Mike Matusow’s WSOP Profit Claims Questioned in New Controversy

Mike “The Mouth” Matusow has courted controversy once again by allegedly claiming to have won more at this year’s World Series of Poker than he actually did – eagle-eyed fans calling out the four-time bracelet winner after he posted this on Twitter...

Just woke up & feels weird to not be going to Rio to play more!
Final stats 23 tourneys 11cashes 3 final tables $26 k profit! Oh what could of been if I can change 3 river cards! Bubble 25 k horse to start series by 1 out, the 3 outer in the 10 k plo 17 left hurt the most!

— Mike Matusow (@themouthmatusow) November 25, 2021

It didn’t take long for the praise, and the questioning, to come in on Matusow’s apparently excellent WSOP run.

One 2plus2 forumite posted:

“If this is to be believed, Mike's Cash rate (48%) is phenomenal. If you were lucky enough to buy into one of the 11 events he cashed, you probably made a little something, if the mark-up didn't chew up all your profits.”

We’ll come back to Matusow’s “mark-up” momentarily, but first it appears that Mike the Mouth’s maths, or memory, had missed the mark.

Rob Smith, aka AtariRob, looked a little closer at Matusow’s series, producing a spreadsheet (below) and commenting...

“I couldn't sleep lets kick this out quickly. These were the events we can verify through PokerNews that Mike played. The last event we saw on youtube that he played. 24 events, $162,000 in buy ins, $174,736 in cashes for total of $12,736 for I believe is around an 8% ROI.”

That profit number is less than half of that claimed by Matusow, and doesn’t even take into account any rebuys that he may have indulged in.

As others have pointed out, Mike’s tweet got three out of the four stats presented wrong – not great if you are relying on accurate figures as one of those who bought a piece of Mike’s action.

That was already a somewhat controversial subject as Matusow had charged 1.5 markup on some of the bigger buy-in WSOP tournaments.

I’m selling 50% of all my wsop 10 k or higher @YouStake come checkout my package! I’m giving a free 25% in my smaller tourneys for free to anyone who buys half of my 10 k or higher events! My poker games been real sharp & I’ve only lost 1 yr @wsop! Good luck us! #positivity

— Mike Matusow (@themouthmatusow) September 15, 2021

That sparked a lengthy to-and-fro discussion/argument on what mark-up is or isn’t acceptable, or ethical.

Andrew Barber claimed:

“This markup situation in poker tournaments is never gonna go away, is it? Big names are straight up robbing people once again, and it’s because the people buying simply don’t know enough about the process.”

Matusow’s actual results in the $10k+ events saw him book a small loss, with 12 events played, $135k in buy-ins and only $121,084 in cashes. Assuming no rebuys, that’s a loss of $13,912, just over 10%.

Of course, many fans would have bought Matusow’s action as a fun sweat of a legendary poker player rather than any real expectation of making a big profit.

Forumite “Loctus” on 2plus2 gave a succinct summary of the situation:

“Is Matusow winning at 1.5 in high rollers? No.
Is Matusow winning in high rollers? No.
Should he be allowed to sell at 1.5? Yes.
Should he be ridiculed and called out for it? Yes.”