The Shooting Star isn’t your average tournament as it features an interesting twist in that there is $5,000 bounties placed on certain pros and anyone who knocks them out collects the bounty. In addition to this, the chip leader at the end of each day pocketed $10,000 which added to the side incentives.

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These generous and numerous prizes were enough to attract the likes of major stars Phil Ivey and Phil Hellmuth Jr., current WSOP champ Jerry Yang, Kathy Liebert, Gavin Griffin, Jennifer Tilly, Gus Hansen, Men “The Master” Nguyen, J.C. Tran, Hoyt Corkins, John “The Razor” Phan, Lee Watkinson, Brandon Cantu, and Nam Le.

Unfortunately, many of the star players who made the trip to San Jose did so in vain as quite a few went out in the first day – some with bounties on their heads. In day 1a, David Williams and Jerry Yang (staying consistent with his quick tourney exits) went out very early as others collected $5000 from their misfortunes. Thirteen other day 1a bounties would fall later including Gavin Griffin, Gus Hansen, Hoyt Corkins, Nam Le and Bill Elder. Brandon Cantu took the first lead of Bay 101 and collected ten grand in the process.

Day 1b wasn’t too kind to big name players either. Jennifer Tilly and Kristy Gazes were free to enjoy the rest of the day as they quickly made an exit from the tables while giving up bounties to those who ousted them. Gavin Smith, T.J. Cloutier, and Antonio Esfandiari were a few more $5K bounty players who fell on day 1b as well. Blair Hinkle won his $10,000 entry fee back as he was the chip leader at day’s end.

138 players made it past the a,b junk to play in day 2 and 16 of them were Shooting Stars. Men Nguyen, who’s been doing excellent in live tournament so far this year, didn’t fare so well in this one as he was the first bounty to go in day 2. Mike Matusow, Phil Laak, Scotty Nguyen, and Kathy Liebert were a few of the other bounty players to go on this day which saw Michael Baker take the lead in chips. It also saw the tourney director give Phil Hellmuth a microphone which he probably didn’t know would be used for the next half hour to tell stories and talk to buddies still playing.

By the time day 3 had begun, Phil was finally done talking and most of the Shooting Stars business was over with. Now, with just 36 players left, it was time to shift eyes on the million dollar prize for first place. Day 1b leader Blair Hinkle had run through all his chips by day 3 and Full Tilt hottie Clonie Gowen could go no further either as she busted out too. Lee Watkinson, David Pham, and J.C. Tran were the last ones to have their stacks run dry as they finished 9th, 8th, and 7th in a pro-heavy rush to make it to the final table.

With day 3 completed, the final table was ready to go. Brandon Cantu regained his chip lead and sat first with $3,323,000 worth while he was followed by Michael Baker who only fell one spot with his 1,964,000 chips. Noah Jefferson checked in at third and far behind the top two with $842,000 and Jennifer Harmon was sitting in fourth after a steady tourney climb. Veteran Steve Sung was in fifth and the Corona-guzzling John Phan fought his way to the final seat at the final table.

John Phan came into Day 4 intoxicated and last in chips as things began. Not much changed in either category as The Razor’s chips diminished quickly right up until he was knocked out by Noah Jefferson. He left $135,000 richer.

Michael Baker, who’d battled Brandon Cantu for the chip lead most of the tournament, continued this battle at the final table. On one hand, the two got into a pre-flop betting war which left both with half a mil in the pot. After the flop was shown, Qs, Td, 2d, Baker said, “OK, let’s gamble” and went all-in. The surprise came when he flipped over Kd, 3d which gave him a flush draw but really raised some serious pre-flop questions. Cantu showed pocket aces and the turn and river revealed black 5’s which sent Baker home.

Brandon’s stack was considerably larger now and everyone left knew it. Play began to slow down dramatically and the next five hours were very tedious. It wasn’t until Noah Jefferson started making moves against Cantu’s stack that any action occurred. Unfortunately for him, they were the wrong moves and Jefferson went out in 4th. Jennifer Harmon’s stack had begun to take a beating too and she went out quickly after Jefferson in 3rd with $330,000 to her name.

Now it was just Steve Sung left at the table with Cantu and his massive chip hoard. Sung was at a huge disadvantage but he still battled and tried to cut into the stack at the 7th hand of heads-up play. The flop read 8, 7 ,6 and Steve called Brandon’s 200K bet. The turn of A brought no action while the J on the river inspired Cantu to throw 500,000 chips on the felt to which Sung called. People never saw what Sung had for, after Brandon showed pocket jacks for the set, he threw his cards into the pile.

With virtually no chance now, Steve went all-in on the next hand. However, his pocket 3’s were clipped by Cantu’s pocket 4’s making Brandon the Bay 101 winner. The $40,000 he’d won in bounties and day leader bonuses now seemed insignificant to the $1,000,000 he claimed at the end. The leader for the majority of the tournament, Cantu earned a well deserved victory over the dozens of shooting stars in San Jose.