Phil Hellmuth showed up two hours late.
Phil Hellmuth left his table eight hours early.
After an unbelievable World Series of Poker, Hellmuth's stint in the main event came to a halting end after his hands just ran into bigger hands time and time again.
"It all happened in five hands," Hellmuth said. "I had two jacks on the fourth hand. He had two queens. I had two kings on the fifth hand, he had two aces."
Sometimes even the greatest players can't even survive the minefield that is Day 1, but for Hellmuth, he's still happy with his WSOP performance.
"I'm still on cloud nine," Hellmuth said Sunday, "I'm still feeling good after that tenth bracelet. I'm probably playing my best Texas hold 'em in my life and there are six more bracelet events."
Hellmuth then put up six fingers and repeated "Six, six, six."
Even though they are smaller buy-in events, Hellmuth is still looking forward to the opportunity of winning a record-setting 11th bracelet.
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Big names dropped on Day 1B and lots of members of the media learned some new ones. Hossein Tagh Avi is the newest chip leader after the first two Day 1s with $229,125 in chips. I seriously would like to ask him just how he accumulated that much. The chip leader from Day 1A, Francis Cipriano, has only $123,200!
Other notables who survived their first day include Phil Ivey, John Juanda, Allen Cunningham, David Williams, David Chiu, 21-year-old phenom Jeff Madsen, Billy Gazes, Mike Caro and Chris Ferguson.
Some players who didn't make it through: Hellmuth, Doyle Brunson (who was honored with a cake and standing ovation for a celebration of the 30th anniversary of his first main event win), Howard Lederer, Gavin Smith, Patrik Antonius, Shannon Elizabeth, Joe Sebok, and Paul Darden.
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Quote of the day:
"I just caught about five coolers. Hand after hand." -- Phil Hellmuth after being busted out.
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Small blinds: As mentioned earlier, Doyle Brunson received a cake and a standing ovation when he walked into the Amazon Room prior to the start of Day 1B for the 30th anniversary of his first WSOP main event win. Jeffrey Pollack, the WSOP Commissioner who presented the cake, should've brought enough to share with the 2,100-plus players who participated, and he could save the leftovers (if any) for next year when Doyle celebrates his 30th anniversary of his second WSOP main event win..… Joe Sebok was dressed in a bear costume with a diaper due to his loss in a bet with Gavin Smith. The bet was based on money won at the WSOP and the loser of the bet had to dress up in superhero costumes for three of the days, and for the day that the loser was playing, the winner got to choose the costume for the loser. … Johnny Chan is launching his own online poker site, chanpoker.net. How many times will people type in the chat, "I'm sorry John, I don't remember."…The winner will take home $11.7 million. Who'll be the next Moneymaker? Only 12 more days until we find out.
Steve Rosenbloom contributed to this report.
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