Barry Hutter Books Shootout Win to Capture First Bracelet, Vaults Into POY Contention
On Saturday night, Sarasota, Florida's Barry Hutter took down the 2015 World Series of Poker Event #14: $1,500 No-Limit Hold'em Shootout in Las Vegas, collecting his first bracelet and vaulting himself into 2015 GPI WSOP Player of the Year contention.
"It's always good to close one out and this is a pretty good one to win," he said. "I've had a lot of chances to close out some big tournaments and I finally got one, so this will kind of be a landmark in my poker career."
The $283,546 win marked Hutter's 13th WSOP cash lifetime and third of the 2015 WSOP, including a 13th-place finish in the $10,000 Heads Up No-Limit Hold'em Championship and a 14th-place finish in the $5,000 No-Limit Hold'em.
Hutter began the day Saturday in the top ten on the 2015 GPI WSOP Player of the Year leaderboard and will surely move up the ranks now with plans to continue to play all the no-limit hold'em events he can get his hands on and a few smaller pot-Limit Omaha tournaments as well.
"I'm going to probably keep pretty much the same schedule I had before," he said. "Of course it would be great to win [2015 GPI WSOP Player of the Year], but I'm not going to go jump in events that I really don't know what I'm doing just to do it."
Hutter said his first two shootout tables were tough and a final table that included original November Niner Dennis Phillips, 2010 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure Main Event fourth-place finisher Benjamin Zamani, and 2014 WSOP Ladies No-Limit Hold'em Championship fourth-place finisher Elizabeth Montizanti wasn't any easier.
"It was a really tough table and when I got heads-up, Ben is really tough to play against," he said. "I made some hands, won the big pots and that helped. The stars aligned, I ran really well and I guess I played really well too."
For Hutter, it all amounts to a poker dream come true.
"This is what most people play poker for," he said. "I'm speechless really."
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