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Welcome back to the finals of the NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship. Erik Seidel won the first match of this best-of-three series. The pressure is now on Chris Moneymaker to knot the score and send the finals to the rubber match.
Cards are in the air for Match 2.
Erik Seidel had Chris Moneymaker at a 2-1 disadvantage as they saw a 
flop. Moneymaker risked the rest of his chips holding 
for an open-ended straight draw. Seidel's 
gave him top pair and the lead in the hand. The 
was no help for Moneymaker, and the 
river improved Seidel to trip jacks.
With that, Seidel won the first match to take a 1-0 lead against Moneymaker. They'll be back in 15 minutes for match #2.
Hold on, poker fans. Don't book Match 1 as a win for Erik Seidel just yet. With blinds up to 10,000 and 20,000, he opened his button to 40,000. Chris Moneymaker three-bet all in for about 250,000. Seidel took his time before calling with 
. He was ahead of Moneymaker's two live cards, 
.
The crowd tittered as a flop of 
gave Moneymaker an open-ended straight draw. He binked that draw on the turn with the 
to double up to 500,000. If he doubles again we'll be back to Square One.
We could forgive Chris Moneymaker if he feels frustrated right now. Every move he makes is countered by Erik Seidel. On a flop of 
, Moneymaker checked his first action to Seidel, who made a standard continuation-bet. Moneymaker then tried a check-raise to 80,000. Seidel pondered for about twenty seconds before three-betting to 350,000, enough to set Moneymaker all in. Moneymaker flicked his cards into the muck.
Our guesstimate has Moneymaker down to about 250,000 in chips, with the remaining 1.35 million in front of Seidel.
So far the first match of this best-of-three finals has been all Seidel. Seidel had the button for the most recent hand that he and Chris Moneymaker played. Seidel raised and Moneymaker called from the big blind. Both players checked a flop of 
. When the turn came 
Moneymaker check-called a bet from Seidel. Moneymaker also checked the 
river. Seidel fired another 125,000 into the pot.
Moneymaker furrowed his brow at the large bet. He said a few words to himself, shook his head, then cut 125,000 off his stack and called. Seidel showed down a face card and a 
for trip sevens, earning himself another pot.
Moneymaker is down to about 400,000 in chips now, while Seidel is up to 1.2 million.
It's time to bump the blinds up to 8,000/16,000 for the third level of the first match between Erik Seidel and Chris Moneymaker.
Seidel - 1,000,000
Moneymaker - 600,000
Erik Seidel is used to looking down on everyone else. He's known as a humble, likable guy, but standing a foot taller than most of his opponents, he just can't help it. Now Seidel can look down from one more lofty perch: the top spot of the Hendon Mob's all-time money list. Seidel made a charge to the top in 2011, cashing for an astonishing $3.59 million in the first two months of the year. That gave him a gross (and sick) day rate of $60,000 in January and February and propelled him to second on the money list.
This morning the top of this list looked like this:
1st: Daniel Negreanu - $14,116,192
2nd: Erik Seidel - $13,947,297
3rd: Phil Ivey - $13,859,944
By advancing to the finals here, Seidel has guaranteed himself $300,000 and given himself a shot at $750,000.
At the conclusion of two or three simple heads-up matches, the all-time money list will look like this instead:
1st: Erik Seidel - $14,247,297 or $14,697,297
2nd: Daniel Negreanu - $14,116,192
3rd: Phil Ivey - $13,859,944
The rankings are a tad arbitrary with the figures close enough to be impacted by missed cashes or unreported chops over the past 20+ years and debates aplenty over whether invitational events and extremely high buy-in tournaments with tiny fields should be counted. Either way, Seidel's score today adds one more line to the Poker Hall of Famer's stunning resume and gives Negreanu added incentive to get back to the grind.
For the finals each player started with 800,000 in chips: one stack of yellow chips (25,000 each, 500,000 total); two stacks of pink chips (5,000 each, 200,000 total); and five stacks of orange chips (1,000 each, 100,000 total). After one level of play it appears that Chris Moneymaker is down to 680,000. Correspondingly Erik Seidel is up to 920,000.
Cards are in the air for the first match in this best-of-three series.
The 2-out-of-3 finals are scheduled to start at 5:30pm. The crew is currently preparing the set.
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