Poker’s biggest assholes!

The recent shenanigans between William Kassouf and, well, almost everybody, got me wondering just who was the biggest douchebag/asshole/dick in poker? The person who refuses to talk to fans, or speaks to other players like they are scum, or who generally berates and badmouths their counterparts in the poker world.

To make life easier for me, those lovely people (and trolls of course) at the 2+2 forum have put together a thread entitled ‘big-name-pros-dicks’, which may have been titled a bit better (!) but has elicited a fair bit of interest.

The reason for the post? Well, new poster ‘Truetellher’ wanted to know:

"Does anybody have any experience meeting big name pros like Tony Gregg or Hollywood Haxton? Did you talk to them and were they nice? I ask because I’m planning to play a tournament in Europe next year but one of the main reasons why I’d like to go is to take pictures with pros. I wouldn’t want to Timex to tell me to **** off if I ask for a picture so I’d rather know now before I waste my time and money. So if any of you guys have met big name pros at events let me know how it went. Thanks.”

Of course, one person’s asshole is another person’s hero – Kassouf himself receiving torrents of abuse and bags of support in equal measure – but when you see or hear the same names cropping up all the time, it’s fairly safe to say that if it looks like and asshole, and quacks like an asshole – then it’s an asshole!

First up on the forum’s answers was SrslySirius, a veteran poster who stated:

"I used to interview poker pros for my job and I found most of them to be reasonably polite. The only dicks that come to mind are Scott Seiver and Phil Hellmuth.”

He added, however, that:

"Not a lot of them get hounded by fans, but Daniel Negreanu does and is pure class about it, even off-camera, even when it's inconvenient. He seems to take that part of his job seriously.”

Next to weigh in on the ‘he’s a douchebag’ debate was ShizzMoney, who explained:

"Some guys also build their brand off of being a Richard. Scott Seiver and Shaun Deeb come to mind, they get on these shows not only because they are high stakes players but also because they are well crafted, high quality douche canoes... and that's good for TV. Hellmuth is another perfect example of this.”

We’re already seeing a pattern among the names of top pros here, and HowdyThere added to it with:

"I can confirm shaundeeb is major dick in person. To be fair though, he's an ******* to rich and famous people too, not just normal everyday folks.”

Women aren’t immune from the ‘asshole syndrome’ either, as testified to by SuperSwag who posted:

"Played with Maria Ho (sick brag) and she was not pleasant at all.”

Assortednuts threw in his tuppenceworth with:

"…my wife ran into Annie Duke in the ladies room and found her shall I say, a bit aloof, given that she was just sort of combing her hair or some equivalent. Was talking to Violette or someone like that, and could not be bothered by a commoner.”

He added:

"A work friend played Todd Brunson T the stud8 tourney and was equally unimpressed by his attitude. Especially after he cracked Todd's trip kings for the scoop.”

2+2er Jamie Barlow described one of his favorite poker moments:

"I was in a tournament with Tony G one time and actually was busted out by him AA vs my KK. I asked him for a photo and he started going off on me most likely to be funny but whatever. He told me to get on my bike. I think he then could tell I was bummed considering it was a buy in way above my usual that I satellited in. He pulled me aside to apologize and actually rebought me into the same tourny for a 5050 split of any winnings. Pretty good guy if you ask me.”

OMGJustinBieber, isn’t a fan of the Aussie brother duo, saying that:

"Tony and Joe Hachem are ****s. Joe still thinks he's the **** even though he hasn't done anything in 10 years.”

So, according to 2+2 our OP might do well to avoid a lot of those named above. And what about you the readers? Any bad experiences meeting the big names of the game? Any good times you had with the ‘baddies’ listed? Let us know in the comments section below!