It was exactly what you want to see when you've got just a handful of big blinds on Day 2 of a Mystery Millions at the WSOP.
"A very aggressive recreational player jammed all in."
Brian Smith, who had just pulled the $100K bounty a few hours prior, was down to the felt when he looked at ace-five of clubs.
"I just knew he had a big hand. I knew it was queens or kings. And I had eight bigs, so I just said, 'I know you have kings.' But there are three aces in the deck, so let's spin it."
His opponent had queens. The flop was ace-queen-five, and the turn was a blank. He was right, but it all went wrong.
Smith was way behind until the river was the ace of spades, giving him a full house and the double up.
"That catapulted me."
Smith won another big pot soon after.
"I played pretty aggressively to run a stack up a little bit. I just started sun-running, man. It's crazy. It's surreal."
From the outhouse to the penthouse
The sequence of events was mind-boggling. Over a short amount of time, Smith had gone from eight big blinds to over 10 million chips. He was the table captain at break, buying up the 5,000 chips and doing big business.
Equally surreal was the $100K bounty pull just a few hours earlier. The six-figure bomb brought a lot of emotion after a pledged donation to charity, the routine for Smith. He always donates a significant portion of what he wins to a charity called Purple Pansies.
"Purple Pansies is a charity that's designed to end pancreatic cancer once and for all. Most of the money goes to research to hopefully end the spread and find a cure for the disease. The rest of that money goes for grants and scholarships for kids who have been impacted by losing a family member. I think they sent 38 kids to college last year."
It doesn't matter how many bullets Smith fires or how much he loses, he's committed to donating the same amount.
"It's a percentage of tournament earnings. So, I could fire five bullets, still lose, and still provide the same amount."
'Most epic sun run'
Smith loves poker, and he loves winning, but he doesn't grind it out like some others. If you catch him in eight tournaments in a year, that's considered a lot.
"I'm a national sales leader. I have a great job. I love my career. I've met a lot of people in my business through poker. But I'm on the most epic sun run of all time. I've final tabled eight of my last 13 tournaments. No one understands how or why it happens. I drink at the table. I talk."
Smith was born in New Jersey, but he now lives in Atlanta, Georgia, with his wife, Stacey, his three-and-a-half-year-old son, and a Golden Retriever.
"I'm the opposite of a robot. I don't study charts, and I play by feel. I've been doing this for 22 years, and I've made so many good friends from this game. I just love it so much. I love the competitive spirit, and coming out here every summer is summer camp, like everyone says. I think this is my 21st summer out here at the World Series."
Still climbing
The Mystery Millions, which started with record-breaking 22,811 entries, was inside its last 100 runners after the dinner break on Day 2. Smith was still one of them, sitting in the top 15 with over 11 million in chips. His previous best finish at the WSOP was a fifth-place run in last year's Double Board PLO Bomb Pot. PLO is more his speed, but he'll roll with no-limit hold'em for now.
Blinds are 200K/400K/400K, so it's going to move fast as Day 2 closes out, but Smith is in a serious spot for his first bracelet and the opportunity to give away a big chunk of his $1 million top prize.
