Top 10 Poker Scandals of 2019 Part 2

4 years ago
Top 10 Poker Scandals of 2019 Part 2
10:19
18 Dec

As we saw in part one of our look at the top poker scandals of the year, dodgy behaviour and dubious ethics are as alive in our game as they are in any other sphere of life.


Today we’re going visit the top five stories that had us shaking our heads and tut-tutting in our coffee, starting with…


5. Nick Marchington’s WSOP staking woes

This year’s summer shindig in Vegas had more than its fair share of scandals and jaw-dropping stories, and young English pro Nick Marchington found himself at the centre of one of them.

A fantastic 7th place in the Main Event – a $1,525,000 cash – was tarnished when his winnings were put on hold, a staking group claiming he owed them 10% of his final table winnings.

What followed was an unfortunate he said/they said tale of miscommunication and alleged greed that ended up in court, Marchington eventually prevailing and collecting his WSOP windfall.



4. Phil Ivey’s WSOP winnings waylaid

Sticking with the Vegas angle, the legendary Phil Ivey was another to fall foul of grubby fingers looking for money, the Borgata Casino’s legal team pouncing on Ivey’s PPC payday.

The sting followed Ivey’s long-running legal dispute over the $10million edge-sorting debacle in Atlantic City, and the poker legend’s $124k summer cash was withheld by the WSOP.

The dispute didn’t end there, however, Daniel 'Jungleman' Cates and Ilya Trincher filing suit that they were Ivey’s backers and were due a chunk of the cash – that argument still ongoing in the courts.


3. Dennis Blieden falls foul of the Feds

Wire fraud and identity theft were at the heart of WPT champ Dennis Blieden’s embezzlement charges this summer.

Poker buy-ins and online gambling accounted for some of the $22million he is alleged to have defrauded the company he worked for, StyleHaul Inc.

The Ohio businessman sprang to prominence last year when he scooped the WPT LA Poker Classic title and $1million, but facing a possible 200-year prison sentence wasn’t quite what was expected as a follow-up score.



2. Ken Strauss in WSOP and terrorism shocker

One of the biggest – and saddest – stories of the year started when Pittsburgh poker player Ken Strauss was DQ’d from the Main Event after dropping his pants and throwing a shue.

Worse was to come, the clearly ill Strauss arrested on a terrorism charge later in July after threatening Vegas casinos, the judge recently describing him as ‘mentally incompetent’ to stand trial.



1. Postlegate - the Scandal of the Decade?

For the poker community there was only one scandal that has dominated every single sphere of the game in recent weeks – the alleged cheating by Mike Postle in live cash games.

Postlegate, as the incident quickly became known, saw claims that Mike Postle was winning at a ridiculous rate, and by extremely nefarious means – involving technology and insider help at Stones Gambling House in Sacramento.

A community-led investigation trawled through hundreds of hours of streamed cash game footage and has provided tonnes of evidence, with Postle and others now facing both a $30million civil action, and a criminal investigation.



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Andrew from Edinburgh, Scotland, is a professional journalist, international-titled chess master, and avid poker player.Read more

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