While every player is keeping an eye on the tournament clock (which shows how many players are left), Bill Baxter thought he saw a chance to make some money. He gave a guy 2-1 odds that the field wouldn’t get pared down to 350 before the fifth level ended, going contrary to popular opinion. “The longer you play the fewer shorter stacks there’s going to be,” he said. “I can’t imagine there are 73 short stacks left in this room.” At that point the field was down to 423. It seemed to hold steady at that total for nearly five minutes, far longer than the usual pace, which had been roughly one bust-out every minute. It’s now down to 405.

At this point in the tournament the measure of a player’s success is how many orange 5k chips they have sitting in front of them. My dark horse Lasse Aspen Melby only has two, but he still has several stacks of yellow chips, so I’m not giving up on him yet. Ethan Steinberg, a friend I used to play with in a home game in Jackson Hole, started the day with 12k, which he has since pumped up to nearly 100k. These are a couple of the lesser known stories that interest me just as much as those of the well known pros. The World Series of Poker is about chasing a dream, and for many of the players whose goal is to simply cash they have gotten oh-so close.

Troy Stromer, the floor man, listened to the dealer’s explanation and that of the offending player and decided that the ruling should stand, that the hand was dead. “If you are using your phone in any way,” Stromer said, “your hand will be dead.” Then he explained that the players had been warned that morning and suggested that the French guy, who was still holding his phone, put it away for the night so it wouldn’t happen again.

Back at Seed’s table he called a 6k preflop raise and folded when someone bet the A97 flop. He then left for the dinner break two and half minutes early. He actually missed one hand, but getting away from the table was obviously more important to him than playing one last hand. He knows what works best for him. After all, he did win the world championship in 1996.

The players have now returned from their dinner break. They were expected to play five levels today, but that schedule has now been amended. If the field is pared down to 350 before the fifth level is over, play will be stopped for the night. The players on Day 2B will have the same schedule. At that point the field will be combined and the frenzy surrounding the money bubble will begin.

Gaining a reputation for always having a stable of horse in most of the tournaments he enters, Lindgen was busy buying pieces of other players right up until the moment the tournament director announced, “Shuffle up and deal.” He had entered the Amazon Room with, to name a few, Huck Seed, Chris Bell, and Anthony Reategui, who in an amazing coincidence were all sent to the same table as Lindgren. “Somehow they put us all at the same table,” he said. “It’s really unfortunate. I’ve got them all to my left so I’ve had to play really tight solid poker, which I would probably be doing any way. They don’t give you enough chips to actually mess around. You can’t just bluff your way through. It would be pretty stupid.”

In an encounter that showed how problematic it has been for Lindgren to have so many tough players sitting on his left, he opened for a $600 raise from the cutoff seat and Huck popped it to 2k from the button, forcing Lindgren to muck his cards. “I don’t think Huck necessarily had anything,” said Lindgren afterwards. “Our table just sucks right now. It’s the worst table in the joint. There are 3,000 people here and I’m playing with four really good players and five other guys who can play.”

At the fifteen-minute break between level 5 and 6, Lindgren had about 3.7k. “I’m alright,” he said, “but I had better make something happen this next level. I’m getting in trouble.”

[Lindgren would get eliminated by Huck Seed shortly after returning from the break.]