If break down the earnings of Richard Lyndaker and Joe Commisso during Event #46, and figure out an hourly rate, they are both still doing pretty well: not quite what Bill Gates makes per hour, but still more than most world leaders.
Lyndaker and Commisso started the day as the top two players in terms of the chip count. Lyndaker acted as a hammer during this event, taking out three of the four players that had to be moved out of the way so that he and Commisso could dance uninterrupted. Three eliminations happened in the first hour and a half of play: two of these were by Richard Lyndaker's hand. His first victim was Davidi Kitai, whose pocket tens ran into Lyndaker's pocket Kings. The flop produced A-3-A while the turn and river added a 2 and a final Ace. Both players had a full house, but with Kitai all-in, everyone knows Kings beat tens. He was gone in 6th place.
Tom Lutz got into a pre-flop betting war with Richard Lyndaker, and he had two very good reasons to be confident: Lutz was holding a pair of Aces. Tom went all-in after a 9-Q-8 flop, thinking he had an unbeatable pair. He was right of course, no pair could beat him. Three of a kind is a different story. That is exactly what happened when Richard flipped his cards over to show pocket 9s. The turn and river were a harmless 2 and 4, and Lutz was done for the day. His run finished in 5th place.
The next hand was nearly a mirror image of the one that took Lutz out: only the names and card values were different. Edward Ochana and Sam Trickett were both all-in after the flop. Trickett was counting on his pocket Kings to carry him through, but a flop of 10-8-6 had given Ochana a healthy three-of-a-kind. The next two cards were useless and the evil 666 stood alone as the master of the hand. Sam Trickett was punted in 4th place.
Ochana's euphoria was short lived as he soon ran afoul of Richard Lyndaker. During this confrontation, both players held their fire until after the turn, calling and checking. With the board showing 2-3-8-9, Lyndaker check-raised, and Ochana called. When the river gave the board a 10, Richard moved all-in and Ochana called. Ochana was betting more on the fact that Lyndaker was bluffing when he pushed all his chips to the center of the table than on the cards in his hand. In the end all Edward Ochana could muster was a pair of 10s. Richard Lyndaker had rivered a straight. Edward was knocked out in 3rd place.
Richard Lyndaker may have delivered the killing blow to a lot of players at the final table, but most of them were crippled and limping due to big losses to Joe Commisso. Despite the fact that he didn't personally end someone's day, Joe walked into heads-up play with a 2 to 1 chip lead.
Despite this, it took him six hours of grueling play to crowbar Lyndaker from the tournament.
Over next several hours Richard Lyndaker had harassed Commisso, rallied several times, and survived a total of nine all-in bets. He had even briefly taken the chip lead for a while. Commisso was unshakeable though, and nothing blunted him, or lessened his resolve. He simply patiently waited for his opponent to make a mistake, or for the luck to run out.
It turns out the 10th all-in was one too many. Joe had just taken the chip lead back when he ran a boat through Richard's pair of Kings. A couple of hands later, Lyndaker went for his 10th all-in. Apparently he had not realized that he had used up all of his lives, because all his chips were pushed to the center of the table before the flop while he was only holding an unsuited 9-7. Commisso called with his unsuited A-Q.
The flop delivered a Q-4-10. At this point it was all over except for the celebration. The turn was another 10, and the river gave Lyndaker a lowly pair of 7s. Joe Commisso had just won a marathon heads-up encounter along with the Event #46 championship bracelet. Congratulations!
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