Barry Greenstein Takes WPT “Fathers and Sons” Title

In the midst of the main event of the WPT World Poker Finals at Foxwoods Casino Resort, a special tournament was filmed Wednesday. The “Fathers and Sons” tournament pitted six high-powered father/son duos against each other in a battle of families.

The teams played as a single player, but with only one of the pair playing at a time. Whenever they wanted, even if it was in the middle of a hand, the players could “tag out” and switch with their family member. No discussion was allowed during a hand, but the fathers and sons were free to strategize in between hands.

When one team came out on top, the winning father and son were then to face off against each other for intra-family supremacy. The player who prevails in the heads-up match would be awarded a $25,000 seat at the World Poker Tour World Championship.

The teams were as follows (fathers listed first):

Seat 1: Barry and Jeff Shulman
Seat 2: Dick and Vince Van Patten
Seat 3: Doyle and Todd Brunson
Seat 4: Barry Greenstein and Joe Sebok
Seat 5: Steve and John Stolzmann
Seat 6: Romeo and Michael Simon

The single table tournament went relatively quickly, most likely because the only prize was the $25,000 seat at the end, so plodding along to move up a spot did not make any sense to these seasoned players.

The Van Pattens were the first ones eliminated with Dick getting lambasted by his opponents. He lost with a busted straight draw, two pair versus a flush, mucked a hand on the river, and was finally knocked out when his J-T ran into Todd Brunson’s J-J. Son Vince never got to play.

Less than 20 minutes later, the Stolzmanns got cold-decked. Todd Brunson raised pre-flop and Steve Stolzmann moved all-in. Brunson called, flipping over K-K, but Stolzmann was a huge favorite with A-A. Unfortunately for Stolzmann, Brunson flopped a King and that was that. At this point, the Brunsons had almost as many chips as the other three teams combined.

That big lead did not last long, however, as Brunson the Elder doubled up Barry Greenstein, giving the Greenstein/Sebok team the spot at the front of the pack. Greenstein then proceeded to eliminate the Simons when his J-J defeated Michael Simon’s A-T.

Not ten minutes later, Greenstein’s son, Joe Sebok, did the exact same thing to Barry Shulman. Same cards and all, although this time, Sebok hit a full house for good measure.

Going into the team portion of heads-up play, the Greenstein/Sebok duo had about a 3-to-1 chip advantage on the Brunsons. For a few hands, there was not much action, but as had been the case up until then, an elimination was in short order. In a matchup of the sons, Sebok raised from the big blind pre-flop and Brunson moved all-in. Sebok called with A-T (where have we seen this before), and Brunson had to reveal that he got caught bluffing with Q-8. This time, the A-T won and it was down to Barry Greenstein versus his son, Joe Sebok, for the $25,000 seat.

It would have been interesting to see the two square off in a fantastic battle, but it wasn’t to be. The two decided to just go all-in blind on the first hand. Father’s A-Q defeated son’s K-2 and Barry Greenstein now has a free ride into the WPT World Championship.

Originally published November 16, 2006