‘Phil’ means ‘love’. Seriously, look it up. A word with a Greek origin, it’s why a ‘cinephile’ is a movie-lover, why ‘philosophy’ is a love of wisdom, and why the city of Philadelphia is known for its brotherly love.
With poker’s famous holy trinity of high-profile Phils - Ivey, Hellmuth and Galfond - the game has its share of ‘Philphiles’ (don’t look that one up, we just invented it), and yesterday brought a unique opportunity for us Phil-lovers to watch two of them in action.
Phil Galfond and Phil Hellmuth are both representatives of BetRivers Poker; the former after his Run It Once poker platform was acquired and transformed into the new product, the latter after signing on in January of this year.
With the site live in Pennsylvania (biggest city, Philadelphia), the opportunity to get these two poker giants to face off online was clearly too good to pass up. The Phil vs. Phil match was announced just the day before, taking place online on the BetRivers client, with both players streaming every hand.
$5K buy-in, $25/50 blinds
The plan was for a couple of $5K buy-in heads-up matches, and it took under 90 minutes for Hellmuth to felt his opponent for a 1-0 lead. The Phils fired up another table, again with $5K starting stacks, to play a second match. That one, too, went the way of Phil the Elder.
While Galfond was rarely able to build a worthwhile lead in game 1, the second match saw him fare better, yet ultimately fall once again to his namesake.
The crucial hand came in something of a cooler for Galfond, though Hellmuth’s careful, trappy play was a big factor in getting maximum value.
Hellmuth, on the button with 
and playing off a stack of $6.8K, called the blind and Galfond, holding 
with $3K behind, checked his option.
The 
flop gave Hellmuth a set, which he cannily checked along with Galfond.
The 
on the turn was a bad card for Galfond, giving him two pair and cause to bet, which he did to the tune of 2/3 pot, $66. Hellmuth min-raised, which Galfond called.
If the turn was bad news for Galfond, the 
on the river was a disaster. He elected to check his full house - 3s full of deuces - and bait a bet from Hellmuth, who obliged with his better full house (5s full of 3s). Hellmuth bet $121, Galfond raised to $928, and Hellmuth came back with a raise to $2,693.
The call left Galfond with fewer than 5 big blinds, which Hellmuth soon scooped up for a profit of almost $10K and a 2-0 win for the day.
A dream stream
The beauty of watching a poker streamer do their thing is being able to observe their thought process, first-hand, in real time as it happens. Having two such significant figures in 21st century poker each streaming their hole cards, independently, in a heads-up match was a treat for those fans who logged in to one, or both of the streams.
“I just play this very unique style, and I’ve been very lucky with it,” said Hellmuth in the immediate aftermath of his 2-0 victory. “My style's so unique, it's just very hard to play, and requires some real patience and some real bright lay-downs here and there. You just have to routinely get used to making these.”
As for Galfond, he took defeat with the grace for which he’s known, and spent a few moments at the end of the game responding to chat comments in his stream. One suggested that whoever wins the challenge would win the name ‘Phil’, with the loser relegated to ‘Philip’.
“I guess I’m Philip now,” said Philip.
Additional image courtesy of PokerGO.
