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  It takes a special type of person to pay a $50,000 buy in in order to test their poker skills in one of the toughest tournament formats in existence. The word most folks would be looking for when describing this type of "special" person, is crazy. Some people could try to make that word stick when describing Scotty Nguyen, but he has five World Series of Poker bracelets draped around his wrists that testify to the fact that this guy knows exactly what he is doing.



  Scotty spent the last five days playing his heart out in an effort to win what is arguably the toughest of all the WSOP events. After five days he found himself sharing a final table with other bracelet winners, some cash game specialists, and a few legitimate Player of the Year candidates. Fortunately, he was looking down at most of them from his massive stack of chips. He was ahead of just about everyone by almost 2 million little ceramic disks. Only Erick Lindgren had a marginally larger pile of chips than Scotty. It was almost a given these two would be there at the end of the tournament.



  Erick started the table fast by knocking out the smallest stack. Patrick Bueno was a chip charity case by the time he found himself against Lindgren in a Razz contest. It was a short, brutal struggle that sent Patrick home in 8th place.



  The next smallest stack at the table was Michael DeMichele who had survived for quite some time after the Bueno was knocked out. His survival is thanks to not only his own skill, but the fact that the rest of the players were feeling out the competition and playing in a rather conservative manner. This allowed Michael to start adding to his stack.



  By the time DeMichele found himself against Huck Seed, his chips outnumbered those of Mr. Seed. In a hand of Stud hi/lo Michael proved to be the bigger stud, completing a flush and also getting the low, punting Huck from the competition in 7th place.



  Scotty Nguyen got into the action by bankrupting Barry Greenstein, and sending him packing in 6th place. Greenstein was another Stud hi/lo victim. Barry had Aces and Fours and no low, this left him open to Scotty's triad of sevens.



  There were a few hours before the next shoe dropped. When it did, it was Lyle Berman's, who has struck WSOP gold in the past and has a "Big Game" victory on his resume. Of course resumes don't win championships, and he was both helpless and hapless when he got in the middle of a broadside barrage between Scotty Nguyen and Michael DeMichele. During a hand of Razz, these two were throwing bombs at each other and wound up taking out Berman. He went all in when DeMichele tabled an 8-7-5-4-3. That was the end of Lyle's tournament. He was gone in 5th place. Scotty took a hit as well, but he would live to tangle with Michael again.



  Nguyen took out his frustration on Matt Glantz, who went all in on the flop. Scotty was not intimidated, and in the end Matt couldn't compete with Nguyen's pair of Aces and a flush draw. The river completed Scotty's flush. He scooped the pot and eliminated Glantz in 4th place.



  With three players left, and almost 2 million dollars on the line, nobody was anxious to leave. It took almost six hours for the next person to fall. When the 3rd place elimination did eventually happen, it was Erick Lindgren walking to the rail. Though his pair of 8s couldn't stand up to Scotty Nguyen's 9s, his third place finish did put him ahead of Barry Greenstein in the Player of the Year race. At least that is something.



  Heads up play pitted Scotty Nguyen against Michael DeMichele. Scotty has several bracelets and a history in the game as long as Shaquille O'Neal's arm. Michael has only been to one other WSOP final table and according to reliable sources, just started shaving last week and recently gave up his security blanket. The 22 year old was facing a 4 to 1 chip deficit, and pitting his stack of 2,660,000 against Nguyen's mountain of 12,140,000 looked like a suicide mission. Looks can often be deceiving, but not in this case, it took 10 hands before the words "It's gonna be all over, baby" fell from Scotty's mouth as he raised the kid's preflop raise. To his credit, Michael resisted the temptation to punch his elder in the mouth, and politely called all in. Both players were holding Aces with Scotty having the better kicker: a 10. DeMichele had a 3 paired up with his Ace for an uneven combination of power. This was all over after the flop when an Ace hit the board. No other card that was dealt helped either player, and Scotty won the kicker war. For his efforts he was presented with his 5th bracelet, almost 2 million dollars, and the Chip Reese Memorial Trophy. Michael has nothing to be upset about. He had the second shortest stack going into the final table and finished just short of the most difficult bracelet to attain. He also won $1,243,200 for his second place finish. Congratulations to both of these men.