Just a couple of months ago, the World Poker Tour ended its longest season ever, the one that spanned the length of a pandemic and beyond. And when it was all done and in the books, Brian Altman had taken the Season XVIII Player of the Year title. He did it by winning the Lucky Hearts Poker Open – the same one he won during the previous season – and making two other final tables and adding a 10th place finish at another event. He not only won the POY title but a WPT $15K passport, Hublot trophy, and Hublot $20K watch.
In what seems to be his quest to be the WPT GOAT, Altman just kicked off the World Poker Tour’s Season XIX with a win. It was his third to date, putting him in an elite club of WPT winners.
The only players to have won three WPT titles in the 19 seasons of tournaments were:
The first three listed play very rarely anymore, especially on the American tournament circuit. Afriat and Zinno do compete, though, and could try to join an even more elite club. It is the one for which Altman is aiming, a club that has only one member: Darren Elias.
“To earn my fourth title and chase Darren down would be pretty awesome,” Altman told the WPT. “He’s a buddy of mine, and I appreciate him taking this one off and giving me a better shot to win, so kudos.”
Jokes aside, Altman is on a mission, one that hit its latest target at WPT Tampa.
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New Stop, Big Field
The World Poker Tour and Seminole-run casinos in Florida have been partners for live tournament action for years. The WPT had hosted a WPTDeepStacks event at the Seminole Hard Rock Tampa in the past, but this was the first time it hosted a WPT main tour event. Not only that, this recent WPT Tampa event just kicked off Season XIX.
The full festival started on June 9, but the WPT Main Event didn’t start until June 18. By that time, players were in the groove and ready for the $3,500 buy-in Main, also known as the Tampa Championship. It offered two starting days and a $2M prize pool guarantee.
The first of those two starting days brought in 548 entries, though only 124 of them made it to the end of the night with chips. Another 617 entries piled on the following day, with 146 of them surviving. The final numbers for the tournament were:
Day 2 brought 284 players back into the mix, with Clayton Jiang from Day 1A as the overall chip leader with 542K chips and Peter Vitantonio from Day 2 close behind with 513K.
https://twitter.com/WPT/status/1406687602435055619?s=20
To Six Players Standing
Day 2 started with 284 players, but shorter stacks fell away rather quickly. Still, it took a few levels to get to the money bubble, at which point Naing Thu busted on said bubble. Among the first players to cash were Allen Kessler, Harrison Gimbel, and Craig Varnell. As the evening wore on, Jerry Wong busted in 79th place, Justin Zaki in 77th, Marie Harrell in 73rd, Frank Stepuchin in 69th, James Calderaro in 56th, Marsha Wolak in 54th, and former chip leader Clayton Jiang in 50th place.
That night ended with 40 players in contention for the title and Jonathan Jaffe as the chip leader.
The first payout level for Day 3 was $15,690. Those escalating payouts found Mike Sowers taking $18,420 for 30th place, Sam Panzica winning $26,290 for 20th place, and Peter Vitantonio taking $48,805 for 11th place.
After Yuri Martins busted in 10th place for $61,325, play stopped soon after without reaching the final table of six. Brian Altman was the far-and-away chip leader with 10.8M of the chips, with Steven Queen in the distance holding 6,875,000 and Jonathan Jaffe in third with 5,875,000.
When the last day’s play got underway, T.K. Miles exited first, followed by Queen. Altman eliminated both of them and then Dave Berman in seventh place for $100,030.
Obviously, Altman had a chip lead going into official final table play. His 23.95M chip stack was far ahead of everyone else. Jaffe had 8,175,000, followed by Gabriel Abusada with 6.3M. Zachary Smiley, Will Berry, and John Haas rounded out the short stacks.
To the Last Player Standing
Haas took his shot early and doubled through Altman to stay in the game, and Smiley did the same. Berry then doubled through Jaffe but took another shot a few rounds later. That time, Jaffe’s A-J outdid the A-10 of Berry and busted the latter in sixth place.
Abusada had been chipping up and took more chips when he busted Haas. Abusada’s K-T didn’t look good against the A-J of Haas on the Q-J-3 flop, but the turn and river brought diamonds to produce a flush. Haas departed in fifth place.
Jaffe moved all-in with pocket sixes, but Altman called with eights, which held up to send Jaffe home in fourth place. And when Smiley pushed his short stack with Q-3, Altman called with A-Q to send Smiley out in third.
Altman took a commanding lead into heads-up play with 35.85M chips, and it was only 53 hands into the day. Abusada chipped up, slowly at first but rose to 18,525,000 chips after about 35 hands. Altman still led with 27.95M, though. And suddenly, Abusada pushed all-in with pocket sixes. The board didn’t produce anything of substance, and Altman took his familiar place in the winner’s circle.
Altman told the WPT, “My recent success in the past two years is probably due to just decades plus of work and trying to improve my game-playing, and the compounding effects of playing a lot of poker and gaining more experience, and putting more time in to improve my game.”
It worked.
1st place: Brian Altman ($613,225)2nd place: Gabriel Abusada ($408,825)3rd place: Zachary Smiley ($302,200)4th place: Jonathan Jaffe ($225,675)5th place: John Haas ($170,275)6th place: Will Berry ($129,825)
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