Controversy at PokerStars

During the recent World Championship of Online Poker, which was held at PokerStars, there were many poker events with over $40 million in guaranteed prize pools but it‘s the $215 Heads-Up Pot-Limit Omaha “second chance” tournament that has caused huge controversy at PokerStars after two players agreed to sit out and watch a boxing match.

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The heated debates started at PokerStars when two players made it to the last sixteen but rather than fight it out to see who made the next round the two players agreed to sit out and watch others fight it out in a boxing match on the TV instead. However after 250 hands had automatically been played by the PokerStars software the match was awarded to the player with a slight chip advantage, which was decided as a result of the order in which their blinds had been passed back and forth.

Despite the fact that nowhere in PokerStars rules does it say that the tournament will end after 250 unplayed hands or in light of the pleas from both online poker players, PokerStars would not allow them to continue their game. ‘Anti-Matter’, the player who was deemed the loser by PokerStars requested that he at least be paid what he calculated to be his equity in the tournament at the point of effective disqualification but PokerStars was unable to do anything besides give him his payout for making it to the last sixteen.

The controversy behind this poker news story didn’t end there though. ‘Anti-Matter’ posted his thoughts on the TwoPlusTwo online poker forum where a mess ensued, with opinions flying left, right and centre. Some online poker players took a dim view of the two player’s decision to halt a high-stakes world championship online poker game. As it was a heads-up tournament poker games can end very quickly but the players who had had finished would have had to wait until the boxing match and the poker match had finished before playing the next round.

Since the massive debate PokerStars have agreed to pay ‘Anti-Matter’ the $900 he claimed he was owed and have also added new rules which state “Two or more players may not make any agreement to sit out simultaneously whether at the same table or different tables” in a hope to avoid this sort of incident again.

25/05/2010 15:17:17

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