Last night, Sam Razavi proved he was more than just a face by taking down his first event since arriving in Vegas last week: the $350 Megastack at Caesars Palace.
Despite the combined use of the words 'mega' and 'stack', Sam managed to get his 25,000 in on the very first hand of the night on a T-K-J flop. He did have the nuts though with A-Q; his opponent had J-T for bottom two and failed to improve.
From thereon in, Sam didn't look back and sailed his way, first, into the money, and then the final where he boasted the title of chip leader with a mere 1.3 million of the 5.2 million in play.
Sam didn't release his foot off the pedal; instead, he donned leather jacket and shades and terminated every single one of his final table opponents. Three-handed, he was seated before so many chips that his soon-to-be victims offered him first place so they could split second and third.
Sam therefore took away the first prize of $13,000 without having to jump his final two hurdles.
But wait! There was a limited edition Caesars Palace card protector up for grabs, and his opposition requested that play continued so they could vie for this illustrious prize - Sam eliminated them both in the same hand to pop a cherry on his already creamy cake.
"This series is horrendously good value," he revealed in the aftermath. "People were opening for 10x, calling off 150 big blinds with A-J, and so on. If you can ride the waves, Caesar will bear you fruits."
"Incidentally, I had a Chinese meal just before the tournament," he added, "and the fortune read: 'You will be coming into a fortune'. Ominous…"
Something tells me that quite a few people in Vegas stumble upon that message…
This isn't Sam's first encounter with Benjamin Franklin and friends; in fact, he possesses the honour of being the first Black Belt Poker player to cash at this year's World Series of Poker when he finished 150th of 1,604 in event #16's $1,500 Six-Max.
"I was obviously pleased to cash in the first event I played," he beamed. "I busted just before the end of the night to Matt Matros, who went on to win. I also busted IPT Campione to the eventual winner too, and on both occasions they were drawing virtually dead on the flop. I knew I was holding the winner's chips; just hoped I'd be the one with them at the end!"
For his second event, Sam tackled one of the affectionately referred to 'donkaments'. After some mistimed "hero calls" during the opening levels, he regrouped the troops and rebuilt his stack up before running A-5 into 3-3 on an A-5-3 flop. In the words of his fellow Black Belt: "Marvellous."
Sam's other tournament venture before chowing down on Caesar's selection of fruits was event #23's Six-Max. Faced with a tough starting table, Sam slipped to 6,000 (from a starting stack of 9,000), before opting to "resort to the same Internet hero style of play all the other antisocial players were playing" and doubling up with the mighty 8-4 of spades.
"I got moved to Jake Cody's table," he regaled, "and there was one guy who was getting ridiculously lucky. When I found A-A versus his A-K, of course, he hit two kings. Why wouldn't he? I don't mind losing, but this one was hard to swallow as it would have given me a 150-big blind stack with 330 left of the original 960. I would have been in with a great shot, but it wasn't meant to be."
Sam's schedule tends to be results-dependent, and a fruitless start in Vegas will undoubtedly lead to him hotfooting it to Mexico "for a break before the Main Event rather than pressing the issue if things aren't going to plan".
His recent success may have eliminated that option, meaning the lineup will likely be as such:
Event #31 - $1,500 No Limit Hold'em
Event #38 - $1,500 No Limit Hold'em
Event #41 - $3,000 No Limit Hold'em
Event #46 - $2,500 No Limit Hold'em
Event #50 - $5,000 No Limit Hold'em
Event #53 - $1,500 No Limit Hold'em
Event #56 - $1,500 No Limit Hold'em
Event #61 - $10,000 No Limit Hold'em Main Event
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