Field Down to 147 on the Main Event Dinner Break

We are at the dinner break of the official Day 5 of the WSOP 2014 Main Event. What started as the biggest Main Event in the past four years has come down to just 147 players. Speaking in percentages, approximately 98% of players who paid up their buyins have now been eliminated.

The top 2% keeps on fighting. When they started today, the number was nearly double, as 291 players were still keeping their dream alive but many of them were once again reminded of the cruel reality of the tournament poker – you are almost always one bad hand away from the rail.

This is something not even the best in the game are immune to, as Phil Ivey was reminded just last night when players were back from the dinner. Ivey had a good showing this year, but couldn’t fade all the traps that the field of this size is just full of.

Quite a few more players shared in on that same fate tonight, as Rep Porter was sent to the rail, Jeff Madsen, who kept sending “slowroll tweets” about being at risk and then doubling up was felted for real and the same happened to Kory Kilpatrick and Kevin MacPhee.

The run ended for David Einhorn as well. Einhorn is no stranger to deep runs in the Main Event, as he finished in 18th in 2006, but the billionaire will not be breaking his record on this occasion. He still cashed for nearly $45,000 and all of that money will be going towards Robin Hood NYC, a non-profit organization fighting poverty in New York City.

There is still no shortage of big names in the Main Event. One that sticks out in the crowd is certainly Griffin Benger, who sits second in chips with close to 4 million, only behind Brazilian Bruno Politano who has nearly 5.3 million. Dan Smith, who had a great run yesterday, is still in the top ten chip counts with 2.8 million while Brain Hastings has nearly 2.6.

There are still four ladies standing as well. Mikiyo Aoki is doing the best of the four, with about 2.5 million while Maria Ho is still in a very decent shape with a stack just under a million. Mark Newhouse who made the November Nine last year is also still in the contention and is actually in the top nine counts, with the stack of just over 3 million.

It was predicted earlier by WSOP staff that we would see the tournament field going under 200 players, but will it dip into the two digits category? It is certainly not impossible, as there is quite a chunk of play left after the dinner break. At this point, it feels almost surreal that so few are left of so many invading Rio tables just days ago. From almost seven thousand to couple dozen in a few days – the tournament poker at its best.

Some of those with the big stacks can probably taste that $10 million first prize, but there is still a lot of play left and there will be a lot more pain and disappointment before those final nine surviving on Monday can finally start brushing up their game for November.