The biggest bounty tournament on the World Poker Tour calendar, the Bay 101 Shooting Star Championship, continued yesterday with a very eventful Day 2. Not only was the day responsible for the elimination of 109 players (leaving only 36), but it also saw the money bubble burst and all but four "Shooting Star" players sent to the rail.

These final four "Shooting Stars" will now have to add the original pressure of being a bountied player, worth $5,000 and an autographed T-shirt when knocked out, with the added stress of representing for the "Shooting Stars" as a whole, as one would hope that of a total starting field of 391 players, at least one of the 50 initial pro "Shooting Stars" would make it to the WPT final table.

The last four worthy "Shooting Stars" shouldered with these burdens are Kathy Liebert, Hoyt Corkins, Paul Wasicka and the pride of PokerRoad (and my boss), Mr. Joe Sebok!

Of the four, Joe will begin Day 3 with the biggest hill to climb. His 116,500 in chips is the shortest stack of all the remaining "Shooting Stars" and significantly below the field average. However, with a pile that contains nearly 30 big blinds, Joe should still (according to theory) have plenty of room to maneuver in hopes of finally breaking the "Seventhbok" curse.

Some of the players currently standing in Joe's way include Amnon Filippi, Matt Lessinger, Freddy Bonyadi and Sebok's "Favorite Little Online Guy" Vivek Rajkumar.

To cheer Joe and the others on as the WPT Bay 101 Shooting Star Championship now plays down to the final table visit www.worldpokertour.com for live updates, chip counts and exciting interviews featuring PokerRoad's own Amanda Leatherman.


Story by Mark Anderson