Fact-Checking; or, The Professor’s Plight

Am still occasionally giving time here and there to ongoing fallout from Howard Lederer’s interviews for PokerNews (“The Lederer Files”) and for the Two Plus Two Pokercast (Episode 239). Have viewed QuadJacks’ “Oral History” compilation of responses, am reading Diamond Flush’s still-in-progress summary-response, have watched Daniel Negreanu’s latest rant, and have looked in on the forum discussions and op-eds continuing to pop up.

These responses kind of remind me of all the so-called “fact-checking” that happens following each of the debates between the major parties’ presidential and vice-presidential candidates. Some of that effort is legitimately aimed at seeking corroboration (or the lack thereof) to support or challenge statements made during the debates. But a some of it -- perhaps a lot of it -- is really just spin, that is, a rhetorically-savvy way to persuade others to read a particular, desired message or intent into what was said.

Speaking of fact-checking, there was a moment in the Two Plus Two interview with Lederer in which he instantly inspired pretty much everyone listening to engage in such. I’m talking about that moment when the “Professor” professes a kind of ignorance that Full Tilt Poker continued to deliver the “your funds are safe and secure” message to customers well after the point when it was obvious that was not the case. (I’ve written about this a little before, but forgive me a quick look back at it in the present context.)

To review, Lederer was asked during the 2+2 interview about Full Tilt Poker’s continuing to tell customers that their funds were safe even after Black Friday. Lederer responded by saying he did not believe the words “safe and secure” were still being used in any of FTP’s communications “after April 20 [2011].” And if they were, “it happened without me knowing about it.”

To me that was one of the more blatant bits of culpability dodging Lederer exhibited in either interview.

For one, as just about everyone listening to the podcast knew immediately, the statement was obviously inaccurate. We all remembered how assurances to players about the return of their funds continued to appear well after April 20, 2011 via emails and forum posts by FTPDoug (Shyam Markus). Some of us also recalled the amended civil complaint, filed on September 20, 2011, which catalogued several post-April instances of the “funds are safe and secure” message being repeated.

I included a reference to this point in a post earlier this month. There I noted how the FTP website continued to display the message until after the amended civil complaint appeared that “funds are safe and secure.” I also referred to a post I wrote on 9/22/11 called “Talk About Red Pros (More on the DOJ vs. Full Tilt Poker)” in which I included a screen shot of the front page of the FTP site, taken that day, showing the statement still appeared.

But you don’t have to believe that. Or rather, if you want to check my facts, just take a look at the amended complaint where the DOJ makes the same assertion. “As of September 19, 2011,” they write, “Full Tilt Poker’s website stated that players’ funds were ‘safe and secure.’”

Which means not only is the statement inaccurate, it also sounds highly insincere.

That’s because when Lederer says he doesn’t believe FTP was saying anything about funds being “safe and secure” after April 20, he’s suggesting both that he had no idea what was posted on the fulltiltpoker.com site between April-September 2011 and that he wasn’t aware of the long list of examples of the assurance being repeated that appears in the amended civil complaint.

The latter suggestion is especially odd to consider, given how Lederer himself is being directly charged with funneling player funds into his own accounts in that very complaint. Indeed, it is at the end of the long section titled “FULL TILT POKER’S AND THE FTP INSIDER DEFENDANTS’ THEFT OF PLAYER FUNDS” that we find the quote about FTP’s website continuing to maintain on 9/19/11 that player funds were “safe and secure.” In other words, it is beyond disingenuous for Lederer to have us believe he never read the civil complaint in which he himself is named.

So he’s factually incorrect. And he’s not credible, either, when he explains why his facts might be wrong.

I call this one of the more blatant instances from the interviews of Lederer ducking under a hood of supposed ignorance in order to evade blame, but it isn’t the most significant example of him doing so. And really, in the larger scheme, while Full Tilt Poker’s misrepresentation of the situation to customers during 2011 is certainly blameworthy, worse crimes were committed in order to create that situation.

Again, I think of the debates and the so-called “fact-checking” that follows them. In some cases, those engaged in the effort to confirm or dispute candidates’ statements are being moved by a genuinely estimable intention -- i.e., to seek truth, and to hold those seeking our votes accountable for the words they say. Others are motivated by the less noble purpose of political spin, their goal being to recast objective evidence (the words that were spoken) as supporting this or that self-serving narrative.

While I suppose some of those engaged at present in fact-checking Lederer are just piling on or following the mob, I think most are doing so with good, constructive intentions.

Even so, at the risk of sounding overly cynical, in the end I’m afraid what we’re all mostly engaging in is a big, distracting game of trivial pursuit. The same goes for the debate fact-checkers. Most of the details of their findings will be forgotten come Election Day, and all of them will essentially buried thereafter, only to be dug up later by academics and other obscurists.

It’s a curious text, no doubt, the two-act absurdist play in which Lederer starred in those interviews with PokerNews and Two Plus Two. Call it The Professor’s Plight, another drama helping comprise that fascinating and varied genre of theatrical works that have been produced over the last decade by online poker. About which someone will someday be writing a dissertation, I am sure.

The Thinking Poker Podcast

I’d been meaning to write a post for a couple of weeks now pointing everyone to a new podcast hosted by Andrew “Foucault” Brokos and Nate Meyvis, the Thinking Poker Podcast (so named after Brokos’s excellent blog).

As it happened, I was invited to appear as a guest on the most recent episode of the show, and so what was going to be selfless promotion of others’ efforts might now sound a little more like someone saying “Look at me!” But really, it’s a cool, smart show and should be of interest to anyone who enjoys playing and thinking about poker.

(Also, look at me!)

The Thinking Poker podcast debuted about a month ago. As the pair explained on the first episode, the purpose of the show is to provide “intelligent discussion of any aspect of poker -- the strategy, the news, the culture, the ethics” and more -- in other words, to explore the world of poker and the interesting people who inhabit it.

They’ve already had some interesting guests on the first few shows. Shane “Shaniac” Schleger appeared on the first one, discussing among other topics life as an itinerant online poker player going down to Mexico frequently in order to play. Tommy Angelo was the guest on the second episode, talking about his books and other fun stuff. And Jason Strasser was on for Episode 3, drawing some comparisons between online poker and options trading.

On Episode 4, the pair begin with some emails and a short strategy segment (as usual), then I come on to talk about tourney reporting, my “Poker in American Film and Culture” class, freelancing, the WSOP, and other aspects of poker in culture.

Andrew and Nate asked some great questions and we ended up having an interesting conversation that I think fits well into what they’re trying to do with the show -- namely, provide some thoughtful poker talk that’s perhaps a little off the beaten path.

So check out the show. You can grab it over in iTunes. Or download right here. And after you listen, let Andrew and Nate know what you’re thinking about Thinking Poker with some feedback over on Andrew’s blog.

A Game of Risk

Like about seven or eight million other people, I dialed up that bit of daredevilry everyone seemed to be buzzing about yesterday morning and watched Felix Baumgartner jumping from a balloon 24 miles up to a (thankfully) safe landing in New Mexico.

And like a lot of those who watched, I hadn’t heard the first thing about the attempt until I woke up yesterday and began seeing folks tweeting back and forth about it. I tuned in occasionally during the long ascent -- ultimately to 128,100 feet -- then became fairly locked in during the nine minutes or so it took Baumgartner to fall back to earth.

I have to admit I wasn’t as immediately inspired as others seemed to be while watching the successful attempt. I most definitely felt the anxiety and worry that necessarily arises whenever someone’s life is at risk, and, of course, is all the more intense (or excruciating) when bearing witness. And while I’m all for space exploration and its benefits -- direct and otherwise -- to the advancement of the species, I was perhaps too unclear on the specifics of the sort of research being accomplished by the stunt to appreciate its value while watching.

From reading around a bit, I see that the jump did help test parachute systems as well as offered some useful data for future space programs, in particular with regard to coming up with emergency evacuation systems from high altitudes. So yeah, I see how it all added up to something more enduring than jumping a motorbike over a dozen buses or whatever.

The one thing watching the jump did inspire me to think about, however, was the whole idea of risk and its importance to our experience -- the way our ideas of risk could be said to shape our understanding of the meaning of our lives. Some of us crave it, a lot of us shun it. But we’re all aware of it, pretty much at every moment, and thus does it have a huge influence on our ideas of ourselves and each other.

Self-preservation tends to keep us from taking too many risks, particularly those that threaten our survival. But within that scope a lot of us frequently indulge, taking gambles constantly, usually (but not always) motivated by ideas of improving some aspect of our lives when we do.

Thanks to many of the readings I assign in my “Poker in American Film and Culture” class, I’m constantly invited to think about how the significance of risk-taking provides an important link between poker and American culture. I’m talking about that argument for poker being a particularly “American game” that stems from the way the game so neatly reflects the country’s penchant for risk-taking, its history having been so dominated by examples of such.

Of course, a willingness to take risks -- and curiosity about others’ doing so -- isn’t just an American thing. (Nor is poker, for that matter.) The jump by Baumgartner, an Austrian, was carried on 40-plus networks in 50 countries and streamed by something like 130 digital outlets. For whatever reason, a lot of people were into it.

I think there’s always some benefit to taking a leap once in a while, whether by buying into a poker tournament or pursuing a new career path or just testing oneself in a way that enables one to edge outside the otherwise carefully-maintained orbit of one’s existence.

So -- to quote @BadBlood’s reapplication of Bud Light’s Real Men of Genius campaign -- “Here’s to you Mr. Jump Out of a Capsule From Space Guy.”

You Got to Know When to Hold ’Em, Know When to Punt

That chart to the left is from a website called Advanced NFL Stats, one of many number-crunching sites that produce all sorts of breakdowns and analyses of NFL players, teams, and games.

For every game, Advanced NFL Stats creates a graph such as this one that reflects the chance a team will win the game based on historical comparisons of the situation at any given moment in a game. They call this Win Probability Added (WPA) because what they are measuring is how each additional play increases or decreases a team’s probability of winning the game. (Click here for a full explanation.)

It’s kind of a generic tool, really, that doesn’t take into account the actual teams or players or specific match-ups, but rather just looks at every situation -- the score, the time left in the game, the present down, yardage needed for a first down, and field position -- and compares that to how games have historically gone for teams in similar situations. I’m not sure, but I assume they’re using a database of thousands of previous NFL games to produce these percentages.

I sometimes like to take a look at these graphs after a particularly exciting game, just to see how the line came to resemble a seismograph measuring an big earthquake or some wacky EKG readout.

For example, the particular graph shows how the probability of the Pittsburgh Steelers winning last night’s game was 84% when there was 1:52 left and they had a first down on the Tennessee 39-yard-line with the score tied 23-23.

The Steelers subsequently saw their drive stall at the 36-yard-line (and their WP dip to about 50%), at which point they made a risky decision to have their field goal kicker, Shaun Suisham, try a long field goal -- a 54-yarder, in fact, longer than any Suisham had hit in his entire career.

Suisham missed the try, and immediately the Steelers’ probability of winning dipped to 33% as Tennessee took over possession with 54 seconds left. Meanwhile the Titans’ probability had improved to 67%, and sure enough they drove down the field and kicked a winning field goal as time ran out to win 26-23.

If Pittsburgh had punted rather than try the field goal, their win probability would have also decreased although not as severely. And in fact, if they had been able to pin the Titans back inside their own 20 with the punt, they would’ve likely gotten the game to overtime, at the start of which both teams’ WP would have been exactly 50%.

All of which is to say, Pittsburgh found itself in a tricky spot near game’s end, ultimately deciding to take a chance on Suisham hitting a career-long field goal rather than accept what was essentially a “coin-flip” situation. Literally, in part, as overtime would have begun with a flip of a coin.

Suisham had just hit a long field goal (52 yards, tying his career best) earlier in the fourth quarter, an event that clearly affected the decision to let him try another long one. His chances of hitting that second one are hard to estimate. Career-wise, he was 5 for 12 when it came to attempts of 50 yards or more, although as noted he’d never hit one as long as 54 yards. Probably safe to say it was less than a 50% chance he’d make that attempt last night, although even if Suisham had made it that still wouldn’t have ensured the Steelers a victory.

The whole situation uncannily resembled that of a poker player at the final table of a tournament who after enjoying some recent success -- say, he catches several good hands to chip up and into the lead -- decides to “ride the rush” and take an unnecessary risk that if successful will improve his chances of winning the tournament considerably, but if it fails will unequivocally reduce the likelihood of victory.

Like I say, I find the WPA graphs over at Advanced NFL Stats diverting, probably because of they way they can make analogies between poker and football seem more apparent. So Pittsburgh was 84% to win with a couple of minutes to go last night (probability-wise). The probability of pocket aces beating 8-5-offsuit is about the same.

But sometimes the aces get cracked.

Of course, in the Steelers’ case it wasn’t just a matter of getting unlucky. They failed to make a first down, and their pocket aces were reduced to Q-7-offsuit (or worse). Then they decided to push anyway, and when their hand didn’t hold, they soon found themselves all in and dominated after the Titans drove to set up a game-winning field goal of their own.

Or, to put it another way, Pittsburgh decided to play the role of a punter rather than punt.

Heroes, Villains, and Haralabos Voulgaris

Way, way, way back when I first started this blog, Haralabos Voulgaris was one of the very first poker pros about whom I wrote a post. It was a short one, just praising him for being so friggin’ funny on an episode of the old Circuit podcast with Scott Huff, Joe Sebok, and Gavin Smith. The post was titled “Hilarious Haralabos.”

In fact, looking back I think that was probably the very first post in which I tried to write about something other than my own play or to pretend to offer some kind of pseudo-strategy-type talk. This was late May 2006. Over the next few months I’d write about other things happening in the poker world, including that year’s WSOP. Then in October came the UIGEA, and that’s when the blog really started to focus more on the poker world at large with my own little poker stories only occasionally appearing as part of the overall mix.

Voulgaris would go on to co-host a podcast with Huff, Big Poker Sundays. That show was very well liked, I recall, in part because of Voulgaris’s readiness to share opinions and not pull punches regarding things like the insider cheating scandal at Absolute Poker and other knotty matters. (People also liked BPS because Voulgaris is a funny dude, as is Huff.)

More of a sports bettor than a poker player, Voulgaris kind of receded from the poker scene a bit over the next few years, although he did turn up on High Stakes Poker and also participated in the “Big One for One Drop” at the WSOP this past summer. He also has kept contributing now and then to certain conversations in the poker community via Two Plus Two posts and his Twitter account (@haralabob).

Back in March of this year, when the extent of Erick Lindgren’s gambling debts became public and inspired one of those conversations in the poker community, Voulgaris shared some details of “E-Dog” owing him considerably (i.e., millions) and his six-year struggle to get paid. I wrote some about all that here in a post titled “Hero Call.”

There I discussed (in part) the idea of “heroes” in poker. “I can’t really say I ever thought of any players in such a way,” I wrote, “although perhaps that says more about me and my (modest) aspirations as a poker player than anything.” I went on to suggest that when it came to identifying heroes among professional poker players, it was perhaps best not to choose from those who are the biggest winners (see Phil Hellmuth), but rather to look at “those who are best able to promote and preserve the game -- the ‘ambassadors’ or others who actively work to keep the game going (so to speak) for the rest of us.”

Anyhow, I was reminded of that post and the issue again this week when Voulgaris published a post on his blog titled “Heroes and Villains in Poker.” (Apologies for having a similar title for this post, but really, the alliteration was too alluring to avoid.)

In the post, Voulgaris primarily addresses “Black Friday and the FTP fiasco,” although additionally shares more about his dealings with Lindgren. He also has some things to say about Daniel Negreanu’s calling out of certain figures (e.g., Howard Lederer) while omitting doing so with others (e.g., Lindgren).

“Black Friday turned the poker world on its ear,” writes Voulgaris. “People who were heroes (as much as a poker player could be I suppose) have since been cast as villains, and it has actually become quite difficult to discern (aside from a few obvious choices) who the heroes and the villains in [the] post Black Friday poker world are.”

Voulgaris makes an excellent point, and his post provides still more food for thought, too. And for those wanting more details regarding Lindgren and his debt to Voulgaris, he’s added a lengthy addendum in a contribution to a Two Plus Two thread discussing his original blog post.

While offering some criticism of Negreanu, Voulgaris also praises him for mostly being what I’m describing above as a worthy “ambassador” of the game. That is to say, a “hero” (of sorts), although like Voulgaris I share that urge to add qualifiers when using such a term in the context of poker and poker players.

Anyhow, check out Voulgaris’s post which offers some genuine insight and goes well beyond just dishing more dirt on another now-fallen poker “hero.”

It’s not nearly as hilarious as that appearance on The Circuit, of course. Unfortunately those old shows have all disappeared from the CardPlayer site, although as I was talking about a few weeks ago, I have a number of old poker podcasts saved and in fact do have that very show. (I’d post here, but am sure CardPlayer would object.)

Gonna go listen now. Seem to remember something pretty good in there about Freddy Deeb....

Full Tilt Poker Relaunch Soon (No Shinola)

Full Tilt Poker 2.0 is happening. In less than a month, the site will be relaunched under the auspices of PokerStars. Soon players around the world will be back at the FTP tables, reanimating their geckos and pandas and gnomes and other avatars (I assume) in real money games.

It wasn’t that long ago that the prospect of Full Tilt Poker actually reopening seemed as far-fetched as oh, I don’t know, a team winning a football game by throwing a game-ending interception.

Then again, following his recent media-blitz-cum-absurdist-theater performance of a couple of weeks ago, Howard Lederer is now back at the tables in Vegas playing $400/$800 mixed games.

How did we get here? Well, to borrow a line delivered by the “Professor” character in “The Lederer Files” (Act I, Scene 1), “something weird happened.”

When the Department of Justice first amended the civil complaint in September 2011 and U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara described the site as “not a legitimate poker company, but a global Ponzi scheme,” it was hard to imagine any sequence of events that could result in an FTP comeback.

That sense remained evident pretty much all through that whole uncertain pas de deux between the site and Groupe Bernard Tapie that followed the DOJ’s amendment, when the idea of the site actually being purchased, relicensed, and revived somehow continued to appear a distant prospect at best.

And even after rumors regarding PokerStars entering the picture began swirling in April of this year, for most it wasn’t until the official confirmation of such and estimates regarding the date of an FTP relaunch were starting to be made at the end of July that FTP’s return seemed a real possibility.

And it’s happening, all right. Last month some players in non-U.S. countries began receiving emails from FTP regarding their accounts. PokerStars then began rolling out procedures for those non-U.S. folks to follow in order to access their funds.

Last week came news that Team Full Tilt member Gus Hansen was being tapped as the “first brand ambassador” for the relaunched site. A couple of days ago we learned that after having its licenses suspended and then revoked by the Alderney Gaming Control Commission last year, FTP has been granted a new online gaming license by the Isle of Man Gambling Supervision Commission (the same group that has licensed PokerStars since 2005). Heck, they’ve even announced dates for FTOPS XXI -- picking back up Full Tilt’s popular online tourney series -- scheduled for the first half of December.

All systems are go, then, regarding the targeted relaunch date of Tuesday, November 6. Alas, along with players in a few other countries (Belgium, Denmark, Estonia, France, Italy, and Spain), Americans won’t be able to reopen their accounts and play real money games on Full Tilt Poker that day.

We will, however, be able to vote for candidates running for president, House and Senate seats, and local offices as it just so happens November 6 is also Election Day here in the U.S. A few will grimly note some vague irony tucked away inside that juxtaposition.

Even though Full Tilt will operate as a distinct site and not as a “skin” of PokerStars or part of the same network, its position in the online poker market will nonetheless be as a kind of Stars subsidiary, a highly visible and important complement to the primary site which according to PokerScout currently enjoys “around 50% market share.” In other words, as far as the business side of things is concerned, the online poker “game” should be affected considerably by FTP’s return.

Should prove an interesting game tto watch. Which is what we mostly do here in the U.S. at present when it comes to online poker. Watch.

The Boeree Principle

Amid the poker-related news of the past week, you might have heard something about a short video by the Institute of Physics featuring poker pro Liv Boeree that appeared last week. I wanted to mention (and share) it here, as it includes what I find to be several worthwhile messages.

The Institute of Physics is a U.K.-based organization that functions as a charity, a lobbying group, and a professional association for educators and scholars. First formed way back in 1874, the IOP currently boasts about 40,000 members from all over the world. The IOP’s mission involves promoting and advancing physics education and research, working with policy makers to help increase understanding of physics, as well as publishing and producing materials related to physics education.

The video featuring Boeree is an example of the latter, made to promote physics education and in particular to encourage girls to consider physics as a possible area of study. Before winning the 2010 EPT San Remo Main Event in April 2010 and becoming a Team PokerStars Pro a few months later, Boeree studied physics and astrophysics at the University of Manchester where she earned a 1st Class Honours Degree.

In the video Boeree persuasively explains how her background in physics has proven useful to her at the poker tables, among other topics. Take a look:

I particularly like what Boeree says when she insists that being a professional poker player hardly means she is “wasting” her physics degree.

“The beauty of doing physics as a degree is that it doesn’t mean you have to become a physicist... you don’t have to become a research scientist” explains Boeree. “The training that I got from physics -- the way it’s trained my mind to think -- has enabled me to go into such an analytical game as poker.”

I often find myself making an analagous point when talking to undergraduates who are uncertain about the usefulness of, say, a degree in English or some other major for which future job prospects aren’t necessarily obvious.

Many students are under the false impression that getting a degree in English necessarily means one is destined to become a teacher (and probably destined to earn a less-than-desirable salary, too). In fact, there are a lot of students who are under the false impression that any non-business degree is somehow going to be a waste of time for them, which to me largely misses the entire point of going to college -- i.e., to learn how to think and thus prepare yourself for later life, with the obtaining of a credential mostly incidental to that training.

Boeree goes on to talk about how playing poker and studying physics both involve making complex decisions with many variables and bits of information that you have to sort through when analyzing a problem. Her argument is similar to that posed by Jennifer Ouelette in an article titled “Big Game Theory” that appeared in Discover magazine a couple of years ago.

Ouelette draws many of the same connections Boeree does, in fact, when she talks about the way “poker appeals to physicists because it is an intricate, complex puzzle... steeped in statistical probabilities and the tenets of game theory.” Ouelette also brings up how poker and physics both present problems in “partial information” that players/researchers are challenged to solve. I wrote more about Ouelette’s article -- and about connections between physics and poker -- in a post titled “Physicists & Poker.”

Like I say, I appreciate the messages Boeree is helping the IOP deliver with this video, among which we might list defenses of both higher education and poker. The encouragement to young women not to shy away from male-dominated fields like physics or poker (or heavy metal!) is commendable, too.

But most of all I like the larger argument that whatever you happen to study -- I mean really study with earnestness and a genuine desire to learn -- that work of interpretation and analysis and “training your mind” will necessarily prove of use to you when encountering subsequent problems and challenges.

Call it a principle of education, sometimes unheeded, but ultimately inviolable.

Hellmuth and the WSOP

Last week I published a post just as the WSOP Europe Main Event final table had reached a break and only four players remained. As we all know, Phil Hellmuth ultimately emerged as the winner at that table, topping a field of 420 players to earn another gold bracelet to go along with the 12 he’s won at the WSOP in Las Vegas over the last two-plus decades.

After Hellmuth’s win, Grange95 wrote a post titled “Hellmuth & the Hobgoblin” reminding us all of the “Should a WSOPE bracelet count?” debate that started when the WSOP Europe began in 2007. He even pointed to an item I’d written for Betfair Poker almost exactly two years ago in which I brought up the debate.

Both Phil Laak and Gus Hansen had just won bracelets at the 2010 WSOPE (the last in London), and perhaps as a result there had been a revival of discussions over whether or not the bracelets won in Europe were as valuable or coveted as the ones won in Las Vegas. I’m guessing we’ll start hearing similar debates -- though perhaps pursued less energetically -- when the first World Series of Poker Asia-Pacific (“WSOP APAC”) kicks off in April 2013.

In that Betfair item I mentioned Matt Savage (who served as a tourney director for the WSOP in the past) suggesting the WSOPE bracelets were “like a real bracelet” and WSOP VP Ty Stewart firing back that yes, indeed, they were.

The piece also quotes none other than Phil Hellmuth having discussed the issue just a few days before on a podcast, The Hardcore Poker Show (the 9/27/10 episode). There Hellmuth maintained that a WSOPE bracelet was “not the same thing” as a bracelet won in Las Vegas, even going so far as to say that “everybody knows it's not really a bracelet.”

When Hellmuth made that pronouncement a number of people quickly responded by saying as soon as he won a WSOPE event he’d be changing his tune. Such seems to be the case, and Grange95 has some fun in his post pointing out the irony of the Poker Brat’s situation.

There was a lot more reaction to Hellmuth’s win last week, almost all of it coming in the form of praise for his accomplishment in Cannes and expressions of awe at his having added yet another big win to a storied career. The €1,022,376 first prize (equal to about $1.32 million) represents his second-biggest score ever, only exceeded by his prize for finishing fourth in the “Big One for One Drop” where he won about twice that ($2,645,333).

If we count those WSOPE bracelets (and I think we all are at this point), Hellmuth extends his record total to 13, now three ahead of Doyle Brunson and Johnny Chan. And, of course, he’s the only player to win both the WSOP Main Event and the WSOPE Main Event.

Among the reactions to Hellmuth’s victory came a few voices bringing up another idea some have been floating pretty much since Hellmuth parted ways with UltimateBet at the end of 2010. In fact, it’s an idea some were talking about even before Hellmuth had officially cut ties with UB when he’d begun turning up at events during those last couple of months no longer sporting UB gear, something I wrote about in November 2010 in a post titled “Signs of the Times: Hellmuth & UB.”

The idea I’m referring to is the possibility of Hellmuth signing with the WSOP itself as a sponsor. Speculation about such usually has been linked to further conjecture about the WSOP getting seriously involved with online poker, perhaps even in the U.S. (should legislation and other factors align properly).

Somewhat ahead of the curve, B.J. Nemeth briefly sketched out this scenario in a post back in November 2010. The announcement that Hellmuth was no longer to represent UB then came on December 30, 2010. Black Friday arrived a few months later, after which the whole discussion of site sponsorships quickly receded to the background.

Like I say, though, the thought of Hellmuth becoming some sort of spokesperson for the WSOP hasn’t gone away, as evidenced by a few people articulating it once again in the wake of his WSOP Europe Main Event win.

Of course, the whole idea of the WSOP ever wanting or needing a spokesperson might well be a bunch of applesauce. (Indeed, I’d be one to favor not having such a figure at all, at least not among active players.) But if we were going to speculate about the selection of a spokesperson, would Hellmuth be a candidate?

He’s won the most bracelets, he’s made the most final tables, and he has the most cashes. Whenever one goes to search players in the WSOP database, his name is the first listed, right at the tippy-top. He’s obviously one of only a handful of players non-poker people sometimes recognize as a “poker pro” (as currently understood). And he’s known not just stateside but around the world for his accomplishments at the poker table.

If it ever does come to pass that the WSOP is looking for someone to represent them as a kind of spokesperson, then, wouldn’t Hellmuth be a reasonable choice?

I say no way. A couple of reasons spring to mind.

For one, his long-term association with the UB/Cereus crowd, including continuing to promote the site and essentially turn a blind eye while insider cheating scandals rocked the poker community, should make him much less attractive as a potential spokesperson.

In that “Signs of the Times” post from a couple of years ago I noted how “the UB patch has become a unique symbol. It yields various interpretations, but for many it evokes certain, specific themes, including greed, fraud, self-interest, and other negative and/or detrimental associations for poker.” I also noted how Hellmuth’s long-time connection with UB meant that even if he were to stop wearing the logo he’d still always be linked to the site and all of the destructive influence it brought upon the poker community. He “always will be... UB.”

That said, some will argue that since Hellmuth hasn’t been linked to any of the cheating scandals directly, we shouldn’t hold his UB past against him. In other words, that we should overlook his overlooking the scandals.

Even so, the WSOP could do much, much better than to hire the world’s whiniest winner and poker’s poorest sport. (That photo up top of Hellmuth in the fetal position is from the 2010 WPT Bay 101 Shooting Stars event, taken just after his being eliminating in sixth.)

There’s not much need to catalogue all of the many examples of the Poker Brat’s being bratty, although for a few recent additions to the list check out Jen Newell’s “Table Talk” column (for Poker.co.uk) in which she describes some of Hellmuth’s bad behavior at the WSOPE final table.

“Congrats to the best tournament poker player that ever lived!! Phil Fking Hellmuth” tweeted Doyle Brunson (@TexDolly) a short while before the WSOPE Main Event concluded. Like others, I couldn’t help but react similarly to Hellmuth’s win and acknowledge a remarkable sequence of performances at the WSOP and now the WSOPE.

But as far as electing Hellmuth spokesperson for the WSOP/Harrah’s is concerned, I can think of hundreds of candidates for whom I’d rather vote.

“We’re not talking now about a poker game” (Kennedy & Nixon)

Was pulling together a new “Pop Poker” column for PokerListings this week regarding presidential debates and how they so readily get compared to heads-up poker matches. The piece went up yesterday, if you’re curious.

I’m old enough to be awestruck by how quickly and simply we can access information these days. That is to say, I remember how much effort and energy it would have taken to research and write even a casual piece about the history of presidential debates without the ease afforded by today’s internet.

With just a few keystrokes we can search full transcripts of every debate there ever was (since 1960, anyway, when they began to be televised). Heck, we can watch most of them, too.

Anyhow, as I say, I was digging through various items this week and found myself distracted for a while reading some speeches and other material related to the 1960 presidential campaign, the one that ultimately pitted John F. Kennedy versus Richard Nixon.

Nixon we all know was a serious poker player prior to embarking on his political career. The story of him winning significant sums while serving in the Navy and in fact funding his first Congressional campaign with his winnings has been told many times over. And while Nixon often tried to downplay his poker-playing experience and ability once he assumed public office, he nonetheless made references to poker constantly in speeches and communications before, during, and after his presidency.

Anyhow, when looking at some of the speeches Kennedy and Nixon were delivering during the final weeks leading up to the 1960 election, I noticed curious bit of back-and-forthing in which both candidates brought up poker, albeit metaphorically.

The first reference came from Kennedy in a relatively short speech delivered at the Sheraton Hotel in Washington, DC about a week before that first debate in late September. In that speech Kennedy mostly addressed foreign policy and the Communist threat, with just a few quick words about the economy coming in near the end.

Regarding the former, Kennedy argued that “the next President must promptly send to the Congress a special message requesting the funds and the authority necessary to give us a nuclear capacity second to none, making us invulnerable to any attack.... Only then can we get Mr. Khrushchev and the Chinese Communists to talk about disarmament, because having the second best defensive hand in the 1960s will be like having the second best poker hand.”

Six days later Kennedy and Nixon had that first debate in Chicago, the one in which Nixon’s “five o’clock shadow” is said by many to have doomed him. No poker metaphors were employed that night.

About a week after that (and before the second debate), Nixon gave a speech in early October in Elizabeth, New Jersey in which he touched on several points, including what he viewed as differences between himself and his opponent.

After bringing up Kennedy and another speech he’d recently made, Nixon stepped back and kind of self-reflexively tried to characterize the whole process of candidates going out and trying to convince voters in this fashion.

“You know, it’s the custom when presidential candidates travel through a country, a custom which is often cartooned about and editorialized about and written about a great deal, to see who can outpromise the other,” said Nixon.

“One fellow comes in and says, ‘I promise you this,’ and the next one comes in and says ‘I raise you,’ and the third one comes in and says ‘I call you.’ But whatever the case may be, we’re not talking now about a poker game. We’re talking about what’s best for the country.”

Nixon isn’t specifically referring to Kennedy’s use of a poker analogy to characterize the Cold War arms race, although given the close proximity of the speeches it feels like Nixon is perhaps trying to suggest that there’s something unsavory about comparing nuclear conflict to a card game.

I’m reading between the lines, of course. And as I say, Nixon himself so often references poker himself when making various points it becomes all the more curious to see him sound as though he might be trying to criticize doing so.

Anyhow, that was just one of several items I found myself lingering over this week. I’m starting to think it could be fun to pull together a short monograph about Nixon and poker, telling the story of his poker playing and compiling all of his references to the game.

Such a fascinating, complicated, and wildly-flawed figure was Nixon -- and so comprehensively chronicled, too. (I wonder, for instance, how many times poker came up during those 3,700 hours’ worth of tapes?)

What the Hellmuth?! 2012 WSOP Europe Main Event Nears Finish

At the moment just four players remain at the €10,450 buy-in 2012 World Series of Poker Main Event in Cannes, France. The players are currently on an extended break but will be returning at 21:45 CET (15:45 ET) to finish things up today.

Just 420 entered the 2012 WSOPE Main Event, down big time from the 593 who played last year and thus continuing that trend of lower turnouts in Cannes this time around.

Phil Hellmuth, seeking his 13th career WSOP bracelet after winning his 12th this past summer in Vegas in the $2,500 razz event, came into today’s final day of play with the chip lead. He continues to sit on top with four left with a stack of nearly 5.5 million.

The Ukrainian Sergii Baranov is currently in second (with about 3.75 million). Baranov has just a few prior scores from the European Poker Tour and the Russian Poker Tour, his highest-earning performance to date coming from having won a preliminary event at EPT Vienna in 2010.

In third right now is Joseph Cheong (with 2.1 million), who we all remember from his deep run at the 2010 WSOP Main Event where he finished third. A mostly dominating performance at that final table led most to assume we’d hear more from Cheong, and indeed he’s put up a number of impressive cashes since including another near-miss at the WSOP this summer in the $5,000 “mixed-max” event where he finished second. Cheong also went fairly deep in the WSOP Main Event this summer, finishing 116th.

Finally in fourth is the Frenchman Stephane Albertini who sits with 1.26 million. This was the first year for any French players to win bracelets at the WSOPE, with both Roger Hairabedian and Giovanni Rosadoni grabbing gold. Albertini has collected some nice cashes over the last couple of years, mostly in Europe. He also made a relatively deep run at the 2011 WSOP Main Event where he finished 46th to earn $160,036.

Will probably have to check in on the PokerNews updates once they restart things about 90 minutes from now. Might have to see as well about the live stream situation, although as I’ve mentioned here before I’m shut out from the ESPN3 applesauce and so probably am going to remain in the dark as far as that’s concerned.

Amazing, if not too surprising, to see Hellmuth at the summit once again. As I wrote about over on the Betfair Poker blog this summer, his tournament poker record is pretty much without parallel.

Sure, like many I kind of instinctively root for Hellmuth to fail, the resulting schadenfreude being just too damn sweet to resist. That said, it is remarkable (and impressive) to see him in the mix for yet another big poker prize. And his presence certainly makes the playing out of a WSOPE Main Event final table that much more interesting to follow.