JC Tran has been a poker legend since the earliest days of the World Poker Tour. The two-time champ is seeking his third title. The new season of the WPT kicked off at the Bicycle Casino on the outskirts of Los Angeles. JC Tran is the leader with 24 remaining out of 763 runners in the Legends of Poker Main Event. OD Baker, Tuan Le, Phil Hellmuth, Marvin Rettenmaier, David Sands, Garrett Greer, and Allan Le are all still alive. First place pays out $668,692.
And then there were 24! Season 16 (or XVI for all of you roman numeral nits) kicked off with the WPT Legends of Poker at the Bicycle Casino outside of Los Angeles. The $4,000 buy-in Main Event attracted 763 runners this year. The total prize pool topped $2.7M. The top 81 places paid out and only 24 players are left in the hunt.
JC Tran is the big stack with over 3M. Several other players are still alive such as Tuan Le, Allan Le, ODB Baker, David Sands, Marvin Rettenmaier, and the one and only Phil Hellmuth. The Poker Brat bagged up almost 800K. He had never won a WPT title, despite winning 14 WSOP bracelets. He previously advanced to four final tables in WPT events, but came up all donuts. Can he work some of his Hellmuthian magic and make a fifth final table?
T.J. Shepherd made history when he busted out in 47th place. Going into the Legends of Poker, the WPT was closing in on $1 billion worth of prize money awarded to its participants. Well, T.J. Shepherd only won a little over $10K for 47th place, but he got a piece of that $1 billion milestone. WPT gave him a special bonus prize: a free seat into the 2018 Legends of Poker.
JC Tran won two WPT events along with Marvin Rettenmaier and Tuan Le. Will one of them ship a third this week? If one of them picks up a third, they'll join an elite group of players with a trio of WPT wins. The 3-timers club included Gus Hansen, Carlos Mortensen, Chino Rheem, Anthony Zinno, and Darren Elias.
Notables who cashed in this event included... Pat Lyons, Curt Kohlberg, Sam Panzica, Cody Slaubaugh, Adam Geyer, Will Kassouf, and Scotty Nguyen. The man, the myth, the legend himself Scotty Nguyen was the first player in the money. He min-cashed for $7,135.
Day 4 begins at noon local time. You can follow the action for Day 4 over at WPT's website. The final table will be streamed on PokerGO starting at 4:30PM on August 31.
WPT Legends of Poker
Buy-in: $4,000
Entrants: 763
Prize Pool: $2,738,407
Payouts: 81
Final Table Payouts:
1. $668,692
2. $364,370
3. $217,040
4. $161,490
5. $120,775
6. $91,825
Top 10 Chip Counts:
J.C. Tran 3,061,000
Steven Tabb 2,128,000
David "ODB" Baker 1,675,000
Adam Swan 1,636,000
Alex Greenblatt 1,310,000
Benjamin Nguyen 1,273,000
D.J. Alexander 1,258,000
Tuan Le 1,200,000
Oddie Dardon 1,116,000
Mike Heshmati 965,000
