Meet the 2009 November Nine

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This year marks the second year of the ‘November Nine’ format for the Main Event of the World Series of Poker, and after eight days of play (which was really more like two weeks) the starting field of 6,494 players was reduced to a nine man final table that will compete for the $8.5 million+ first prize. Below you’ll find a bit more info on each of the players who comprise this year’s November Nine.

Players are listed in order of chip counts

Darvin Moon – 58,930,000
Your chip leader heading into the 2009 WSOP Main Event Final Table: Darvin Moon. Moon bears no small resemblance to last year’s November Nine leader Dennis Phillips – a middle aged, working class, apparently unassuming guy who ran a fairly serious hot streak into a mountain of chips. Moon is 45 and hails from Maryland, where he runs a lumber business. Moon has no recorded tournament cashes on his record, but if you’re going to pick one cash to be your first, you could obviously do a lot worse than the Main Event of the WSOP.

Eric Buchman – 34,800,000
If Moon is one side of the poker coin, Buchman is essentially the other – a tournament grinder with over a million dollars in lifetime tournament cashes to his credit. He’s already been at one final table at this year’s WSOP – Omaha/Seven Card Stud HL/8 or Better (Event 25) – and will likely be looking to improve on his 6th place finish in that event at the ME final table. A 28 year old poker pro from Valley Stream, N.Y., Buchman’s single biggest cash prior to the 2009 ME was a second in a WSOP circuit event in NJ for about $288k.

Steven Begleiter – 29,885,000
New York resident Steven Begleiter is also cut from a bit of the Dennis Phillips cloth – at least when it comes to support from the rail. While there’s unlikely to be a sea of Begleiter clones in November, his story – qualified for the WSOP through a local poker league – along with the fact that his fellow poker league members apparently have some piece of his action – will no doubt make for a massive and vocal supporting crowd when the final table gets underway. As this is Begleiter’s first recorded cash in live tournament play, he’ll likely need all the help he can get.

Jeff Shulman – 19,580,000
Jeff is the only player of the group who has been to the final table of the Main Event before. The Las Vegas resident took 7th in 2000, and has nearly 1.3 million in total cashes to his credit. Jeff’s other hat: he’s the editor of CardPlayer magazine. Jeff’s third hat: stirring the pot, apparently – he’s told various sources that if he wins the Main Event, he’d throw the bracelet in the garbage.

Joe Cada – 13,215,000
Cada was already on his way to a respectable 2009 WSOP – his first – with deep runs in both $1500 No-Limit Hold’em (Event 34) and $2500 No-Limit Hold’em (Event 13). He’s the deepest stacked ‘internet pro’ (he plays online as jcada99) and has a chance to break Eastgate’s record as the youngest Main Event winner. Despite his relative youth, he’s likely seen more hands than most of the final table, with several years of online play under his belt and a solid track record of tournament success on Full Tilt and UltimateBet.

Kevin Schaffel – 12,390,000
Schaffel falls somewhere in between a recreational player and a grinder on the tournament player spectrum. 2009 marks his third time cashing in the Main Event – in 2004 he took 64th, and last year he placed a solid 324th. He’s also got a handful of small cashes in various larger buy in tournaments, which makes sense for someone who describes themselves as ’semi-retired’ at age 51. Despite that, Schaffel told ESPN he has no plans to serve as a ambassador for poker between now and the final table: “If they want me, they can come to Florida.”

Phil Ivey – 9,765,000
It’s been quite some time since a first tier poker pro has held a seat at the final table of the Main Event. Sure, there have been pros who have made runs, and a few full-time players who have gotten close to the bracelet, but no one with anything even approaching the star power of Ivey. Regarded by many pros as the best of the best, and already the owner of two bracelets from this year’s WSOP, Ivey has to be considered a force at this table despite his relatively short stack.

He’ll also (reportedly) have additional motivation to win, as he’s rumored to have millions of dollars in side bets riding on taking down the main event. Whatever he wins, it will add on to an already impressive total of nearly $11 million in lifetime tournament cashes.

Antoine Saout – 9,500,000
One of only two non-Americans at the table, Saout hails from France and made the switch to professional poker just over a year ago. He doesn’t have a lot of live tournament cashes to his credit, but has cut his chops with online MTTs, primarily as Tonio292 on Everest Poker, where he qualified for the WSOP.

James Akenhead – 6,800,000
The other non-yank of the November Nine, Akenhead is no stranger to the felt of a WSOP final table. He took second in the 2008 $1,500 No-Limit Hold’em (Event 2) for over half a million dollars, and has a long string of international tournament cashes to his credit, with lifetime earnings approaching the one million mark. He’ll be at least doubling that this year, even if he’s the first to bust – but with his experience he’s likely to be more capable than most of managing the short stack.

What They’ll Be Playing For
Fame and fortune, but mostly fortune:

1. $8.5 million
2. $5.2 million
3. $3.5 million
4. $2.5 million
5. $2.0 million
6. $1.6 million
7. $1.4 million
8. $1.3 million
9. $1.25 million

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