Field at NAPT Mohegan Sun Rises to 716

The latest stop of the North American Poker Tour kicked off yesterday at the Mohegan Sun in Uncasville, Connecticut. From what I understand, the Mohegan Sun is a huge place. Supposed to be the second-largest casino in the country, actually, in terms of square-footage. First opened mid-1990s.

Several of my buds are there covering the sucker, and I’m following their reports online over at PokerNews and on the PokerStars blog. Am checking out Andrew Feldman’s reports at the ESPN Poker Club, too -- here’s his Day 1 wrap. By the way, that cool photo from the event is by Joe Giron of the PS crew, with whom I worked at the NAPT Venetian event.

Looks like they ended up drawing 716 players to the $4,700+$300 Main Event, including some of the Full Tilt pros who were not at the NAPT Venetian event, such as Tom “durrrr” Dwan (who didn’t make it through the first day of play) and Phil Ivey (who did). David Williams leads the 450 or so who made it through to today’s second day of play. Vanessa Selbst also accumulated a big stack yesterday, ending the day in second position behind Williams.

The wildest hand I saw reported yesterday was over on the Stars blog, a hand that occurred right near the end of the day. Faraz “The Toilet” Jaka -- a final tablist in the NAPT Venetian High Roller event and who has been on a rampage for the last year or more -- called an opponent’s all-in bet on the river with the board showing , risking half of his stack. His opponent showed -- Jaka had correctly guessed he’d missed a draw.

What did Jaka have? . No shinola. The hand report comes near the top of the page here, if you’re curious.

Seems like 716 is a solid number of entrants for this second American stop on the NAPT. Over a third of those -- 273 -- won their seats via satellites on PokerStars, showing again how much online satellites can help build fields. Feldman reports that the Mohegan Sun tourney manager told him they had planned for just 600 to come. But once they had reached that figure, players kept coming. And coming. Meaning some last-minute scrambling was required.

You can read Feldman’s explanation of how that went down in his report, including what it was Allen “Chainsaw” Kessler was complaining about over Twitter regarding the seating.

Overall, though, it sounds like that first day went off fairly well and with a $3.2 million-plus prize pool looks to be another major event on the professional circuit.

No other NAPT stops have been announced as yet, although I would expect we’ll hear something soon along those lines. I’ll be interested, partly because I’m hoping perhaps to get a chance to cover one or more of ’em down the line.

Speaking of, I found out yesterday that I will be returning to the WSOP this summer to help cover the Series for PokerNews. Will be my third time, and I am definitely excited to be going back. Details to come!

Meanwhile, check those links above for more reports from the NAPT Mohegan Sun.

Kentucky Seeks Biggest Rake Back Deal Ever from Full Tilt Poker

Just yesterday I was drinking a soft drink, a bottle of Mello Yello wrapped in an “old-school”-ish label that looked a little like what was used when the drink was first introduced back in the late 70s. At one point I idly looked down at the “nutrition” information (those are scare quotes there) and noticed the disclaimer in bold letters above -- “CONTAINS NO JUICE.”

Being a poker player, these words had a pleasant ring to them. No one likes the “juice” -- i.e., the money taken out of buy-ins or the “rake” dragged by the house to run their games.

A little later in the day I started to hear a few rumblings about a lawsuit that had been filed by the Commonwealth of Kentucky against Full Tilt Poker a couple of weeks ago. That’s in addition to the rumblings of borborygmi in my stomach, of course.

(Took over four years to use that word in a post. Drawing from an experience working in a pediatric gastroenterologist’s office there. Maybe one day I’ll be able to use “hepatosplenomegaly.”)

Sounded like in this lawsuit the focus here was in fact on the “juice” or “rake” taken by Full Tilt from the games. I continued to listen.

This wasn’t the ongoing seizure-domain case that the Kentucky Supreme Court recently overturned (again) “due to the incapacity of domain names to contest their own seizure.” In that one, one of the defendants, a representative of True Poker (truepoker.com), has filed an affidavit saying that an employee of the company that owned the site (Yatahay Limited) is a member of the Interactive Media and Entertainment Gaming Association (iMEGA) and thus iMEGA does in fact technically have standing there to represent the defendants. The Kentucky Supreme Court is still brooding over that one.

Nor was this the story from just a couple of days ago about a federal grand jury in Manhattan investigating Full Tilt Poker and perhaps preparing to bring indictments against its owners over some sort of money-laundering violations. A lot that is being unsaid in that story thus far, although both Howard Lederer and Chris “Jesus” Ferguson were named as potential targets in the report.

No, this was something new. Another, novel legal tactic designed to bring down online poker in the U.S., it seemed. Shortly after those initial rumblings, the story broke in earnest -- I first saw it over on Poker News Daily. Indeed, in a complaint filed on March 25, 2010, Kentucky sued Full Tilt Poker for allowing its residents to play on the site.

And indeed, it’s about the rake. Kentucky wants its rake back. And then some.

The 14-page complaint begins with a characterization of “The Full Tilt Defendants” and what the Commonwealth believes they have done to deserve this legal action. Reference is made to an entity called “Pocket Kings Ltd” in Dublin, Ireland, which is said to have operated with “certain other unknown entities” to have “acted in concert in a joint venture to facilitate, host, operate, and profit from... Full Tilt Poker.” The arrangement is characterized as “a series of shell companies” that has been constructed “to conceal [the defendants’] identities and avoid their legal responsibilities.”

Then comes a long list of actions the Full Tilt Defendants “purposefully and knowingly” have done, mostly concerning hosting online poker games available to Kentucky residents -- 13,000 of them, as recently noted by iMEGA in the Kentucky Court of Appeals. And, importantly, having “take[n] a percentage of the amount bet, won or lost as the ‘rake,’ ‘take out’ or commission for hosting the poker games” for their own pecuniary gain.

Along the way, the actions of the Full Tilt Defendants are characterized as “tortuous.” That would mean purposefully circuitous, not causing torture or suffering (in other words, what Kentucky is trying to do to online poker players.)

Also, there is a sort of funny, comprehensive reference to the Kentucky players as “losers.” No, that’s not a comment on their poker skills, but a technical reference to KRS 372.020, that part of the state’s civil law that says if in a gambling wager “a person loses to another at one (1) time, or within twenty-four (24) hours, five dollars ($5) or more, or anything of that value” that person is entitled to recovering twice its value plus court costs and attorney’s fees. Accordingly, the Full Tilt Defendants are described as “winners” here.

But wait. KRS 372.040 adds that if “the loser” doesn’t sue “the winner” within six months “and prosecute the suit to recovery with due diligence, any other person may sue the winner and recover treble the value of the money or thing lost” plus court costs and attorney’s fees, if that suit is brought within five years of the wager/payment having occurred.

And that’s what is happening here. Since no one else has sued Full Tilt to get their rake back, Kentucky is doing it. They are suing to get that rake back for the period covering March 25, 2005 through March 25, 2009.

And yes, they want treble. And that means trouble.

Not just for Full Tilt, actually. The remainder of the complaint lists all of the other sites Kentucky intends to go after as well -- the “Other Unknown Defendants” who operate those other sites hosted by the contested domains in that other suit. “As the name and place of residence of the Unknown Defendants are discovered,” so goes the threat, “this Complaint with be amended accordingly.”

Wild stuff. No idea whether or not this suit has something going for it or if it “contains no juice” (so to speak). Not really sure how it is that Kentucky can sue to recover what Kentuckians lost to the rake. (Nor how they expect to go about computing that amount.) In any event, I can’t help but think that whatever happens with regard to the suit, it cannot possibly be good either for Full Tilt Poker or for online poker, generally speaking.

Put that with the impending June 1 deadline for banks to begin complying with the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006, and I’m starting to hear a different sort of rumble -- that of U.S. players seriously contemplating removing their funds from their online poker accounts.

Such is online poker for Americans. Never mellow.

Another Title for the Phil Hellmuth of College Hoops

Once the NCAA tournament reached the Elite Eight, Thomas “GnightMoon” Fuller -- who made the final table of that NAPT Venetian event I helped cover back in February (and which will be airing on ESPN later this month -- wrote a post on his blog, Bad Moon Rising, in which he compared the remaining teams to various poker players.

Kentucky was Phil Ivey, he said. “The best, as long as they try.” Upstart Butler was Jason Somerville. “Lurking, dangerous, ready to break through.” A couple of teams new to the Elite Eight he identified as examples of (relatively unknown) “internet player X.”

And Duke? I asked Vera Valmore, who hadn’t read the post, whom she thought Fuller might have picked to represent Duke. She guessed it immediately.

“Duke is Phil Hellmuth,” wrote Fuller. “Nobody wants to see them win.”

I know I didn’t want to see Duke win last night, although for me -- a UNC-Chapel Hill grad -- the aversion to seeing Duke succeed is instinctive. Like breathing, basically.

I’ve always rooted against Duke. A few years ago Carolina grad Will Blythe wrote a terrific book called To Hate Like This Is to Be Happy Forever: A Thoroughly Obsessive, Intermittently Uplifting, and Occasionally Unbiased Account of the Duke-North Carolina Basketball Rivalry. Title is awkward -- and probably didn’t help sales -- but I’m one of those people who entirely understand what it conveys.

Even so, I’ll admit even I was a little surprised this year at just how much people who don’t necessarily have ties to North Carolina or the Atlantic Coast Conference seem to dislike Duke. I would say they are the Yankees of college basketball, but the Yankees have as many fans as haters. Not really the case with Duke, I don’t think.

Some might have heard about that story that appeared in The Indianapolis Star prior to the Final Four -- “Despising Duke” -- that featured a photo of Duke head coach Mike Krzyzewski that had been doodled on, giving him devil’s horns, a mustache, and so forth. The newspaper ended up pulling the photo and apologizing over the matter. They even changed the headline. (Read about all that here, if you’re curious.)

Was not at all surprised to have heard that story, really. I mean the despising of Duke goes on all over. Like I say, as a UNC guy I have difficulty speaking at all objectively about the subject, but I know many who aren’t Carolina fans truly hate Duke. And last night, when tiny Butler, playing in their backyard in Indy, was David to Duke’s Goliath, well, everybody (it seemed) was pulling for the Bulldogs.

An incredible game it was, and if Gordon Hayward had sunk that three-pointer from half-court to win the sucker at the buzzer, we probably would have had to take a national holiday today to recover from it.

But it was not to be. The team nobody wanted to see win prevailed.

The comparison to Hellmuth is inspired, although there are a couple of important differences between Duke and the Poker Brat. While Duke has had a few poor sportsmen on its rosters over the years (one ironically named “Christian” springs to mind), Coach K and his players tend to conduct themselves especially well. Like I say, there have been exceptions, but nothing as consistently egregious as the figure cut by Hellmuth.

Another difference occurs to me this morning. Duke winning or losing the title doesn’t mean a heckuva lot to the rest those who complete in the sport. Actually, the only teams who can be said to benefit in significantly tangible way are those in Duke’s conference. A chunk of the revenue generated by the televising of the NCAA tourney is given to the participating conferences, with those conferences who have teams do well receiving more of the moneys.

I suppose one could argue that Duke’s deep run ensured higher ratings overall, thus more money overall going back to all the schools. But really the NCAA tourney -- unlike just about every other sport -- gets viewers regardless of who is there at the end.

Over on the poker side, though, everyone benefits from a deep Hellmuth run in a televised event. It draws viewers, and thus new players. We might not like the way his poor behavior might appear to invite others to act similarly, but there’s a substantial plus for all of us -- including poker media types, one has to include -- when he succeeds.

So maybe Duke isn’t quite the Phil Hellmuth of college hoops. That said, with four NCAA titles now under Coach K (1990, 1991, 2001, and 2010), Duke certainly has one thing in common with Hellmuth. It is hard to argue with the success of either.

A Time Out for Timex

When Mike McDonald first joined the forums over at Two Plus Two, it apparently took him just a split second to choose a username (so to speak). A quick glance at his watch -- a Timex -- and he’d made his choice. When I first heard of McDonald and his nickname a couple of years ago, I wondered if he was familiar with the old Timex slogan, used heavily in ad campaigns through the 1970s, though less frequently after that: “it takes a licking and keeps on ticking.” If he was, the nickname seemed a good one, connoting an ability to endure under pressure.

Now it appears “Timex” has made another big decision, though this one appears to have required a bit more study. Has to do with endurance under pressure, actually.

Like many I was somewhat intrigued by that story from last week about McDonald, best known for his win at the 2008 European Poker Tour Dortmund main event, announcing that he was “retiring” from poker at the ripe age of 20. A lot of people found the news interesting, I think, probably because of how McDonald’s announcement sounded several themes with which many poker players are familiar.

The story first surfaced over on the CardRunners site where McDonald has been an instructor and keeps a blog. Last Wednesday McDonald published a 2,200-plus word essay describing his somewhat changed attitude toward poker in a post titled “Where To Go From Here.”

If one reads the post, one finds McDonald doesn’t actually say he’s quitting poker altogether or “retiring” per se. Rather, McDonald explains reasons why “in some ways I feel that the poker chapter of my life is ending” and how he is anticipating taking on some different challenges here in the near term.

McDonald starts out introducing himself as a competitive person who has always enjoyed seeking challenges. Like many poker players he played sports previously, then as a late teen got into poker. He refers to his rapid ascent, including the huge win at EPT Dortmund in January 2008. At just 18 years old, he’d won a whopping €933,600 first prize (about $1.37 million). In the post he notes how following the win he found he’d “lost a fair bit of motivation to grind” and in fact didn’t play much poker for the next short period.

That response in and of itself is probably significant for McDonald, that is, for the big score to have reduced his competitive drive like that. In fact, I’d bet a lot of us have experienced something similar, though obviously not on such a grand scale. Dealing with big wins is in fact quite difficult, and it requires a different kind of mental toughness not to allow success to affect one’s game unduly. Some of us respond to winning a tourney or a hugely successful cash session by playing less well, becoming careless with our bigger bankrolls. Others, like McDonald, become less driven, another potentially significant factor that can negatively affect one’s success at the tables.

Of course, as McDonald explains, he has been able to continue to play well over the last couple of years despite his flagging ambition. And now he finds himself asking a lot of the same questions most 20-year-olds are asking. Hell, these are questions a lot of us keep asking, well after age 20 has receded into the rearview mirror.

The remainder of McDonald’s post sounds a few different themes. He meanders a bit and is at times redundant, but he’s both earnest and thoughtful throughout. And, as I say, I think he’s touching on issues that matter to a lot of us -- whether or not we play poker for high stakes, low stakes, or even play at all.

One theme is the sense that McDonald has that “there was no next logical step” in poker for him. “I just kind of feel like there is nowhere to go from here in poker,” writes McDonald, a situation that contributes to his feeling “unfulfilled by it.” A lot of us find ourselves in careers that aren’t fulfilling -- careers that we may have initially sought out because of our particular interests and abilities, but for a variety of reasons no longer allow us to grow creatively or, as, McDonald says of himself, leave us “no longer really feel[ing] the need to improve.”

“I derive almost no fulfil[l]ment/satisfaction/feeling of accomplishment at this point,” adds McDonald. Hard not to respond a little cynically, of course, to the 20-year-old with over $2.6 million in tourney winnings complaining that he lacks a “feeling of accomplishment.” But I think most of us recognize what he’s talking about. A lot of us find ourselves lacking that sense of accomplishment, even if to others we might be viewed as successfully carrying on with impressive, flourishing careers.

McDonald also talks more than once about poker having what he feels to be a negative effect on his relationships with others, noting how it often feels like “poker has become an escape for me” and that it “seems to be a lot more isolating that I initially realized.” He doesn’t like appearing “one-dimensional” to non-poker people, nor does he like finding it difficult to relate to others (both in and out of poker).

Again, full-timers can probably identify best with this sort of love-hate feeling about poker -- especially those of the online crowd -- but I think again this is something most of us find ourselves dealing with in some fashion. Our jobs distinguish us, but they can separate us, too. That can be challenging enough if we like our jobs, but especially tough if we aren’t being fulfilled by them.

There’s another component to poker that the pros sometimes mention -- namely, the sense that one isn’t really contributing to society in a positive way. As a necessarily “selfish” endeavor, some poker players find it a source of discomfort to spend hours and hours at the tables, helping themselves but not necessarily helping others. I think McDonald kind of evokes this idea in an indirect way when he talks about poker being an “escape” and characterizes it as a way “to let time pass.”

Not all of us are thinking along these lines, but again I think many of us do sometimes step back and wonder about our contributions to the greater good. And whether our jobs or other endeavors matter much in the bigger scheme.

Toward the end of the post McDonald admits he’s “probably a heavy favourite to return” to poker. He’s said elsewhere that he will be playing EPT San Remo and EPT Monte Carlo (both later this month), as he’d already arranged to do so. He doesn’t turn 21 until September, so the 2011 will be his first opportunity to play in the WSOP. Wouldn’t be surprising to see him there.

For now, though, there are other things on the young Canadian’s mind, including a possible return to school and/or exploring some business ventures as a means to find something that is interesting, challenging, and that helps him connect with others in more beneficial ways. (McDonald elaborates a bit more on his post and plans in an interview over at Part Time Poker, if you’re interested.)

I like this sort of self-study and attempt to gain perspective. It’s not often I find it possible anymore to identify much with a 20-year-old’s view of the world and his place in it -- never mind one who’s a multi-millionaire. But I think “Timex” gives us all some things to think about.

Fooled Around And Fell (Into the Money)

Ended up having a blast yesterday playing in those “April Foolishness” tournaments on PokerStars (discussed yesterday). After a bit of study, I decided to enter two of the four $2.00+$0.20 rebuy events. By the way, that picture is the disclaimer that appeared when one entered the tourneys, which caused me to grin. Hey, I always try to have a sense of humor when playing tourneys. Them suckers can cause too much hurt otherwise.

One of the ones I entered was Mike’s Tourney -- or “yenrouT s’ekiM,” as it was listed in the lobby. That was the one with decreasing blinds/antes for the first 21 levels, at which point they began going up again. I also tried Frederik’s Tourney, the pot-limit hold’em/pot-limit Omaha mixed event with blinds/antes going up and down randomly and rebuys for just $0.02.

I initially was enjoying Frederik’s Tourney much more than Mike’s, mainly because of the cheap rebuys. In Mike’s tourney we all started with 4,875 chips, but the blinds started 1,500/3,000 with a 375 ante. On the first hand of the tourney I was dealt under the gun and folded. On the next hand I had in the big blind, meaning two-thirds of my stack was already in the middle. So I called an all-in and luckily flopped a ten to double up.

But that good fortune didn’t last, as within the first orbit I had A-A cracked and soon had to rebuy. I would rebuy once more, ultimately investing $6.20 in the thing, and by the time the rebuy period ended I somehow had 27,960 chips. I could not take the add-on (6000 chips for $2), since another quirky part of the event was you had to be under 12,000 to be allowed to take it.

Meanwhile, I was having more fun with the other crazies in Frederik’s Tourney going all in hand after hand during the rebuy period. I ended up double-rebuying four times over there (for just 16 cents), then took the $0.03 add-on, too, so the total investment on that one was just $2.37. Busting on the last hand of the rebuy period there meant I had the minimum -- 11,000 -- when we cranked back up again in that one.

I’d last another hour or so in Frederik’s Tourney before unimpressively busting in 1,047th (out 2,187). Meanwhile, as the blinds were going down in Mike’s Tourney, my stack was growing.

Was kind of an interesting phenomenon, to watch Mike’s Tourney change from a shove-fest during the rebuy period, to a stretch where a select few were desperately short-stacked, to a period where everyone essentially had deep stacks. As we entered Level 21 -- the last level before the blinds started going back up again -- I had a (well) below average stack of 47,135, which at the time was still 23-plus big blinds.

Even with five-minute levels and the blinds starting to increase more rapidly then they had decreased, I was able to play some postflop poker during that part of the tourney and even managed to play a few hands reasonably well.

A total of 3,517 had entered this one, with the top 396 scheduled to get paid. When the money bubble burst, I was still there, and would continue to hang on before finally busting just shy of the top 90, getting $45.23 back for my trouble. Was pleased to see our friend Kevmath also make it that deep as well (he went out about the same time I did).

By the end, all but a few of those left were essentially short-stacked again, meaning just about all of the eliminations at that point came after preflop all-ins. Kevmath sadly ran pocket jacks into pocket kings. Then, with the blinds 17,500/35,000 (ante 4,375), I was able to open-shove my 220,614 from the button with and got called by the big blind who held . Found out later it was the same player who’d knocked Kevmath out, in fact.

Flop -- -- and turn -- -- were good. But the on the river sent me railward.

I thought afterwards about how I’d at one point had a stack of over a quarter million (even then below average) and how that might have been the most chips I’d ever had in front of me in a tourney.

I railed the other two April Foolishness events a little, including watching the final hand of Alex’s Tourney, the one which featured a normal structure for nine levels, then crazily went to 1 billion/2 billion blinds and a 500,000 million ante at Level 10.

I’m not completely sure, but I think that at the start of Level 10 there were something like 500-600 players left in that one, meaning it took three or four hands to get down to the end. I wanted to show an animation of that final hand, but the converter over at Poker Hand Replays seemed to have trouble dealing with all them chips. So here’s that final hand, converted via Deuces Cracked:

Poker Stars $2.00+$0.20 No Limit Hold'em Tournament - t1000000000/t2000000000 Blinds + t4835667 - 4 players
The Official DeucesCracked.com Hand History Converter

edja15 (BTN): t6574804 M = 0.00
Biböl002 (SB): t128984 M = 0.00
simcof (BB): t2943045 M = 0.00
yulian_99 (CO): t4835667 M = 0.00

Pre Flop: (t14482500)
Flop: (t14482500) 8 3 3 (4 players)
Turn: (t14482500) 4 (4 players)
River: (t14482500) 6 (4 players)

Final Pot: t14482500

edja15 shows 8 Q (two pair, Eights and Threes)
Biböl002 shows 7 Q (a pair of Threes)
simcof shows 6 5 (two pair, Sixes and Threes)
yulian_99 shows T J (a pair of Threes)

edja15 wins t3785244
edja15 wins t8442183
edja15 wins t515936
(Rake: t1739137)

(Not sure why there’s a “rake” listed here.)

Definitely a fun time, made funner by sneaking into some cash. That’s a couple of tourney successes this week -- talked about the other one a little here -- giving me a taste for playing more (not that I’m taking having modest success in a novelty event as an indicator of much of anything). A different sort of glee at winning tourney money versus a successful cash session. More lasting, I think. (And maybe more addictive.)

Have a good weekend, all. I hope everyone finds more time for foolin’ around.

Fool Me Once, Twice, Three Times (Yes I’m Slow... Yr Point?)

Good Lawd. What has happened? Today I wake up and am stunned to read stories like...

“Isildur1 is Mats Sundin”

or “FBI Probe Discovers NBA Has Been Fixing Games For Past Decade”

or “Kahnawake Gaming Commission Identifies Authorities Assisting Ongoing Investigation in UltimateBet Scandal.”

Wait, wat? Oh. Right. (Big grins on that KGC one, by the way.)

What other funny business is happening today?

Well, PokerStars is running a few April Fool’s-related tourneys that look like they might provide a few more laughs. As Brad “Otis” Willis notes over on the PokerStars blog, “the PokerStars Tournaments Team has got their silly on today.”

All four events begin at 15:05 today on the PokerStars clock. All four have the same $2.00+$0.20 buy-in.


Search for “foolishness” in the tourney filter to find ’em. All pretty in pink.

Mike’s Tourney (listed as “yenrouT s’ekiM”) is a no-limit hold’em rebuy tourney in which players start with 4,875 chips. If at or below the starting stack, one can rebuy during the first half-hour (4,000 for $2), and there’s a chance to add on after that (6,000 for $2), but only if one is sitting with less than 12,000. The real twist, though, is in the blinds/antes schedule -- they decrease rather than increase, starting at a whopping 1,500/3,000 (with a 375 ante -- that’s right, everyone begins with an “M” of less than 1), then gradually sliding downwards for the first 21 five-minute levels all of the way to 100/200/25 before turning around again.

Fredrik’s Tournament is a PLO/PLH event. It is also a rebuy event, only for this one rebuys (for 2,500 chips) are only two cents. And the add-on (for 6,000) is just $0.03. The blinds and antes (including antes in PLO) also vary wildly, going up and down for the first 35 levels or so before finally settling into a rapid increase help to finish the sucker off.

Bryan’s Tournament, an NLH event, might also be referred to as “Crazy Eights.” Starting stack just 888 chips, but one can rebuy (888 more) for $0.08, then add-on 88,888 chips for $0.88. The blinds move back and forth between 88/88 and 888/888 during the first eight levels, then move up to 88,888/88,888 at level 11 where they remain for the rest of the event. The antes also vary for that initial period, but starting at Level 11 follow the Fibonacci sequence (1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, etc.). And oh yeah, the tourney will be played eight-handed.

Finally, Alex’s Tourney starts out like a plain old vanilla NLH rebuy event and remains so for the first nine 10-minute levels. Starting stack 1,000, rebuys for first half-hour, 1,500 add-on. Then comes level 10, where the blinds jump to 1 billion/2 billion with a 500 million-chip ante.

I think we can all predict the exact hand where Alex’s Tourney will be concluding. (EDIT [added 5:00 p.m. ET]: I shouldn’t have spoken so confidently here -- actually, it took what appeared to be five or so hands of Level 10 for this one to finish.)

Fun stuff all around. Might have to hop into one or more of these suckers, if I can get all this other work outta the way beforehand. Then maybe there’ll be time for what’s really important. You know, the foolin’ around.

More Multi-Accounting

Last week one of the bigger stories in poker news concerned another scandal of sorts in online poker, this one involving a relatively well known pro, Nick “Stoxtrader” Grudzien.

According to his bio page on Two Plus Two, Nick’s nick comes from his former career on Wall Street. His poker career began in earnest in 2003, with an initial focus on limit hold’em. There’s talk in the bio of his careful bankroll management as he moved up limits (“he has always had 1,000 big bets in his poker designated bankroll for any limit hold’em game in which he has played”). The bio also mentions that 2+2 book he co-authored with Geoff “Zobags” Herzog titled Winning in Tough Hold’em Games: Short-Handed and High Stakes Concepts and Theory for Limit Hold’em, first published in 2007.

I haven’t read that one, but consistently hear good things about it as one of the few high quality, high-stakes LHE books out there. The book was published by Two Plus Two where Grudzien has been a longtime poster and participant in the forums, and until recently was a moderator, too.

In 2006 (I believe), Grudzien helped launch the StoxPoker coaching site which included instructional videos, a forum, and soon became a popular landing place for players looking to improve their games. In 2008 a rival coaching site, CardRunners, acquired StoxPoker and the companies merged although continued to maintain separate sites.

Such a background thus made Grudzien’s recent admission to multi-accounting on PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker -- where doing so is not allowed by either site’s terms of service -- all the more notable.

I haven’t been able to follow every detail of how the scandal broke and eventually led to Grudzien’s confirmation that he had been playing on multiple accounts on a couple of different sites, but here is a thumbnail sketch of what has happened as far as I understand it. (Those already familiar with all of this might skip down for “a few thoughts” about it all.)

It was almost exactly a year ago that there was some discussion on Two Plus Two about possible collusion on Full Tilt Poker between two players -- “Kinetica” and “40putts” -- who always seemed to log on and off at the same times while playing (mostly) short-handed no-limit hold’em games using similar styles.

That furor eventually died down, but “40putts” attracted some attention again in January 2010 when he suddenly disappeared from Full Tilt on the same day another high-volume player named “knockstiff” stopped playing on PokerStars. A little over a week later two new accounts appeared -- “bulltf0rdtuff” on FTP and “gr3atvlewbr0” on Stars -- both of whom began playing the same games (and in the same styles) as had “40putts” and “knockstiff.”

Then three weeks ago an unknown poster -- apparently someone who had been previously banned from the site but who created a new account -- started a thread in the High Stakes No Limit forum at 2+2 with a post accusing Grudzien of multi-accounting using some of the aformentioned accounts. The post also reprised the earlier colluding accusation. The thread got deleted (and the poster banned again, I suppose), but the accusations soon reappeared in a post by the well known pro David “Viffer” Peat and thereby received renewed attention.

As I mentioned before, Grudzien has long been a frequent contributor and a moderator at 2+2. Additionally, StoxPoker had its own sponsored forum on 2+2. So when a couple of days passed without a response from Grudzien, folks began to get increasingly agitated. Finally he did post a response on March 14 (a couple of days after Peat’s post) which addressed the situation but didn’t really deny that he’d multi-accounted.

In fact, it sort-of-kind-of confirmed that he had.

Grudzien’s post included a fairly impressive catalogue of the ways someone might benefit from creating multiple accounts -- presented in the context of a denial that he’d benefited in these ways. Here’s what he said:

“There are online poker players who have used 2nd screenames for the purpose of deceiving others into giving them action, evading taxes, collusion, entering multiple times into the same tournament, ghosting, to obscure previous results and stats, to clear extra bonuses, to circumvent affiliate CPA or rakeback rules, to bypass the pokersites shortstack buy-in time limitation, to teamplay, to share action with others at the same table, to chip dump or otherwise engage in underhanded actions I do not know about. I have never done any of these things. Beyond that I cannot and will not comment on the screename issue, nor can I say why I cannot elaborate further other than to say that my reasons for that are serious and personal.”

Fuel on the fire, that.

Three days later (March 17), Grudzien resurfaced to suggest he felt “a number of competitors and enemies” of CardRunners/StoxPoker were “seizing on this opportunity to discredit myself and our company,” and that an “official statement” would be forthcoming. He soon followed that with a post admitting to the multi-accounting, though denying ever colluding. He added that since he was admitting he’d violated the TOS of FTP of Stars, he would not be playing on either site until they gave him permission to do so.

One day later, Grudzien said he was resigning from StoxPoker. A week after that, StoxPoker announced it would be merging its site with CardRunners altogether (starting May 1, 2010).

A few thoughts come to mind here.

There’s the obvious disappointment at hearing about yet another high profile player -- indeed, one to whom many regard as a coach/mentor -- having failed to abide by the rules most of us don’t think twice about following. I was also intrigued by that list Grudzien provides of the many ways one might benefit from multi-accounting, a list which includes some obvious items but also a few which I hadn’t even considered previously.

Also interesting were the complaints by some (including Peat) about Grudzien having apparently short-stacked while playing under the other accounts -- not a violation of sites’ TOS, of course, but a strategic approach that offends some players greatly. Besides exciting the general detestation toward short-stacking, some believed Grudzien’s doing so was somehow hypocritical given the fact that it ran counter to his coaching. Kind of missing the big picture there (it seems), but a curious reaction nonetheless.

The other part of this story I wanted to mention concerned Two Plus Two’s involvement. Again, we’re seeing how the sites can’t really enforce rules against multi-accounting on their own, and that 2+2 plays an especially significant role when it comes to ensuring some semblance of fairness in online poker. The deletion of the original thread about Grudzien earlier this month (the one started by the banned poster) understandably raised some eyebrows -- was 2+2 attempting to suppress the story exposing a mod, author, and sponsor? -- though I think ultimately the site has handled it all sufficiently thus far.

Mason Malmuth appeared on the 2+2 Pokercast last week (the 3/23 episode, No. 114) to address how the site had decided to suspend (temporarily) its relationship with Grudzien and CardRunners/StoxPoker. Having been somewhat critical of some of Malmuth’s positions before, I was prepared to be a little cynical when he came on, but in fact found his assessment of the situation fairly reasonable and balanced. And even (uncharacteristically) modest, although he did slip in there that the site is currently receiving approximately 30,000 posts a day. That’s a ton of content to try to moderate!

The online sites have a similar issue with which to contend -- i.e., a ton to moderate. I suppose while there is a lot about this story that gets my attention, that is really the only part of it that has direct relevance to a small-timer like me.

When an instructor/expert is willing to violate sites’ rules about multi-accounting, it’s clear they aren’t being enforced well enough (or cannot be enforced well enough) to discourage others from doing so, too. And I guess that’s a bit unsettling, given that long list of ways Grudzien provides explaining how others’ multi-accounting could negatively affect me.