the
way up. Besides Bill Gibbs had caught fire and was building a pyramid of chips.
Boston and Torla looked like they were playing for 2nd each with around
$50,000. In a last attempt to get enough chips to challenge Gibbs, Boston
decided in a hand with Dan Torla to go for it. Alan chose to ignore Dan pairing
his door card and opted to believe he still had a chance all-in. There was no
chance. Boston's Jacks were no match for Dan's 4's full of Queens. It was quite
a marathon for Boston, though.

Few believed that the Rookie had a chance against Bill Gibbs even though Dan
Torla was only a 2-1 chip dog when heads up play began. Bill Gibbs was on a
mission. He had a big chip lead two years ago in this event when Jerri Thomas
caught some improbable cards to beat him. Last week Bill was also one off the
Final Table. It's safe to say that Bill Gibbs is an expert WSOP Stud player.
Then there is Dan Torla. In the 'Year of the Rookie' first time WSOP players
have some unknown karma on their side. Gibbs had Torla down to his last $30,000
when that karma kicked in. Three huge hands helped wipe out a 9-1 chip deficit
for Dan. He made a flush against Gibbs' trips. Then Torla made 10's full to
Bill Gibbs' club flush. And finally, for the title, the Rookie made yet another
10's full to win a bracelet in his first year and only third event at the World
Series of Poker. Is there's something in the air?

Official Money Winners
1. Dan Torla $115,600
2. Bill Gibbs 57,800
3. Alan Boston 28,900
4. Tom McCormick 17,330
5. Rosie Feldman 14,450
6. Walter Davis 11,550
7. Chris Sandrock 8,680
8. Jennifer Harmon 5,780

9th-12th received $4,340
Hassan 'Sam' Chehab, Ron Long, John Womack, Robert Schwing

13th-16th received $2,900
Souvanh Vilayvanh, Pat Nixon, Huberto Brenes, Dan Robinson