At the start of the final table, it seemed like things were going to be a piece of cake for the 24-year-old California poker pro Taylor Paur at the final table. He came into the final table with the chip lead and that stack only got bigger when he knocked both Kyle Cartwright and Ryan Austin in a single hand when he picked up pocket aces to their pocket queens and pocket jacks.
The rest of the final table was, indeed, smooth sailing for Paur, until it got to heads-up against Roy Weiss of Smithtown, New York. During the early stages of heads-up play, both were content to spar in small pots. However, coming back from dinner, Weiss had a new approach to the game: he started open-shoving every hand.
The tactic was certainly an unorthodox one, but it did take a match that seemed to be in Paur’s favor and turn it into a wildly swingy and memorable bout that saw numerous all-ins, come from behind double-ups, and some frustration and emotion from Paur, who could only patiently wait for the best hands and hope they hold up.
In the end, they did hold up and Paur managed to win his first gold bracelet in addition to $340,260. Weiss didn’t fare too poorly himself. He picked up $211,794 for his first cash in his first-ever WSOP event.
This was Paur’s third career WSOP final table and his first win. He also made a deep run in last year’s WSOP Main Event, taking 33rd place.
This $1,000 buy-in event drew 2,071 players and generated a $1,863,900 prize pool. The top 216 finishers earned at least a $1,901 payday. Plenty of notables finishd in the money, including Amanda Musumeci (182nd), Jeremy Ausmus (139th), Andy Bloch (101st), Men Nguyen (85th), Shannon Shorr (22nd), and Phil Ivey, whose first cash of the 2013 WSOP came up short of the final table in 14th place.
The final table featured one bracelet winner, Daniel Idema (7th), but also featured three Circuit players looking to match the success of Jonathan Taylor earlier this week. Kyle Cartwright (9th), Phillip Hui (6th), and DJ MacKinnon (5th) failed to capture the bracelet, but they did continue the strong showing for WSOP Circuit players.
Here are the final table results of the $1,000 No Limit Hold’em Event 18:
1st: Taylor Paur – $340,260
2nd: Roy Weiss – $211,794
3rd: Tai Nguyen – $147,220
4th: Alexander Barlow – $106,027
5th: DJ MacKinnon – $77,491
6th: Phillip Hui – $57,324
7th: Daniel Idema – $42,962
8th: Ryan Austin – $32,608
9th: Kyle Cartwright – $25,041
