It was starting to seem a little odd that Chris Moorman hadn’t won a major live poker tournament. After all, the 28-year-old from Essex, England is the most successful online tournament player of all-time, having earned 20 Triple Crowns (winning three different multi-table tournaments on three different sites within seven days) and more than $10,000,000 in online tournaments as “Moorman1.”
Oh, he’d certainly come close. At the 2011 World Series of Poker, Moorman got heads-up in the $10,000 Six-Handed No-Limit Hold ’Em event, only to lose to Joe Ebanks. “It was kind of a 50/50 shot,” Moorman told ALL IN. “So I didn’t have any big regrets like, I threw that away.”
Four months later, he found himself in the same position, battling Elio Fox heads-up in the WSOP-Europe main event. “That was another situation where he was a great player and we were of equal ability. It could have gone either way.” That match turned on one pivotal hand: Fox flopped top pair, Moorman turned two pair, and Fox made a winning flush on the river.
While Moorman was able to console himself with the $1,784,972 he earned for his two runner-up finishes, a breakthrough victory in a major live tournament still eluded him. It didn’t help that he doesn’t feel compelled to make every single stop on the live tournament trail, instead picking and choosing which events he’d like to enter in between ski trips to Whistler and beach time in Playa del Carmen. After playing two tournaments at the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure at the start of 2014, he decided to take a break from the live world until the WPT L.A. Poker Classic in March.
Turns out he picked the right time and place to return from his little vacation.
•••
The first five days of the LAPC’s main event at Commerce Casino went incredibly smoothly for Moorman – his chip stack was never entirely at risk. “It very rarely happens like that,” he said. “On Day One, I pulled off a big bluff on the river near the end of the day, then on the very next hand I got kings versus jacks against another big stack and won. From there I was always above average in chips. It was smooth sailing.”
From a field of 534 entries, Moorman reached the televised final table of six sitting in second place in chips and feeling confident about his chances. “I got drawn a really nice seat at the final table. I had position on the chip leader, Michael Rocco. Everything felt kind of aligned to me.”
The final table (clockwise from top left): Moorman, Rocco, Friedman, Lafaye, Neufeld, Bruel
As the two most aggressive players left in the tournament, Moorman and Rocco, a 24-year-old from Southern California who wore what appeared to be a cloth sack on his head, were destined to collide early and often. Moorman won six out of the first nine hands, but on the 10th lost a big chunk of his stack to Rocco. Soon after Glenn Lafaye, a 40-year-old money manager from Connecticut, eliminated Adam Friedman in sixth place, Moorman and Rocco collided again in what Moorman called “a really strange hand.”
“Rocco open-limped under the gun, which isn’t a move you see many professional players do these days,” explained Moorman. “It’s more something you associate with amateurs and recreational players. I didn’t think he’d do that with a really big hand. I just thought he was trying to see a cheap flop.”
Holding pocket tens, Moorman raised from the cutoff to 130,000, Lafaye called from the big blind, Rocco re-raised to 460,000 with K-6 suited, Moorman made it 930,000, Lafaye got out of the way, and Rocco called.
“There was around 2 million chips in the pot and I only had about 2½ million left,” said Moorman, “so it was kind of an odd move for him to call in that spot out of position.”
The flop came 10-3-3, Rocco checked, and Moorman slow-played his full house by checking behind.
A deuce fell on the turn. Rocco bet 450,000, and Moorman called.
Rocco played the heel at the final table, ignoring poker etiquette repeatedly
When the river brought a king, things went to a higher level of strange. “He bet,” said Moorman, “and within five seconds he called the clock on me, which was kind of absurd because it was such a big pot and it was a final-table situation. He had taken about five times as much time every hand before the flop just to fold so it was outrageous, really, for him to call the clock on me in this situation.”
As ridiculous as Rocco’s request was, it was in keeping with his style of play. With little concern for social graces, he went out of his way to annoy his opponents throughout the tournament. While vying for a pot against Dan O’Brien with 11 players left, Rocco had taken so long on each street that he’d actually had the clock called on him twice in the same hand. Rocco responded by calling the clock on O’Brien during the hand that saw Rocco knock O’Brien out in seventh place.
In the hand against Moorman, tournament director Matt Savage intervened, deciding not to honor Rocco’s request because not enough time had passed. Rocco’s shenanigans hardly fazed Moorman, as his decision to raise all-in with a full house wasn’t very difficult. Rocco’s fold gave Moorman the chip lead.
•••
Moorman widened his edge over the rest of the field by eliminating Josh Neufeld in fifth place. But with four players left and his first live championship in sight, the wheels began to come off. First, Moorman gave the chip lead back to Rocco when he couldn’t call a bet of 2.1 million chips on the river with 10-7-3-9-A on the board.
“I really played that hand poorly,” he said. “I had pocket queens. The problem was Rocco was putting me in a tough situation with his bet sizes. I probably should have just checked [on the turn] and called when he bet, but I bet and he raised me really big, like over three times my raise, and then I was in a really awkward spot because my hand is really underrepresented because I didn’t bet the flop. I should have maybe folded the turn. It changed the whole momentum.”
Then in a hand against Lafaye, Moorman made what he believed was a value bet on the river with the board showing Q-7-4-5-6. He thought he’d made a straight with J-3, but after Lafaye called with Q-J, Moorman turned over his cards, discovered he actually had J-2, and, a little tilted, tossed his cards into the muck.
When he lost a race with A-K against the pocket fours of French actor, singer, and WSOP bracelet winner Patrick Bruel two hands later, Moorman was suddenly the short stack at the table. The level couldn’t end soon enough for him. “I felt like I had sort of blown my chance. I thought, Wow, this was such a great opportunity I had here, and I’ve messed it all up. Luckily, we had a 15-minute break, the rail talked to me, my girlfriend got me a bit calmer, and I just sort of came back out of it and realized that I had nothing to lose and I managed to put all that behind me and started to play my ‘A’ game again.”
Moorman picked up some much needed chips by eliminating Bruel in fourth place after flopping top pair, then somehow survived another “strange hand,” this time against Lafaye with three players left.
Moorman three-bet before the flop with kings, and Lafaye called. The flop came 9-7-2, Moorman bet 515,000, Lafaye raised to 1,325,000, and Moorman called.
“I could have re-raised there and called if he went all-in,” said Moorman. “It would have been more than fine to do that. But I just decided to call and see what happened on the turn.”
As it turned out, this was Lucky Break Number One for Moorman.
Moorman gets ready for heads-up against Lafaye
“The turn was a queen, which was a pretty safe card for me. If he bet, there was going to be so much in the pot I think I would have had to shove all-in. But he checked behind.”
Lucky Break Number Two.
When another queen fell on the river, Moorman, with no reason to think his kings weren’t good, bet 1,325,000. Lafaye tanked for over three minutes, talking about all the hands he couldn’t beat. There weren’t many. He’d flopped a set with pocket deuces and rivered a full house, yet he chose not to re-raise Moorman on the river.
Lucky Break Number Three.
“If he’d bet the turn card, I would have shoved and been out of the tournament,” said Moorman. “So I was happy I was still in the tournament. I had a second—almost a third—chance now.”
The 6.6-million-chip pot gave Lafaye a commanding chip lead, but it didn’t last long. Less than 20 minutes later, he raised to 325,000 from the button with Q-J of diamonds, Rocco moved all-in for just over 2 million from the small blind with A-8, Moorman came over the top of him for 2,835,000 with pocket tens, and Lafaye snap-called. As dramatic as some of the hands have been at WPT final tables – a conspiracy theorist might suspect the show’s creators of actually scripting them for television – this hand ranks close to the top. Not only did three players go all-in on the same hand, they were the last three players left in the tournament. As shocking as it was to see all three of them all-in before the flop, it was Lafaye’s decision to call and the speed with which he did it that had all the poker pundits talking afterward.
Moorman wasn’t as bothered by Lafaye’s call with a relatively weak hand like Q-J as some others were. “It’s definitely not standard, but I don’t think it was necessarily bad because he had the chance to win the whole tournament there. If he wins, the tournament’s over, and if he loses, he was still heads-up with a slight chip lead.”
The K-Q-J flop raised the drama meter another notch, giving Lafaye two pair and both Moorman and Rocco straight draws. The turn was a blank. Lafaye was one card away from an unlikely championship, but an ace on the river gave Moorman a winning straight, tripling his stack and eliminating Rocco.
•••
Nearly even in chips with Lafaye, Moorman was soaring with confidence at the start of heads-up play. “I felt like I had a little bit of an edge. He’s more of a recreational player, and I’ve played more poker than pretty much anyone, so I felt like I had an edge just on that. I also had picked up a few of his tendencies, which I felt like I could exploit.”
Moorman took command on the ninth hand of heads-up when he fired a 2.7-million chip bluff on the river with K-8-5-6-4 on the board. “There was a chance my A-9 was the best hand,” he said, “but most of the time he’s going to have better than that, so I decided to bet pretty big and put him to the test.”
Lafaye tanked before reluctantly folding.
On the final hand, Moorman raised before the flop, Lafaye called, and the flop came J-7-6. Moorman bet 525,000, Lafaye moved all in for 3.9 million, and Moorman snap-called with aces. Lafaye’s 5-4 gave him an open-ended straight draw, but he failed to improve.
Having finally won his first major live tournament, Moorman was struck by how different it felt compared to a victory online. “A lot of times you win a big online tournament, it can be late at night – like three in the morning,” he explained. “You might be the only one in the house. You don’t get the money in front of you; it’s just on a computer screen.
“Live, it felt completely different – my girlfriend there, a bunch of friends all cheering. It was amazing. I felt on top of the world.”
Article by: STORMS REBACK – a former associate editor of ALL IN and the co-author of three poker books including the 2013 release Ship It Holla Ballas!
1. Chris Moorman – $1,015,460
2. Glenn Lafaye – $662,840
3. Michael Rocco – $423,440
4. Patrick Bruel – $332,190
5. Josh Neufeld – $264,520
6. Adam Friedman – $200,440