There are some who say that poker is now a young man’s game. The generation of hotshot online poker pros tend to get stereotyped as single twenty-somethings who divide their time between grinding the tables and living the high life.
He may not be a twentysomething, but Cliff Josephy is most certainly a poker hotshot. The longtime poker pro has always been considered a legend of the online poker world, but today he reminded us that his live game isn’t too shabby either, as he claimed his second career gold bracelet at a table stacked with young poker pros.
Josephy prevailed over the tough final table in the $3,000 No Limit Hold’em Shootout to earn bracelet number two and almost $300,000. While the final table felt like smooth sailing for Josephy, it wasn’t the easiest path to victory in the early rounds, as the New Yorker had to rally from just 250 chips during the opening round of action. He came back from the brink of elimination though, advancing to Round Two. In the second Round, he bested another tough table, defeating Dan O’Brien for a seat in the final.
That final table featured some greats in the game, including two-time bracelet winners Ryan Hughes and David “Bakes” Baker, and bracelet winner Max Steinberg in addition to Josephy. Throw in accomplished poker pros Tim West and Chris Klodnicki and you have a final table with eight figures in combined earnings not to mention six gold bracelets.
Josephy’s previous bracelet win came in 2005 in a $1,500 Seven-Card Stud event. Unlike that victory, which came in a game Josephy learned how to play shortly before he signed up for the tournament, this time around the win came in a much more familiar format for the man better known by his old online poker moniker, JohnnyBax.
The victory also makes Josephy the first repeat bracelet winner of the 2013 series. Everyone else this summer has been a first-time bracelet winner.
The $3,000 Shootout event drew 477 players and generated a prize pool of $1,302,210. The first round played on a series of eight and nine-handed tables, with the winners of each table moving onto the second round and into the money. The second round saw 60 players take to ten six-handed tables with each winner advancing to the ten-handed final table.
The final table featured someone very familiar with this position, Alessandro Longobardi. The Italian took sixth place in this very event one year ago and managed to improve upon that finish by one notch this time around, taking fifth. Longobardi is the fourth player this summer to final table the same event wo years in a row, joining Ryan Olisar (No Limit Hold’em Re-Entry event), George Danzer ($2,500 Omaha 8/Stud 8), and Greg Mueller ($2,500 Eight-Game).
Other notables who advanced to the second round but failed to make the final table include Dan O’Brien (13th), Cherish Andrews (14th), Brandon Cantu (18th), film critic Richard Roeper (24th), Brock Parker (35th), Antonio Esfandiari (48th), and John Hennigan (59th).
This is the first of two Shootout events on the 2013 WSOP schedule. The second one is a $1,500 buy-in event set to run on Thursday, June 20th.
Here are the final table results from the $3,000 Shootout Event:
1st: Cliff Josephy – $299,486
2nd: Evan Silverstein – $185,487
3rd: Steve Silverman – $123,202
4th: Tim West – $91,428
5th: Alessandro Longobardi – $68,613
6th: David “Bakes” Baker – $51,997
7th: Max Steinberg – $39,756
8th: Chris Klodnicki – $30,641
9th: Ryan Hughes – $23,791
10th: Simeon Naydenov – $18,609
