You gotta love how the Borgata keeps trotting out its Double Play tournament gimmick, which is basically just a fancy amped up re-buy. Hey if it works, stick with it.

And it also gives us a chance to find more double play pics. This one is of Jimmy Rollins.

The Borgata’s next double play will be Oct. 17-19 with a $250,000 guaranteed prize pool, DeepStack tourney.

The key part of the double play is that Day 1 is split over two days. Anyone busting out on Day 1A can re-buy on Day 1B. In this case, the buy-in is a high stakes $1,000 + $90. So that means some players will be putting $2,180 on the line.

Since it’s a deepstack, player’s will start with 30K in chips. Levels last 50 minutes and antes kick in at level five. You can also re-buy each day up to level four. Play begins each day at 11am. Go here for the blinds structure.

The Borgata has also introduced two promotions with guaranteed prize pools on Wednesdays and Fridays.

Wednesday, the casino has $30,000 in guarantees; actually two $15,000 guaranteed $100 + $20 No Limit tournaments at 11am and 7 pm respectively.

Friday, the guarantee is $40,000 through two $20,000 guaranteed, $170 + $30 No limit tournaments, one at noon and another at 6pm.

For a rundown on the tournament structures go here.

There were several big name at The World Series of Poker Europe, but in the end, a relative unknown, James Bord won the man event and about $1.3 million.

Bord

It should be noted that the main event, held at the Casino at The Empire in London, attracted only 346 entrants, so we’re not talking Vegas WSOP or even The Borgta’s recent WPT championship. Still, the event carried a £10,000 buy-in, which we think is a little more than 15K (again, currency conversions not our thing).

Bord, a 29-year-old poker player from Stanmore, United Kingdom, defeated Fabrizio Baldassari when a pair of pocket 10s held up on the final hand.

Here’s a rundown from ESPN:

Baldassari had control during most of the heads-up match, but made a slight mistake forcing the issue holding Q-8 when Bord held A-K. From that point on, Bord dominated the slightly tilted Baldassari until finally the two had all the chips in the center with Bord dominating Baldassari with 10-10 against 5-5. The 10-10 would hold and Bord was mobbed by his friends before finally shaking Baldassari’s hand and complimenting him on a match well played.

“I never thought I would win a bracelet,” Bord said. “Being so close, you just never know when it’s going to come again. And it’s even more special to win it in my hometown. It’s just something very special.”

Bord is the first British champion of the WSOPE and joins Annette Obrestad, John Juanda and Barry Shulman as WSOPE main event winners.

Btw, once again, we are way to cheap to buy an official WSOP picture. Bord’s playing somewhere else in this one.

The World Series of Poker Europe’s main event was in full steam over the weekend and only 22 players remained going into today’s action, including Phil Ivey. The American, however, went down in 19^th place winning £26,400 (that’s English pounds).

The main event winner gets £830,000, or roughly $1.3 million. Don’t hold us to that, however, because foreign currency conversion is a little out of our league.

Some big European names in the mix include Viktor Blom, Arnaud Mattern, Nicolas Levi and Thomas Bichon. Some Americans in the chip lead going into today included Ronald Lee, Dan Fleyshman and David Peters.

There should be a final table today.

Hansen

Meanwhile, Danish pro Gus Hansen picked up a WSOP bracelet by winning a £10.350 WSOPE High Roller Heads Up event. It breaks Hansen’s drought of WSOP bracelets.

“I’ve been playing in the WSOP since 1996 when my good friend, Huck Seed, won the Main Event. I’ve had a lot of attempts since then and come close a couple of times. I’m also surprised it came in a heads-up event,” he said.

Hansen won £288,409 to go with his first bracelet.

And even though this is the European version of the WSOP, Phil Helmuth still made one of his trademark entrances. He entered day one of the tournament surrounded by Lady Gaga impersonator’s with her song “Poker Face” played by a brass band. He also appears to have shown up on a double-decker bus.

“I was pumped to see such a huge crowd gathered at the Empire like never before when I arrived to take my seat at the WSOPE. Quite the arrival I’d say. The London double-decker, the brass band and 11 Lady Gagas all add up to the most unique media event in poker so far,” Hellmuth said in a press release. “My crazy themed grand entrances to the WSOP in Vegas are an institution, and now London’s WSOPE seems to have embraced a whole new tradition too.”

Bloody Yank.

Annie Duke will be at Harrah’s tomorrow (Sat. Sept. 25) to help promote the $200,000 Harrah’s Poker Open, which got underway Thursday. OK, it was a little overshadowed by the Borgata Open Championship, which went to Dwyte Pilgrim Thursday, but hey, it’s a competitive town.

Annie Duke

Duke will participate in a VIP poker tournament in Harrah’s poker room and is making kind of a late night of it.

First up is a Q&A session followed by a photo session at 9:45pm in the 3rd Floor Ballroom of Harrah’s. She will begin playing in the tournament with invited guests at 10pm.

Saturday is also the day of the biggest event at the Harrah’s open, a $100,000 guaranteed, $300 + $40 No Limit Deepstack event running Saturday and Sunday. It starts 11am Sat.

You can get the full schedule here.

It’s also possible that Pilgrim will be in the house this weekend. In interviews after his big win, he said he was going to play some tournaments at Harrah’s Friday.

This isn’t great news, really. He’s kind of hot.

As for the bad beats, Harrah’s combined bad beat (Showboat, Caesars, Harrah’s, Bally’s) is starting to get impressive at $284,132. Remember, anyone playing in a Harrah’s room when it hits gets a piece.

The Borgata’s high jackpot, quad 10s or better, is at about $175,000 and the low jackpot (quad deuces to nines) is at $43,521. The Trop’s bad beat was at about $125,000 (as of Wednesday) and The Taj was at $107,087.

This one seemed like destiny as Dwyte Pilgrim won the Borgata Poker Open Championship Thursday and instantly becomes a “name” pro in the poker World.

Pilgrim wins it

The headline at worldpokertour.com is “Dwyte Pilgrim Shocks the World,” but it started to look like Pilgrim, who has strong A.C. ties, was going to prevail as he went deeper into the five- day tournament.

Pilgrim has seen a lot of success on the World Series of Poker Circuit (something we noticed before), but a World Poker Tour win definitely elevates his status. And also his wallet as he wins $733,402.

Still, we’ll see how Pilgrim fares in the star game after this tournament airs on TV.

Pilgrim, who coined the phrase “We’re going to shock the world” after making the final six and the televised final table portion of the tournament, seems to have gotten mixed reactions to his chatter at the table, especially after he was left heads-up with Kia Mohajeri.

“Watching the WPT final table. The crowd is increasingly getting on Kia’s side as Dwight continues to be rude and insult him.” tweeted Lee Childs, who took 9^th in the tournament.

Well, whatever.

Here’s the final hand rundown from the WPT:

“Mohajeri raises to 1,200,000, and Pilgrim calls. The flop comes Kh, 10s, 9s, Pilgrim checks, Mohajeri bets 2,000,000, and Pilgrim calls. The turn card is the 7d, Pilgrim bets 2,000,000, Mohajeri moves all in, and Pilgrim instantly calls.

Mohajeri shows Ks, 9c for two pair, kings and nines. But Pilgrim shows Qh, Js for a king-high straight. Mohajeri needs to catch a full house in order to survive.

Pilgrim shouts, “Eight percent away from a title!” And then a few moments later, “Can I use my one time? Can I use my one time?”

The turn card is the 7d, and Pilgrim says, “I don’t care what happens. I showed these guys how to play from beginning to end.”

The river card is — the 5d!

Pilgrim runs off the stage, drops to his knees near Mike Sexton and Vince Van Patten, and then falls to the floor face down — we think he is crying with joy.

After about two minutes, Pilgrim slowly stands up and wipes tears from his eyes as the audience gives him a standing ovation. Kia Mohajeri is smiling and clapping near the final table as Pilgrim is speechless with tears of joy covering his face.”

We’re not sure why the turn was mentioned twice, but judging from the reaction, it’s not likely that the two players agreed on a split before the last hand.

The final six finished up :

1st:  Dwyte Pilgrim  -  $733,802
2nd:  Kia Mohajeri  -  $440,945
3rd:  Ofir  Mor  -  $266,835
4th:  Brandon Novena  -  $223,475
5th:  Daniel Makowsky  -  $183,449
6th:  Ben Klier  -  $148,427

And here’s Pilgrim on his win. Bravo.

By the way, we’re suddenly big fans of Kimberly Lansing.

Phish fans are expected to take over Atlantic City this Halloween as the group stages its annual Halloween concerts in the resort and The Tropicana’s poker room will hold some of the action.

The Trop’s poker room will be the site of the Phamily Poker Classic, a charity event to benefit The Mockingbird Foundation. The non-profit foundation was formed by Phish fans in 1996 to support music education for children. The foundation has raised more that $600,000 to date.

Here’s a breakdown of the tournament:

The Phamily Poker Classic is a No Limit Texas Hold-em event for the phans taking place October 30th with the final table taking place  October 31st. The Phamily Poker Classic is a completely non-profit event with a portion of the proceeds going to The Mockingbird Foundation and the rest to the prize pool along with other cool donated items.

Every player in The Phamily Poker Classic will have an opportunity to win the Tropicana’s Tournament Bad Beat Progressive Jackpot. The jackpot is at about $50,000 as of today (Sept. 23).

Each table will have a bounty player. This player is playing for the benefit of The Mockingbird Foundation and a special prize will be given to the player who knocks a bounty player out of the tournament.

Tournament tickets are $120 and are available for advanced purchase at Cardboard Spaceship. If there is a demand to expand the tournament; additional seats may be available. Do not count on purchasing tickets at the door as this event is likely to be sold out in advance at 100 players.

The tournament’s Website is here.

As we suspected, the final table of the Borgata Poker Open Championship got underway last night (Sept. 22) and there have already been a few eliminations ahead of today’s final table start at 4pm.

Only six players remain of the original 10 at the final table. Here’s the chip count, complete with a handy big blind count from worldpokertour,com.

The final six

Seat 1. Kia Mohajeri – 4,225,000 (21 big blinds)
Seat 2. Benjamin Klier – 6,125,000 (31 big blinds)
Seat 3. Ofir Mor – 7,300,000 (37 big blinds)
Seat 4. Brandon Novena – 5,125,000 (26 big blinds)
Seat 5. Dwyte Pilgrim – 4,800,000 (24 big blinds)
Seat 6. Daniel Makowsky – 3,300,000 (17 big blinds)

The name on that list gaining the most attention is Dwyte Pilgrim. Pilgrim is originally from Brooklyn, but has spent a lot of time in Atlantic City learning the game. He parlayed that into three wins on the World Series of Poker Circuit last year, gaining a sort of an unofficial WSOPC player of the year acknowledgment from the poker world.

Now he has a chance to make a big splash at a World Poker Tour Event, not to mention gain a nearly $734K cash.

He talks about his chances down below.

The Open has drawn several other big names and plenty of drama. Here are a few examples:

Lee Childs, who final tabled the WSOP Main Event in 2007, finished 9^th making $61,706.  Childs went all in on pocket nines, but faced pocket 10s from Klier. A 10 on the flop sent him to the rail.

Papola

Jeff Papola, who is in the running for player of the year, went out in 7^th place, ending last night’s play. He cashes for $118,408. Papola couldn’t improve ace, eight of spades against Ofir Mor’s pocket sevens.

John D’Agostino, of Egg Harbor Township who was among the chip leaders several times, went out in 14^th place. D’Agostino went all in for about $860,000 against Brandon Novena with jack, nine of diamonds, but missed the straight and flush and fell to a pair of aces. He gets $28,351.

Along with Pilgrim, you can see interviews with all of the final six players here, not to mention follow the action live. Look, we can only embed so much before we get tired.

They’re down to two tables and 14 remaining players at the Borgata Open Championship and it’s beginning to look like a final table will be seated tomorrow, on day five of the tournament.

Final two tables

Or late tonight, it’s kind of up to them.

Only 27 players started today’s action.

Still in the hunt is A.C.’s own Dwyte Pilgrim and E.H.T.’s John D’Agostino.

Some other big time big pros were also in the hunt. Ema Alabasi went out in 18^th place, adding $18,345 to his more than 800K in career winnings.

Lee Childs, with about a million in tournament winnings is still going.

Also playing is Daniel Makowsky (about $1.7 mill in earnings) and Jeffrey Papola ($1.4 mill).

There are a couple of amateurs in the mix, but largely, pros will dominate the final table.

Top prize, in case you forgot, is $733,802.

Merritt is bubble boy

Greg Merritt of Frenchtown NJ (somewhere in Hunterdon County) is the bubble boy for the Borgata Poker Open Championship Event.

Merritt got trapped by Giuseppe Pantaleo’s set of deuces after moving all in with pocket kings after the flop. No help came.

100 players get paid.

With the bubble burst, short stacks are moving in faster and the remaining players are shrinking. There’s still a good chance the final table will have cards in the air by tomorrow.

Here’s the payouts:

1st: $733,802
2nd: $440,945
3rd: $266,835
4th: $233,475
5th: $183,449
6th: $148,427
7th: $118,408
8th: $90,057
9th: $61,706
10th-12th: $40,025
13th-15th: $28,351
16th-18th: $18,345
19th-27th: $15,009
28th-36th: $13,008
37th-45th: $11,674
46th-54th: $10,340
55th-63rd: $9,339
64th-72nd: $8,339
73rd-81st: $7,672
82nd-90th: $7,004
91st-100th: $6,671

The Borgata Open’s championship event went into today with 165 players remaining out of 1,042. With the field shrinking so fast, you have to wonder if the tournament will need to run until a scheduled fifth day.

The chip leader at the start of the day was local pro John D’Agostino of  Egg Harbor Twp. D’Agostini is closing in on $1.7 million in tournament earnings. He started the day with 681K in chips.

Another local player, Dwyte Pilgrim (though he lists Brooklyn as home) was at 16 with 400K in chips.

As of about 2 pm., however, Giuseppe Pantelo, of apparently just Italy, had the chip lead with about 900K. Last year’s champ, Olivier Busquet was in 5^th with 645K.

There are a few other notables left, but Gavin “Birdguts” Smith isn’t one. Smith actually busted out on the last hand of the night Monday when he couldn’t improve ace, king against pocket sixes.