Final Table Set For WPT Borgata Poker Classic, David Tran Leads

Poker pro Gavin Griffin is one of the chip leaders at the final table of the WPT Borgata Poker Classic, just behind David Tran. (Bodog Beat Image)

OK, so all in all, not too bad. The final table of the WPT Borgata Poker Classic has a couple of well-known live poker pros, an accomplished online player, the student of one of the best in the game and a couple of unknowns. So, again, not too bad, some definite storylines. We were beginning to dread the WSOP with major tournament final tables get getting more (yawn) as the year progressed.

Anyway, 2007 was very good to both Gavin Griffin and Lee Watkinson, the two most well known names of the final six. Griffin won the EPT Grand Final back in March then final tabled the $5k Pot Limit Holdem event at the 2007 WSOP, taking home over $2.6 million last year. Watkinson made it to the final table of the largest tournament of the year, the WSOP Main Event, and ended up finishing in eighth place. He also cashed in two other WSOP events for total winnings of over $600k in 2007.

Noah "FourUHaters" Schwartz is an up and coming online poker player who is, obviously, now making a splash in the brick and mortar world. Mainly a tournament player online, Scwartz has won over a half a million in big buy-in events and seems to be translating that success well into his live game.

The current chip leader at the final table is David Tran, apparently a student of David "The Dragon" Pham. He is learning his lessons well from  last year's CardPlayer Player of the Year and cashed in three events at the 2007 WSOP, including a 14th place finish for $429,114 in the WSOP Main Event, and added a WPT payday for good measure at the 2008 World Poker Open just over a week ago.

The two unknowns are Ervin Prifti (bless you) and Thomas Ware, but are on different ends of the spectrum. Prifti (bless you) has no major tournament cashes to his name and is severely short-stacked. Ware has a couple of cashes at tournaments in Atlantic City and has a much healthier stack, currently sitting in third place.

Here are the chip counts heading in:

David Tran - 5,271,000
Gavin Griffin - 5,105,000
Thomas Hare - 2,851,000
Noah Schwartz - 1,320,000
Lee Watkinson - 397,000
Ervin Prifti - 289,000

Play resumes at 5 p.m. EST when the six will congregate on the WPT final table set for the televised portion of the event. So, stay tuned to the Beat for more updates from the WPT Borgata Poker Classic.