JPML OUI Tournament Results
When I got a text message from our friend Kaori Shimizu saying that she didn’t do very well at the OUI tournament in November, I figured that she had gone out in the quarter-finals.
Nope! She meant at the final table. If that’s not doing good I hate to think of what my results come to…
The OUI tournament started with amateur qualifiers all over the country. I recommend this tournament for anyone visiting Japan during October. In the spring you can play in the Masters Tournament, but these are the only chances for non-pro’s to play in JPML tournaments.
The Pro qualifier happened in November and Garthe, Kamimura, Konno and I played in the first day along with over a hundred other players from various organizations. Konno was the only one of us to make it to the main event, but he didn’t make it to the finals. There was another qualifying day and because of the popularity of the event this was the first year they didn’t allow us to play on both days of the qualifier. Instead Garthe and I played in a tournament at Kamimura’s mahjong parlor the next day.
The next week hosted the main event and the quarter-finals and a week after that was the semi-finals and the final table. Our featured player Kazunori Takizawa won this title 2 years in a row but we didn’t see him at the finals this year. However, all the players were from JPML and there were many familiar faces, even to those of us at RM.com.
The final five: Masayoshi Ara, Kaori Shimizu, Hiro Yamai, Yoshihiro Ohashi and Satoshi Oda.
Ara, being the vice-president of JPML was the seasoned veteran and has held this title twice before in 1977 (before it was even a JPML event!) and 2003. Shimizu also won the event in 2001.
The final table started with 5 games with one player sitting out each game. The top 4 players would play the last 2 games for the title. After the second game these veterans were hurting with negative scores while Ohashi was in the lead with Yamai right behind him. Yamai was able to take that lead in the next game but Shimizu and Ara were still trailing with 3rd and 4th place finishes.
Shimizu took first in the 4th game but it wasn’t enough to get her in the black and her 4th place finish in the 5th game put her right back down in the negative score. Ohashi stole the lead back with twice as many points as Oda in 2nd place.
The second round didn’t bring any solace to the players behind as Oda and Ohashi took first and second again respectively. The last game changed nothing and the final results were
1st – Yoshihiro Ohashi
2nd – Satoshi Oda
3rd – Hiro Yamai
4th – Kaori Shimizu
5th – Masayoshi Ara
Kudos to Kaori for making another final table, even though she wanted to win and congratulations to Ohashi on his second title (he won the rookie cup his first year in the league). Ohashi is also an avid poker player and this title solidifies his presence in the professional mahjong league. You can catch all these players on Ron2 and Ohashi, Yamai, Shimizu and Ara also appear on Mahjong Fight Club.
