Chris Ferguson’s Apology Just Makes Things Worse

Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Thing To Say

It finally happened. It took eight years, but he did it. Chris “Jesus” Ferguson came forward to “apologise” for his involvement in Full Tilt’s Black Friday collapse, and the millions of dollars poker players lost or had frozen in its wake. 

If you remember that mess was partly untangled by PokerStars stepping up and buying the whole mess outright.

Ferguson’s 42 second video is a pre-prepared statement uploaded to Vimeo. 

42 seconds to fix the feelings of bitterness that tens of thousands in the poker community have been nursing. 42 seconds doesn’t even put a plaster on the 7 years of gangrenous anger that has been festering unaddressed by Ferguson and his cronies the whole time. 

42 seconds would not have been enough even if it seemed genuine.

Which it doesn’t. Instead of a genuine apology we are told he did everything he could to fix the problem, that he wishes he could have stopped Black Friday (a rather empty sentiment), and that one day he hopes the “real story” will get out, implying that if we knew more, we’d believe his innocence . There is a general sense, not of contrition, but of self-justification and I suspect that very few in the poker community are gonna swallow it.

Haters and Debaters

Phil Hellmuth is among those who seems to by buying the is of a hidden “real story” that will put everything right. 

Other players, like Daniel Negreanu are more skeptical. Though not all his followers agree.

Given the timing of this video, it is hard not to feel that this is cynical attempt to reduce the backlash when he turns up in Vegas for the WSOP over the next few weeks. 

However, I doubt the video will do much more than raise hackles. This exact strategy didn’t work for Howard Lederer, but Chris has always seemed more sympathetic than Howard. Even so there wasn’t much it it in terms of who took more flak when they started to show up at live events again.

Seven years is too late, Chris, and forty seconds is just plain insulting.