When the Wizard of Vegas, LatestCasinoBonuses.com, and Las Vegas Advisor Forums are the only ones where I am an active member, I do frequent other Forums and, more often than not, I come across them while browsing the Internet for information on Las Vegas. In any event, I came across a blog article by Daniel Negreanu, a member of the Poker Hall of Fame, in which he expressed his opinion that Howard Lederer and Chris “Jesus” Ferguson should not be expelled from the game because of their (alleged) participation in the Full Tilt incident.
It was the first time in a long time that I had given any attention to “Black Friday,” which occurred on April 15, 2011. I definitely wasn’t engaged or interested in online poker at the time (or today, for that matter), nor was I involved or interested in gambling in general at the time. However, I was reminded of Black Friday to a certain extent, and I decided to look into the demise of Full Tilt Poker as a result of my memories.
To begin, I should point out that, although I did not participate in internet poker, I did frequently participate in Limit Texas Hold ‘Em live games, as well as infrequent No Limit or Mix home games, and I even participated in the rare No Limit Tournament at one of a few nearby casinos. Given my passion in poker at the time (I play MUCH less often these days), it seemed inevitable that I would spend a lot of time watching poker on television in the hopes of developing my game by studying the play of people who were better than me.
Prior to the controversy, one of my favorite players was Howard Lederer, who, although some saw him as arrogant, I found his methodical and analytical approach to the game to be very appealing, and I could see why he was nicknamed “The Professor.” According to what you will discover, whatever it is that he might be considered a “Professor” of, it isn’t Business Management…much less Business Ethics.
In addition to his usual reserved attitude, Howard Lederer was capable of the odd burst of comic energy, as follows: Lederer sucked out on Poker Legend Phil Hellmuth one night when I was watching Poker After Dark on NBC, which has since been discontinued (and was provided to you by Full Tilt Poker, by the way). It was one of my favorite moments of the series. I wasn’t expecting to be able to locate that particular footage on the internet, but here it is
“Oooohhh, that’s right.”
I find Lederer’s response amusing since it is comparable to the reaction of a player with a low expectation who gets very fortunate, which is not exactly what you’d expect from a seasoned and experienced professional poker player like Lederer.
In reaction of the poor beat, Hellmuth had an outburst that was out of character for the normally calm and quiet poker player, adding to the humor. (For those of you who aren’t familiar with the game of poker, the above phrase may be the most sarcastic thing I’ve ever written. However, apart from Lederer’s attitude at the table, I thought him to have a very strong mathematical approach to the game, which I appreciated. A player like Daniel Negreanu, for example, has an amazing ability to place players on a particular hand, but he does this by a mix of reasoning, intuition, and intimate knowledge of his or her opponents. Someone who had only 25% of Daniel Negreanu’s intuition would almost certainly be a competent poker player based just on that factor, in my opinion.