Praz Playing Poker
We've found a very familiar face over here in the Purple section of the Amazon Room, a face that just missed out on being the November-Nine kind of familiar. It's Brandon Steven, the 10th-place finisher from last year's Main Event, the last player shut out of Jonathan Duhamel's November party. He earned $635,011 for his run through the 2010 field, and he's done some good work on the felt in the meantime too. In January, he came close to the final table in the $25,000 PCA High Roller Event. He finished -- you guessed it -- tenth.
Steven is back inside the Amazon Room today, and he's giving this Main Event thing another go. Day 1c had been going along rather swimmingly for him, but he just ran up against Praz Bansi in a hand that fouled up his stack.
It began with a player on the button opening with a raise, and Steven called from the small blind. Bansi squeezed to 2,450 from the big, the button folded, and Steven called to go heads-up. The board ran 
, with Steven check-calling bets on both the flop and the turn. On the river, there was about 25,000 in the pot when Bansi shoved all in for just less than 19,000. Steven would spend a long while in the tank, long enough that he had to apologize for taking so long. "Sorry guys, I got a real hand here." He repeated himself again, this time folding as he did. "I got a real hand here," and the 
appeared on the felt as he mucked. Bansi took the opportunity to flash his airball 
as he pulled in the pot, moving up to about 44,000.
We've apparently missed some other drama between the players, because they don't seem to be best of buddies right now. Steven got a little peeved about the Bansi needle, and Praz told him, "If you'd told me what you had when I asked, I wouldn't have done it." It might have been about how much Steven was playing, or a hand prior, we're not exactly sure. Whatever the backstory, Steven wasn't buying the explanation.
"That's the biggest load of..." he trailed off.
"It's the truth," Bansi said.
"Well go tell it to someone else," was the last word from Steven, glaring down forlornly at the ~13,000 chips he has left.