Greg FBT Mueller wasted no time mixing it up in the $5,000 World Championship Mixed Holdem event final table, raising in early position. And that was before the cards were even dealt.
FBT was doing his best to convince tournament director Jack Effel to roll back the starting blinds for the limit portion of the final table. While the no-limit portion of the tourney has featured a slow structure with plenty of play, the limit structure has been where all of the big pots get raked. The betting limits opened at 30k-60k with 15k-30k blinds. The no-limit blinds would open (30 minutes later) at 10k-20k with no antes.
FBT wasted no time mixing it up once play started either. He open-raised in early position on the first hand, John Younger 3-bet on the short stack, and chip leader Fred Berger put in the 4th bet from the big blind. FBT was stuck in a tough spot as he knew Berger had to have a big hand.
And FBT's railbirds wasted no time in speculating on his hand. "Ah, he's got junk, I know him, he just wanted to raise on the first hand," claimed Kyle Wilson. David Baker's analysis proved more accurate, "He's got A10 or AJ and only has three outs." Mueller opted to fold and announced he mucked A
J once Younger called and was all-in. As it turned out, Mueller would've outflopped both AK and AQ on his way to making the nuts on a J
5487 board.
Mueller then took the chip lead with a board reading Q5446
holding the AQ
versus Berger's JJ. He was relatively quiet in the no-limit section, letting his 1.05m chips hold up for the lead going into the most recent level change.
Current chip counts and results as announced by tournament director to the stars, Chris Spears:
- Greg Mueller - 1,055,000
- Fred Berger - 1,020,000
- Steve Paul Ambrose - 1,015,000
- Steve Billirakis - 645,000
- Tony George - 435,000
- Roger McDow - 350,000
- (eliminated) Kirk Morrison for $63,591
- (eliminated) Jon Turner for $46,633
- (eliminated) John Younger for $33,915
