Byron Kaverman is the tournament short stack heading into Day 3, and the only player under 1 million in chips. With a stack of 495,000, Kaverman will enter the final nine with under 10 big blinds and have a lot of work cut out for him.
After really igniting a spark in his poker career in 2014 with more than $1.4 million in live tournament earnings, Kaverman has already one-upped himself with more than $2.4 million in winnings this year — and that's before this event. Coming into this tournament, Kaverman has recorded six six-figure cashes this year.
One of those results was a huge one — the second largest of his career — and came at the World Series of Poker when he won the $10,000 Six-Max No-Limit Hold'em Championship for his first gold bracelet and $657,351. His other big paydays in 2015 were for $409,219, $332,593, $282,948, $282,435, and $243,240. Two of those scores were from back in March when Kaverman won back-to-back Aria $25,000 High Roller events in the span of one weekend.
Frenchman Sylvain Loosli is best known for his appearance at the 2013 World Series of Poker Main Event final table. It was there that he recorded his second live tournament cash, and it was a big one worth just shy of $2.8 million after he finished in fourth place. Loosli currently sits sixth on the French all-time money list.
Since he final tabled poker's most prestigious event, Loosli has gone on to win over $500,000 in live tournaments from a handful of results. This result, whatever it may be, stands to be the second largest of his career and it continues an impressive 2015 for Loosli. Of note, he finished eighth in the EPT Malta €10,300 High Roller for €75,000 and second in a €5,300 side event at the EPT Grand Final for €99,800.
Loosely holds a Masters in Business and resides in London due to online gambling restrictions in France. His is a former roommate of fellow countryman Bertrand "ElkY" Grospellier and generally focuses his skills in online cash games.
Ivan Luca is an up-and-coming star of the game, currently having his best year ever on the live felt with nearly $1.3 million in tournament earnings coming into this event and winning his first World Series of Poker gold bracelet his summer.
Luca is from Argentina, but his biggest results have come from elsewhere in the world. At the end of Season 11 of the European Poker Tour, Luca was in Monaco for the Grand Final. There he took eighth in the €50,000 Super High Roller event for €121,700. Right before that, at the EPT stop in Malta, Luca finished runner-up to David Peters in the €10,300 High Roller for €397,000.
He also finished fourth in the FPS Deauville €1,100 Main Event back in February for €68,500 and fifth in the EPT Deauville €10,300 High Roller for €90,960.
At the WSOP this summer, Luca topped a field of 2,150 entries to earn a $353,391 top prize in Event #30: $1,000 No-Limit Hold'em. While that win proved the first bracelet of his career, he's someone we expect to win a couple more before he's all said and done.
Paul Newey is the resident "old guy" of this event's final nine, and the former businessman from England will be looking to turn things around as one of the shorter stacks in order to earn his first live poker victory.
Back in 2012, Newey first came onto the poker radar with an appearance in the first-ever World Series of Poker $1,000,000 Big One for One Drop. In fact, this was the first real poker tournament he ever played.
"It was my first proper tournament," Newey told PokerNews in a 2014 article. "It was a little bit silly to invest $1 million, but I wanted to be a piece of history. There was a charity element as well."
He failed to cash in that event, but returned in 2014 for another go. It was there that Newey finished in seventh place for over $1.4 million and recorded the largest score of his poker career. Later on that year, Newey competed in the European Poker Tour Prague €50,000 Super High Roller and took second for €557,090.
While Newey has certainly made his mark on the poker scene in recent years, especially in large buy-in events, he hasn't always been a poker player. That's certainly not where he made his fortune, either. In 1991, Newey founded the debt consolidation company Ocean Finance. He later sold that company for a reported £200 million in 2006, but stayed on as a chief executive before stepping down in 2009.
All told, Newey boasts over $2.25 million in live tournament earnings coming into this event.
Hailing all the way from Australia, Michael Egan is the chip leader heading into the third and final day of this event with 5.41 million in his stack. He's also the most unknown of the bunch, with just $173,932 in live tournament earnings over his career and a lack of information available.
What we can tell you is that Egan said yesterday that he doesn't play many live tournaments, or online for that matter, and rather focuses on cash games. Mainly playing online from his home country, Egan did record a nice live win back in 2010 when he won the 2010 Victorian Poker Championship Main Event for $144,223.
Already guaranteed €123,600 no matter what happens here today, Egan looks like he should go on to eclipse that figure pending a catastrophe of epic proportions.
With nearly 22% of the chips in play, a chip lead of over 600,000, and 90 big blinds to work with, we like Egan's chances here, despite not knowing too much about him.
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