Faraz Jaka Adds WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk Title to Season VIII WPT Player of the Year Honors

By Tim Duckworth

The inaugural WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk $1,500 Main Event has come to a conclusion with Faraz Jaka (pictured) topping the 251-entrant field to win his first WPTDeepStacks title and the $77,290 first-place prize that includes entry into the season-ending WPTDeepStacks Championship.

Jaka was the most accomplished poker player to take a seat in this WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk field as he has amassed nearly $6.3 million in lifetime tournament earnings. The highlight of Jaka’s career was winning the Season VIII WPT Player of the Year award, and with his win today, he is the first player to win both WPT Player of the Year honors, and a WPTDeepStacks title. Although Jaka has amassed a successful poker career to date, his last major win came back in November, 2014, and when asked about how he feels after breaking his drought, he said, “Feels great. I actually didn’t play too much the last two years and I just got back on tour this year. So it’s kind of a nice refresher to get back in there and get a little win. I’m going to be playing much higher stakes the next few months. So it’s nice to get back in the groove of things.”

WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk Final Table Results
1st: Faraz Jaka – $77,290*
2nd: Ryan Remington – $54,305
3rd: Aaron Frei – $34,475
4th: Zackery Whitney – $20,970
5th: Krzysztof Stybaniewicz – $16,195
6th: William Mietz – $13,420
7th: Jeremy Wood – $11,265
8th: Yang Ruan – $9,420
9th: Evan Shaughnessy – $7,730
* First-prize amount includes the winner’s $3,000 buy-in into the season-ending WPTDeepStacks Championship.

Across three starting flights, a total of 251-entrants took a seat in the inaugural WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk $1,500 Main Event, and when those flights were complete, just 47 players survived into Day 2. Action was fast on the penultimate day of play as the bubble was burst early before the likes Austin Peck (32nd), Kyle Kitagawa (28th), Angel Vu (24th), Mike Itoafa (21st), Tyler Patterson (20th), Ben Keeline (15th), and Wendy Freedman (13th) all fell short of reaching the final table. With the final ten players re-drawing to one table, it would be WPTDeepStacks San Diego Champion Maxwell Young eliminated in tenth place to leave nine players at the WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk final table.

When play resumed on Monday, a three-way all in would open the action, and as a result William Mietz found a triple-up while Evan Shaughnessy would be eliminated in ninth-place. Just a few hands later, another three-way all in would occur with the short-stacked Yang Ruan falling in eighth-place as Krzysztof Stybaniewicz secured the near-triple.

The following orbit, Jeremy Wood would battle with Ryan Remington in a blind-on-blind and battle, and when he shoved fourth-pair on the river, Remington made the call with two-pair to eliminate Wood in seventh-place. Faraz Jaka began to make his run up the leaderboard and snatched the chip lead before he eliminated William Mietz in sixth-place when his two-pair were superior to Mietz’s two-pair.

As Jaka held nearly half the chips in play, two quick eliminations would occur as Stybaniewicz was eliminated in fifth-place by Remington before he then eliminated Zackery Whitney in fourth-place. When overnight chip leader Aaron Frei was eliminated in third-place courtesy of a blind-on-blind cooler against Jaka when he ran his ace-ten into Jaka’s ace-queen, seven of the players would be eliminated in just over 60 minutes of play.

With heads-up play beginning with Jaka holding a 4,610,000 to 2,920,000-chip lead over Remington, Jaka extended his lead over the first few hands before Remington secured a double-up when king-jack connected on the flop against Jaka’s ace-queen after all the money went in preflop. Remington then used this momentum to make a charge up the leaderboard before taking the chip lead from Jaka for the first time. The two then wrestled with the chip lead back-and forth as the two-hour mark was reached in heads-up play, and with it saw the defining pot.

Remington raised the button and Jaka called and then check-called a flop bet before turning the nut straight. On the river, Jaka bet half his remaining stack and Remington shoved all in with second pair. Jaka called with his straight and secured a monster double to hold a greater then six-to-one chip lead. Remington doubled once, but on the final hand with just eight-big blinds, he would see his go down to Jaka’s on the run out to be eliminated in second-place.

With Jaka topping the 251-entrant field to capture the WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk title, he would take home the $77,290 first-place prize that includes a $3,000 buy-in into the season-ending WPTDeepStacks Championship. Jaka now sits with nearly $6.4 million in lifetime tournament earnings and can add WPTDeepStacks Champion to his poker resume.

Congratulations to our newest WPTDeepStacks Champion Faraz Jaka!

That concludes our coverage from WPTDeepStacks Black Hawk. Thanks to the Golden Gates Casino in Black Hawk, Colorado, for hosting another great stop for WPTDeepStacks.

Up Next for WPTDeepStacks in the United States
The next stop on the WPTDeepStacks schedule in the United States is WPTDeepStacks Big Stax. The Main Event runs from May 17-20 at Parx Casino in Bensalem, Pennsylvania. Find all the details for WPTDeepStacks Big Stax right here.

Photography by Melissa Haereiti / PokerPhotoArchive

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