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 #21. Andy - Las Vegas

WORLD SERIES OF POKER 2002

EVENT #21 POT-LIMIT HOLD'EM
Wednesday, May 8, 2002
$1,500 BUY-IN
$1,500 in chips

"GOD LOVES ME"

Years before anyone had heard of Phil Ivey or Paul Darden, most experts would
have picked John McIntosh as the best Black American tournament player. Yet,
although he had some nice wins John still didn't have a WSOP Final Table until
today.

There were 340 entrants in the $1,500 Pot-Limit Hold'em for a total prize pool
of $479,400. Three tables were paid, a total of 27 players.

When Doyle Brunson was knocked out of this event by the pocket Aces of Scotty
Lundberg, Doyle promised to come back soon and bring his friends Chip Reese and
Bobby Baldwin with him. That will be a great day for the WSOP.

To setup the Final Table Thursday afternoon, Bruce Van Horn was desperate for
some checks and went all-in from the small blind for his last $6k with K J.
Tommy Vinus picked up pocket 8's in the big blind and called. First, a Jack
windowed on the flop…then an Ace and lastly…an 8. Bruce Van Horn pounded
the table in 11th. The other 10 were allowed to go to the next table to pound
on that one.

THE FINAL TABLE 72 mins left of 75. The blinds were $1,500/$3,000

Player Hometown Chip Count

Seat 1 Johan Storaakers Stockholm, Sweden $84,000
Seat 2 Ian Dobson Aldridge, UK $40,000
Seat 3 John McIntosh Baltimore MD $33,000
Seat 4 Mel Weiner Calabasas CA $61,500
Seat 5 Tommy Vinus Houston TX $70,000
Seat 6 Ivo Donev Bregenz, Austria $27,000
Seat 7 Chris Tsiprailidis Syracuse NY $25,500
Seat 8 Dennis Waterman Myrtle Point OR $50,500
Seat 9 Roger McDow Foothill Ranch CA $31,500
Seat 10 Antonio Turrisi Munich, Germany $77,500

After 14 hours of play Wednesday, the Pot-Limit Hold'em crew quit for the
night. There were still 17 players left. At the time Ivo Donev was the clear
chip leader with $88,500 $30k more than Johan Storaakers. In a span of the two
hours it took to get down to the last ten and the Final Table, Ivo Donev
imploded and was 10th in chips out of ten. Since this is a Final Table report,
it doesn't cover what happened to Ivo. Hopefully someone on the net is telling
the story. It was obvious that Donev was depressed by his change of fortune, as
Ivo's body language couldn't have been clearer. After less than an hour of play
in which his luck didn't change, Ivo raised all-in under the gun with pocket
9's. Tommy Vinus found pocket Jacks in the big blind and ended Donev's misery
about $170,000 short of his dream when he woke up this morning.

'Syracuse' Chris Tsiprailidis has made a nice living betting the ranch on
premium pocket pairs in the blinds. It's almost his trademark. In fact, players
are so used to this bet that they usually lay their hand down. Maybe Chris
doesn't always have to have a premium pair. On occasion someone is going to
reraise Chris with a better hand. That's what John McIntosh did with pocket
Kings to Chris' pocket Jacks in the big blind. With his stack decimated, Chris
went all-in on the next hand from the small blind with his last $5.5k and the A
8 of Hearts. Sitting next to him in the big blind 'Swami' Dennis might have
said, come on in Chris the water's fine. Dennis Waterman called Chris with the
A 3 of Spades and turned the nut flush.

There is nothing sweeter than being reraised when you have pocket Aces. Ask Mel
Weiner. Since this was pot-limit, Mel's maximum bet at this level was $14k, so
a bet of $8k may have appeared a little weak to Roger McDow in the small blind
with A Q. Roger reraised and Weiner got McDow all-in heads up drawing real
thin. Acting more like the McNasdaq than the McDow, Roger crashed into 8th.

This is when poker writers should get 'torture pay.' It took an hour and a half
to eliminate another player. The table got so tight only an enema or Layne
Flack could have loosened it up. Poor Andy Glazer reporting hand for hand, must
have had over 50 'bet-and-take-its.'
(Meanwhile, I spent this dead time losing $50 in a $4/$8 Omaha Hi-Lo game
downstairs.) These stretches should be bottled as cures for insomnia. The only
thing that can break these logjams is a rise in the blinds.

Even with the doldrums, this table had lots of memorable hands. An early one
involved Tommy Vinus and Mel Weiner. Vinus, a high-stakes player, proved why
those kinds of players are often successful in tournaments. They can smoothly
make the following type of play. There had been some early betting between the
two and a check on the turn when the board read J 9 9 A. When another Jack came
on the river, Mel Weiner bet $40k. Without a flinch, Tommy Vinus raised all-in.
Mel was tempted to call because he's usually the loosest player at any table
he's at. But Weiner seemed to have made a promise to himself to be good today.
He's never played so tight in his life. Mel folded and showed A 10. "He showed
me his hand, so I showed him my hand," Vinus said later. "I'm a limelighter,
turn on the lights and I will dance." Tommy showed Mel the 3 4 of Hearts for a
stone-cold bluff and Vinus took over the chip lead. Perhaps the poker deities
weren't amused by Tommy's dance because within an hour Vinus was low stack.
When the blinds went up to $3k/$6k, Tommy went all-in with A J and danced out
in 5th to Ian Dobson's pocket Kings. That's also why high-stakes players aren't
always successful in tournaments by the way. They can get called more often as
it is assumed they can bluff.

In fairly quick succession for this timid table, the insanely unlucky Antonio
Turrisi left in 6th and Dennis Waterman was out in 5th. Turrisi started 2nd in
chips and never had a chance. Antonio got so few playable hands, he couldn't
have done much worse by not showing up at all. Blinded off from $77k, Turrisi
would probably get 6th.

Dennis 'Swami' Waterman on the other hand was a factor and could have won this
thing if a few wishes had come true. Dennis is called 'Swami' because he looks
like he should be wearing a turban on the 'Tonight Show with Johnny Carson.'
But unable to guess what card was coming next, Waterman finally sank below the
waves when the blinds increased. This wasn't WaterWorld. The smokers nailed
Dennis in his coffin with a series of better flops. Still as a 7-1 favorite on
his last hand, Dennis deserved a less watery grave. Waterman had the good/bad
hand of the night, J J. Johan Storaakers put Dennis all-in with A Q. One of
Johan's six outs came on the turn, a Queen.

Johan Storaakers. Remember that name. You will be reading much more about this
young man in the future. Johan seems to be the protégé of the great Chris
Bjorin who is also from Sweden. Johan might have run away with this event, (and
would have never looked Bach) except for the small fact that people kept making
a better hand on him. Starting with the chip lead, Storaakers was nearly out in
10th when, first, he flopped a set and John McIntosh flopped a higher set
followed by quads. Then Johan bet his pocket Aces and was run down by an all-in
Chris Tsiprailidis with a second pair on the river. This kid's got guts,
though, he fought all the way back and retook the chip lead from only $14k.
When the higher blinds had induced a novel concept at this table: gambling,
Johan raised John McIntosh all-in with an overpair to the flop, pocket 9's. Big
Mac called with 6 8 and an open-ended straight draw. No waiting! The McIntosh
8-out straightener came on the turn and sent Storaakers straight out in 4th.

As mentioned before, J J had cut both ways. Ian Dobson had the Yaks and lost
with them when John McIntosh called Ian's raise all-in with an earlier
open-ended straight draw. You can be sure God loves you, if you make two of
these for huge pots in one night. This time John only had six outs with his 9
8, because Ian had two of John's Jack outs. No worries, a Jack came on the
river to drive Dobson nearly crazy. Now three-handed, Dobson would finish 3rd
by losing to the infernal pocket Jacks. Ian went all-in for about $110k with A
J and had to be disgusted when John McIntosh turned over the knaves. Oddly, the
case Jack came on the river to torment Dobson even more.

Heads up, McIntosh had about a 3-2 chip lead on Mel Weiner. Mel was never that
close again. When John raised on the flop and Weiner reraised all-in John
called with A 7. The flop had come 7 5 4. Weiner had 4 3. With a 2 on the turn,
Mel picked up the draw that made John McIntosh today's champion: an open-ended
straight draw. No speculation about God's love here. We are all lucky to be
alive. But Mel didn't get any of his 8 outs on the river. John McIntosh toured
the Final Table area giving high fives.

"God loves me," John McIntosh had said glowingly after knocking out Ian Dobson.
Phil Ivey and Paul Darden were the first ones out of the stands to give the big
guy some human love.

Official Money Winners
1. John McIntosh $177,380
2. Mel Weiner $ 91,080
3. Ian Dobson $ 45,540
4. Johan Storaakers $ 28,760
5. Dennis Waterman $ 21,580
6. Antonio Turrisi $ 16,700
7. Tommy Vinas $ 11,980
8. Roger McDow $ 9,580
9. Chris Tsiprailidis $ 7,680
10. Ivo Donev $ 5,760

11th-12th received $5,760
Bruce Van Horn, Max Stern

13th-15th received $4,800
David Evans, Brian Decater, Ken Flaton

16th-18th received $3,840
Minh Nguyen, David Chew, Josh Arieh

19th-27th received $2,880
Melissa Hayden, Danny Qutami, Randy Allen, Peter Vermaas, Bruce Atkinson, David
Dodgion, Tom Cawley, Harry Demetriou, Larry Wright