Ring Event - 15: $580 No-Limit Hold'em

California native comes to Vegas on a whim, wins $14,997 and first ring.

Las Vegas, NV (August 31, 2016) — Making decisions when you’re on tilt, generally results in poor decisions and bad outcomes. Sean Marshall was tilting after busting out of a tournament in California and decided to fly to Vegas for a few of the World Series of Poker Circuit events at Planet Hollywood.

The decision proved to be useful for Marshall. He got off the plane and won the first tournament he played, besting a field of 100 players for $14,997 in the $580 no-limit hold’em event.

“It feels awesome man,” said Marshall. “I was totally tilting. I had a huge stack in a $1,000 buy-in with like $75,000 up top and played like 12 hours and just dusted off a huge amount of chips. I was just like ‘Ok, I’m just going to go out to Vegas. There’s some tournaments going on out there and I’m just going to come and play.’ That’s how it happened. No joke.”

Marshall was playing a smaller buy-in than he was in California, but he found himself at a much tougher final table than he would in most places.

Joining Marshall at the final table was bracelet winner Brent Hanks, four-time ring winner Josh Turner, and Cary Katz, who is a regular in the all of the high roller tournaments around the world. Katz’s son, Sam Simmons, was also at the final table.

Marshall relished his time at the final table with such high caliber opponents.

“It was cool seeing those guys,” said Marshall. “I’ve seen Cary on TV, obviously, and I had no idea what he was doing here at first, but it was a cool experience. Any time you get to play against a super high-stakes, super high-roller player and mix it up a little bit, it’s really cool.

“He wasn’t taking it super seriously, obviously, but it was a ton of fun and he was really nice to play with. I got to sit next to him at the final table and chop it up a little bit and talk a little bit. So yeah, it was a ton of fun.”

Marshall lives in Northern California and over the last 18 months, he’s been spending most of his time playing poker. He was working for a marketing agency that was bought out. He took his buy-out money and took some time away from work and spent more time at the poker table.

“I play mostly limit cash games and local tournaments that nobody tracks online or anything like that,” said Marshall of his main games back home.

In two weeks, Marshall heads back to the office grind. He and his wife decided they are going to start a family and he’s taken another job.

“I have about 10 days off between now and the first time I have to go back to work in about a year and a half,” said Marshall. “I’m trying to squeeze some fun in at the same time and I’m really happy to scoop a tournament before going back to work.”

The tournament was scheduled to finish in two days, but Marshall got heads-up with Todd Duplantis with about 30 minutes left in the last scheduled level of the day. The two players decided that they would rather play it out to completion. They played almost another two full levels before Marshall had taken it down. It was almost a 16-hour day of poker for Marshall.

“Thankfully Red Bull really helps,” said Marshall. “But yeah, fatigue definitely plays a part when you are playing that long.”

Chris Herrin

On a flop of    , Kindah Sakkal checked from the small blind and Chris Herrin bet about 50,000 from the big blind. Todd Duplantis called from under-the-gun and Cary Katz moved all in on the button for an additional 90,000.

Sakkal quickly folded and Herrin thought for a minute before moving all in for about 400,000, having the entire table covered. Duplantis took a couple minutes in the tank of his own before calling and all in for about 200,000.

Herrin showed   , good for top pair, Duplantis tabled   , good for the nut flush draw and second pair, which left Katz drawing to just a gutshot straight draw with his   .

The turn was the  , giving Duplantis trip eights and the lead. Herrin needed a nine on the river to eliminate two players, while Katz needed a seven to stay alive, but the   came and Duplantis won both the main and the side pot to take a big chip lead heading into four-handed play.

Katz took home $3,552 for his fifth place finish. 

They are playing in level 19 with blinds of 3,000/6,000 and a 1,000 ante. Duplantis has about half of the total chips in play.

Todd Duplantis - 570,000
Chris Herrin - 195,000
Cary Katz - Eliminated

The cage has released the payout information and the top 12 finishers in the $580 no-limit hold'em will earn a payday. A min-cash is worth $1,045, but the top spot takes home $14,997 and a Circuit ring.

Here is a look at the payouts:

Players have made their way back from their first break of the day and with just over two hours left of late registration, the field is up to 83 entrants in this event.

Craig Gold, Neil Scott, David Jackson, Vincent Moscati, Maurice Hawkins, Jonathan Dimmig, and Jamie Kerstetter are among the notable pros in the field so far. They are in level 5 and are playing with blinds of 100/200 and a 25 ante. Registration and re-entry is open until the start of level 9.