Doyle Brunson Five Diamond World Poker Classic

Doyle Brunson Five Diamond World Poker Classic Final Table
Dec. 20th 2009

Not surprisingly one of the toughest tournament of the year turned out a final table laden with top pros.  While tournament namesake Doyle Brunson and his team of emerging online pros didn’t have a representative at the final table the cast of the final 6 was still filled with top notch players covering a wide array of styles and backgrounds.
The tournament ended up going to the young but seemingly much older than his years Danny Alaei.  Danny is in his mid-twenties but his demeanor and confidence give the feel of someone much older and more mature.  He has the feel of a battle hardened veteran at the tables even at a relatively young age.  Alaei was able to sang the $1.4 million top prize after he defeated the other veteran at the final table, Josh Arieh.

Arieh came into the final table as one of the short stacks but a single double up and some impressive play took him from the bottom of the pile to a dominating chip leader.  Arieh was all in for and well covered by Scotty Nguyen but the pocket sevens of Arieh held up against the AJ suited for Nguyen to give Josh a double up that started him on a run that left the other players stunned.  From as low as 1 million chips Arieh quickly and steadily built a stack of over 10 million and continued to chip up to over 13 million, which he took into heads up play against Alaei.

Danny started heads up play with around 7 million and Arieh had a coinflip for the title when the two were all in with Josh’s AK against the pocket queens of Alaei.  The pair held and after that the stacks were more balanced and Alaei was able to battle on to the victory, leaving Arieh in the runner up spot but with a still very hefty payout of over $950,000.

The young gun at the table was Faraz Jaka, known as “The-Toilet” online which came from his propensity to play any two suited cards when he first started playing, leading him to make his fair share of flushes.  Jaka came in as the chip leader and held steady through much of the final table play but was ultimately eliminated by Alaei in 3rd for $571,374.  Back in July Jaka had a runner up finish at the Bellagio Cup World Poker Tour main event for $775,000.

Shawn Buchanan (4th for $333,202), Scotty Nguyen (5th for $249,976) and Steve O’Dwyer(6th for $202,362) rounded out the final table finishes with Joe Cassidy coming up just short of making the TV table with a 7th place finish.

Brunson 10 member Amit “Amak316″ Makhija finished in the money with a 26th place finish for $28,569.

The tournament circuit comes to a halt around the holidays but kicks back off in early January.  Check back often to see what is going on in the live tournament world and to follow the progress of the Brunson 10.