Tournament Details

It’s so sweet when something that’s been built up actually exceeds your expectations. Such was the case with the WPT Battle of Champions. Here’s the hype: Six savvy poker pros - all of them tournament winners culled from the WPT’s inaugural season of thirteen high-stakes, fast-action tournaments - meet on the green felt at the beautiful Bellagio Las Vegas to battle over a prize pool of $250,000, and the right to be called the WPT Champion of Champions.

The eleven winners from 2003 - Gus Hansen and Howard Lederer both won twice - were whittled down to six, leaving these quality players on the rail: Alan Goehring, David “Devilfish" Ulliott, Hip-Hop promoter Paul Darden, poker bad boy Layne Flack, and top international player Christer Johansson. The final six: the Legends of Poker winner, and short stack at the table, Chris Karagulleyan; the great Dane, and the WPT’s all-time money leader, Gus Hansen; the Costa Rica Classic champion, international player Jose Rosenkrantz; the man many consider the best poker player in the world today, Howard “the Professor" Lederer; the sole amateur and Cinderella story, free-roll winner of the Aruba Poker Classic, Finnish card dealer Juha Helppi; and retired businessman and World Poker Challenge champ, Ron Rose.

Right out of the gate, the action was explosive and unpredictable. The WPT’s all-time money leader, Gus Hansen, took a Kh-Qh all-in against the inscrutable, sunglassed Juha Helppi, holding Ad-9d. When Juha called and flipped over his hand, Hansen seemed stunned. When the flop came all black and A-Q-2, Hansen’s chances also darkened. The turn and river came 8, 2, and just like that, the first player to earn over a million dollars on the WPT was gone, with a token $10,000 for his troubles.

Next, Chris Karagulleyan put in a raise with J-T off suit, but was re-raised by Jose Rosenkrantz and his Ad-Jd. All that pre-flop heat scared off Howard Lederer with wired 8’s, and Ron Rose with A-Q. When the flop came Qc-7s-4c, the chip-starved Karagulleyan, needing two running cards to make his straight or flush, but also having most of his checks in the pot, went all-in. The turn came Ks, keeping one dream alive, but a 5 on the river snuffed that out, sending Chris home, $15,000 richer. Three hands played, two players gone.

If you like steely-eyed, stone-faced, pot-stealing thieves re-raising with rags, or guys with the nuts check-raising on the turn, you’ll like how things went after this. Perhaps thanks to the effect of watching two great players get knocked out on successive show-downs, we didn’t see another one for seven hands. By that time, Howard Lederer had taken the chip lead with over 2,000,000, based on masterful poker, raising and re-raising aggressively to take control of the table with marginal hands. Juha Helppi consolidated his chip position in 2nd with alternating good reads, knowing just when to raise with nothing, and when to make a quality lay-down.

The next critical hand came with antes at 5,000, and blinds at 15,000-30,000. After Ron Rose took wired 7's and icily raised facing a flop of 3 overcards, he skimmed a couple hundred thousand off the chip leader when Howard folded, and set up a doozy. With Ac-Kc, Howard bet 90,000 and Ron called with A-J off suit. Jose, stack dwindling, needed to make something happen, and chose this as the time to do it. He came all-in with pocket 8's. After Ron mucked his hand, Howard called, and with 1.7 million in the pot, flopped top pair, then picked up top two pair with an Ace at the turn. Jose had exactly two outs. With his good friend and Costa Rican comrade Humberto Brenes yelling “Ocho! Ocho!" from the gallery, the river card came - you bet, an 8! Howard actually jumped out of his seat, hand on his heart in disbelieving shock, as Jose became the new chip leader.

Next, it was Juha Helppi’s turn for a scorching bad beat, this one with even more dire consequences. Going all-in with T-9 and top pair on a flop of Th-8s-7h, he found himself head’s up against Ron Rose, and his Kh-8h flush draw. 4d helped neither at the turn, and with 2.2 million hanging in the balance, the river came 4h, making Ron's flush and sending the shell-shocked Finnish National Paintball Champion to the rail with a 4th place finish worth $20,000.

Three-handed, and facing Ron holding over half the chips at the table, Howard picked the wrong time to try to steal a pot, going all-in with a 6-3! Jose swallowed hard and called with pocket 7’s, and when the board went K-5-2-6-A, the Professor’s class was dismissed, and he went to recess $30,000 heavier, but very disappointed. “I was hoping he wouldn’t call me" he shrugged with his customary good grace, “I had a six high."

So it was now down to the Captain vs. the Costa Rican. After some aggressive betting with marginal hands drew Jose to just about even, he got stung on successive show-downs, Ron making a flush draw, and then a straight draw. Now with a commanding 2:1 chip lead, and antes up to 10,000 with blinds at 40,000-80,000, Jose tried to earn back some chips with K-Q off suit. After a J-T-7 flop gave him the open-ended straight draw, Jose bet strong with 200,000. Ron, however, had drawn top and bottom pair with J-7, and he raised it another 200,000. Jose took a flyer on his draw, and pushed all-in. The river came Q, giving Jose 16 outs, but his luck ran out when a 4 floated up on the river. Jose was through, with 2nd place money of $50,000, and Ron Rose - retired U.S. Air Force Captain, retired businessman, mathematician, and Life Master in bridge - had added $125,000 to the bank account and another title to his impressive list: WPT Champion of Champions.