High Stakes Poker

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The Mayfair Club in New York started as a club for bridge and backgammon players. Things changed in the mid eighties when Mike Shictman took over the club. Shictman was a long time professional gambler from the Bronx that became the majority owner in the club and worked to establish it as a poker club. Originally poker started as a side game by the backgammon and bridge players after they were busted out of their games. As time passed, more and more interest grew in poker and eventually poker was the primary game of choice in the club.

Photo: Poker After Dark

All games in the Mayfair Club were dealt by the players, unlike other card rooms that would use professional dealers. Other clubs in the city offered lower stakes and professional dealers, but the level of competition was not as high as that of the Mayfair Club.

The stakes at the Mayfair were higher on average than the other poker rooms. Many top name players got their start or dramatically improved their game at the Mayfair Club. Names such as Howard Lederer, Steve Zolotow, Dan Harrington, Jay Heimowitz, Mickey Appleman, Erik Seidel, and even Stu Ungar were regulars at the poker club.

Mayfield Club regulars started to make a name for themselves at the World Series of Poker. In 1987, Steve Zolotow took fifth in the Main Event and Erik Seidel took second. In 1988, their dominance continued. It started with Jay Heimowitz who finished in 11th place. Dan Harrington and Howard Lederer both made the final table, taking 6th and 5th respectively. Erik Seidel ranks fifth all-time in World Series of Poker bracelets with eight. Dan Harrington took the 1995 WSOP Main Event and Stu Ungar is one of only two players to ever win the Main Event three times.

For those of you that have seen the movie Rounders, the Chesterfield Club in that movie was modeled after the Mayfair club. The club had a reputation of being an upscale room, complete with cocktail servers and security. When players took part in the games at the Mayfair, they knew that they were up for some world class competition. Games at the Mayfair ranged from Holdem games to various mixed games. Games ranged from $5-$10 Stud 8 or better to a $75-$150 H.O.S.E. game.

New York law does not prohibit people from playing poker for cash, but it does prohibit people from profiting on hosting games. Technically, card rooms like the Mayfair were illegal. For years, card rooms in New York were a known secret by the authorities, but unless there were conducting other illegal activities, they were left to hold their games.

Things changed in 2000 when Mayor Rudolph Giuliani instituted a “Quality of Life” campaign. One by one, the various card rooms around New York City were raided and shut down. Finally, the Mayfair Club was targeted, raided, and shut down.

Sadly, the Mayfair Club came and went before the poker boom started in 2003, but many of the big names from the club have went on to be dominant forces during the boom and became household names. While the Mayfair club no longer exists, its influence on poker and the players that frequented the club will impact the game for decades to come.

Hey guys just wanted to share some info. I ncase some of you didn’t know this yet. If you ever wondered how the poker rooms make money of poker this is the explanation. It’s called rake and it’s basically a small percentage of the pot that is set aside for the poker rooms profits. Often the rake is so small you will not notice it but on many poker rooms you can see directly on the table as the rake is collected. Rake is something all players pay in order to play at the tables but not all players are offered a part of their rake back. If you want to take part of what is arguably one of the most popular online poker promotions, together with the no deposit bonus, then you should read on.
Rakeback is either offered directly by a poker room, or more commonly through a partnered rakeback site. A rakeback site works night and day to score future poker players the best rakeback deals. The poker rooms always agree to different rakeback deals depending on how powerful the rakeback site actually is. A poker room is not going to share its main source of income if it doesn’t get anything back, so the more new players a rakeback site can generate the better rakeback deals it gets.
Rakeback sites with little visitor rate and low conversion will hence not be able to offer its visitors rakeback on a competitive level. It’s to the high-performing rakeback sites you should turn you attention. When smaller sites only can offer a couple of percents worth of rakeback, market leading sites award their members with up to 50 % rakeback for sign-ups to poker rooms like Carbon Poker and Absolute Poker.
People visiting a rakeback site are often quite new to poker and in need of more than just great promotions. I’ve noticed that the team at RakeBrain.com seems to have realized this as well. Here, visitors not only get market-competitive rakeback deals but an extensive introduction to the subject as well. Equipped with a Rakeback Calculator, great advice from rakeback blogger Le Cheese and great sign-up bonuses and promotions. So if you guys are new and feel like getting some more into on this make sure to check them out and hopefully found this useful.

Brian Townsend Multi-Accounting Scandal Exposed

Brian Townsend is a well known poker pro who has been known to play a lot of online poker and recently he has been exposed in a multi-account scandal. Brian who typically plays poker at the high stake tables on Full Tilt and Poker Stars decided to create a multiple account to play at the lower stakes. It’s difficult for a poker pro to get any action at the low stakes table which is why Brian said he made his multiple account. The opinions of the poker world so far seem to be very different from each other with some feeling it was justified while others think it’s unfair and against the rules.

Brian runs a poker blog over at CardRunners.com and this is where he has just posted his public apology to everyone. Basically what happened is Brian was playing on Full Tilt poker with the alias Stellarnebula and on Poker Stars with the alias Makersmark66. He was using the accounts for the past six months and generally playing at the $25/$50, $50/$100 and $100/$200 PLO. He was also at this time using his Brian Townsend account at the $50/$100 and $200/$400 PLO, but he never played at the same table with any of his accounts.

In light of this whole situation Brian Townsend has decide that he will donate $25,000 to an unannounced charity that will be named in the future. I don’t really see what this is showing because $25,000 isn’t very much to Brian, but it’s also better then keeping all of the money he made off of his alias accounts. From reading his apology blog post I came to the conclusion that he’s being sincere in his apology, but that still doesn’t make what he did right. A lot of people we’re basically cheated out of money by a pro poker player playing under aliases that he wasn’t suppose to be playing under.

Brian has since cleared his online poker accounts and has left $100,000 for his main account in which he hopes to double and then triple up this coming year. He won’t be going anywhere this means, but I’m sure he won’t be playing under anymore aliases any time soon. Brian has mentioned that he will continue managing CardRunners and that everyone can expect some more top of the line instructional videos to come out in the near future.

It took a real man to apologize to his peers and the online poker community and I feel we all need to respect the fact that he did come clean. A lot of people would have just run, but Brian is willing to face the music for what he did, and for this I believe he’s a real stand-up guy. We’ve all made mistakes, and most of us couldn’t say we wouldn’t do exactly what Brian has done if we had the opportunity. If you want to ask questions or read the questions being asked to Brian you can find threads on the CardRunner Forums and also the 2+2 Forums.

Decades ago it was impossible for someone to learn poker without losing some real lot of money in it. Even if they get in to quality coaches, they will not teach them all the techniques of the game, but after the advent of the internet poker game almost everything from the rank of the hands through highest bluffing strategies are available in the internet for free. Any player that wants to get started with online poker will have to just surf through the net and understand the logics and get to start. The system of internet poker game is less scary because you are allowed to practice for free until you are self-assured that you can perform the best on your own. Until you are confident about yourself you can practice for absolutely free!

The internet poker game knowledge can be gotten quite easily. It is not slow at all. Once you are through the logics and play a few tables, the knowledge of the complications, ups and downs of the game etcetera will simply flow in. You need not anymore play with just intuitions as a beginner. In fact you can play your first money poker game like a pro if you make a deliberate and dedicated attempt to understand the internet poker game mathematics in full as it is made available already in the internet by many pro players.

You can simply have a good grasp of the complicated and easy concepts of internet poker game for absolutely free. The magic of winning comes with you being sure that you practice applying what you have learnt in real time playing with real human opponents.

Apart from knowing the logics of the game it is important to play in abidance with the social laws. You must not play illegal poker. Every kind of internet poker game is not one that is organized or played in accordance with gambling laws. Some are scam internet poker sites, while some site might be where you are not supposed to play per your state laws. When you choose to play internet poker game be sure to verify the legality of playing poker in the site.

Also you need to know the psychological effects of internet poker game like addiction and compulsive gambling. You need to know the limits of playing internet poker game without touching the lines of addiction or compulsive gambling. When you succeed to do such you are walking the winning path.

Mike ‘The Mouth’ Matusow is almost known worldwide by poker fans for his loudmouth mixed with his great playing style. Matusow is known for both his famous tilting blow ups as well as his common verbal wars with his opponents. It was no secret when Matusow and fellow Full Tilt Poker Pro David Singer got into it while playing online. While Saturday brought up the $2,500 buy in tournament. Those who railed Mike at his first table saw him sitting next to ‘DaEvils’ also known as foxwood fiend. The very first hand of play saw Matusow pick up pocket kings and take 500 of ‘DaEvils’s chips, who called Matusow down with pocket nines. Matusow, iin typical fashion, lived up to his nickname of the Mouth and let ‘DaEvils’ hear about it in the chat room.

Mike Matusow: he ddint want to fold the 99
Mike Matusow: on ffirst hand like im bluffing there lol
DaEvils: what’s funy mike is how you feel like talking trash
DaEvils: when you played your hand about as bad as possible

The back and forth talk quickly went to what seemed like a challenge from Matusow.

Mike Matusow: love to play all u idiots live
DaEvils: mike i swear to god
DaEvils: i will play you live
Mike Matusow: u cant fold 99 ther u just a stone sucker
DaEvils: for 100k freezeouts
DaEvils: until one of us quits
Mike Matusow: witha CAPITOL CCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCC
DaEvils: i wll be in vegas in 3 weeks
DaEvils: but you just love to talk trash whlie relizing you’re awful and a joke
DaEvils: so won’t back it up

With ‘DaEvils’ quickly accepting the challenge, it seemed like Matusow started backing away from the heads up match.

Mike Matusow: TAKE U AND YOUR INTERNET POKER SUCCESS AND BIT ME
DaEvils: i will play you live
DaEvils: as much as you want
Mike Matusow: 99 LOL
DaEvils: it’s just pathetic you pros that talk so miuch trash about medium sized pots

Things seemed to start getting heated and slowly looked like they were turning personal very quickly.

DaEvils: when you’re constantly broke and begging for stakes
Mike Matusow: SUCKS U GOT TO GRIND YOUR WHOLE LIFE I DONT DONT IT
DaEvils: and all you have is your ego about value towning me with your 1/2 pot bes
DaEvils: lol way to change the topic
Mike Matusow: sucks dont it
DaEvils: and i never grind, i play like 10k hands a month
DaEvils: but sik brn bro
DaEvils: if i can use sme rtarded matsow splling
Mike Matusow: sup post flop gm sir
DaEvils: seriously, stop changing the subject
DaEvils: and jus say yes or no for the rail to see
DaEvils: will you play me HU for 50k?
Mike Matusow: ah go cr me a river im done with u
DaEvils: or 100k?
DaEvils: live
DaEvils: and if not is it because you think you suck?
Mike Matusow: wheheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
Mike Matusow: ehehehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
DaEvils: pathetic trash talkers
DaEvils: all you live dinosaurs
Mike Matusow: whehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Mike Matusow: sorry ill be on the road in german and london playing real poker
Mike Matusow: in my real life
Mike Matusow: have to challenge me some othe rtime
DaEvils: ‘mike you’re actually just acting like the idiot 8 yer old who puts his hands over his ears and goes “nah nahy
nah nah i can’t hear you”
Mike Matusow: when im not so busy making real money
DaEvils: but its funny because you’re not 7
Mike Matusow: oh wait
DaEvils: you’re just an old sad sack
Mike Matusow: lol
Mike Matusow: sucks u willnever be me dont it

This comment didn’t seem to sit well with ‘DaEvils’ who quicly came right back with some strong words of his own.

DaEvils: LOL
DaEvils: as much as i’d like to have substance abuse problems
DaEvils: and constantly go broke
DaEvils: i think i’ll find somebody else to idolize
Mike Matusow: u see what i posted on my show other day afer playing in these ftops zeroooooooooooooooo repsect for
any internet superstar tourn player
Mike Matusow: zero
DaEvils: lol at me being a tourny player
Mike Matusow: 000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
Mike Matusow: 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
DaEvils: and you have zero respect but puss out at a challenge
DaEvils: i have 0 respect for people who talk tons of trash and don’t back it up
Mike Matusow: wowo u played a hand well idiot congrats
DaEvils: mike keep acting so smug
DaEvils: when you’e been exposed as a trash-talker who won’t play me
DaEvils: it’s pathetic
DaEvils: for the record, will you play me HU live or not?
DaEvils: just so all your adoring fans can see you have little cojojnes?
DaEvils: guess i shouldn’t have gotten my hopes up to play HU vs someone who’s almost definitely broke
DaEvils: feel sorry for whoever you’re going to try to con into thinking you have an edge
DaEvils: so you can lose their money
Mike Matusow: hes just a young kid nobody that cant play anygame but nl holdem an dprolly cant eve play that a fking
blind person can play nl holdem

The chat seemed to die down before Matusow started making more noise when he began chatting again. This once again spurred the want for a heads up match from ‘DaEvils.’

Mike Matusow: hi
DaEvils: i’ll put pLO in the mix also if you want
DaEvils: i’ll even let you play 08 vs me in the mixDaEvils: which you’re supposedly best in the world at
DaEvils: to make it fair for how much i’d own you at the other two games
Mike Matusow: this got to be worst table draw in the whole tourn
DaEvils: i’m very happy with my seat
Mike Matusow: u a idiot ill bust your %&! with a blind fold on my hairy assssss

The talk of playing heads up didn’t stop there and the two kept going at it trying to get a heads up game going.

DaEvils: i’m sitting at empty Hu tables every stakes from 25/50 to 200/400
DaEvils: come and play me mikey
Mike Matusow: come play me 1k2k horse hu
Mike Matusow: or 5 1k
Mike Matusow: 5 games
Mike Matusow: oh wait u only know one
DaEvils: thing is
DaEvils: i’m not talking trash about how bad you are at horse
DaEvils: if i were it would be stupid to pass up the oportunity
DaEvils: whereas you are talking trash about me and then not playing
DaEvils: if you need more help with subtle distinctions between various analogies let me know
Mike Matusow: i even sat in a cheap hu horse game just for u 5 1k
Mike Matusow: so im sitting their jsut for u
DaEvils: if you’d ever gone to school past 8th grade you’d know these things

The players were then moved, which was a surprising move as it didn’t seem like tables would break so early in such a deep stacked tournament. The two were separated however, and Matusow quickly informed his new table about what he had just gone through.

Recently, there has been a stir circulating the very popular ‘Two Plus Two (2P2)’ internet forums. Recent online controversy has circled around the online cheating that has gone on around various sites. However, the war of words here, although mostly one sided, came from a post accusing a highly ranked moderator of the forums, ‘Cornell Fiji.’ Allegedly, Steve Ware, the man behind the user name, had been guilty of stealing their money. The first, and the claim that brought up the most attention, was when it was posted on the 2P2 forums. A thread popped up accusing Ware of the unpaid debts, and was quickly deleted. The damage was done, however, and word got out enough to the point where the site had no choice but let it be openly discussed in the ‘news, Views, and Gossip’ section of its forums.

Cornell Fiji aka Steven Ware and Admo 2+2 rolling” />
The first of the claims came from ‘Admo.’ According to ‘Admo,’ Ware had been looking for a way to transfer money online by paying cash. ‘Admo’ quickly accepted, and the two kept in touch. In ‘Admo’s’ words, the deal was set to go down where ‘Admo’ would fly to Vegas and pick up the $30,000 cash while he would transfer money to Ware’s online account on Full Tilt Poker, where he plays under the screen name of TheMatadorKGB. Ware allegedly denied this, however, and decided he would just transfer the money directly into ‘Admo’s bank account, which was fine for both sides, and ‘Admo’ quickly sent the money online. However, he claims the following day went by with no money being deposited into his bank account. Ware fended him off for a day saying he couldn’t make it to the bank, but responded the next day with a text message sent to ‘Admo’ reading ‘well I’m sure you probably guessed what happened…’
Ware, according to ‘Admo,’ admitted to being a degenerate gambler and that he had blown the money at the Bellagio to what has rumored to have been known player ‘Boosted J’ as well as in the sportsbook, although none of that has been confirmed by Ware himself. ‘Admo’ has claimed that Ware has promised to get the money back whether it be by borrowing from friends or family, selling his own property, paying from his upcoming book, or selling stock. However, none of this has yet to happen. Ware’s actions recently have been very questionable. He posted on the 2P2 forums challenging a player known as ’stelthmunk’ to a minimum of $250,000 heads up match. This has led many to believe that he is really not in as bad of shape as he is leading off, and could repay the money to ‘Admo’ immediately if he wanted. ‘Admo’ did not panic. He waited paitently and even set up a reasonable $2,500 a week payment plan that was agreed to by Ware. However, the first deadline came and went, leaving ‘Admo’ once again with no money that he was promised.
In order to regain the money, ‘Admo’ has threated legal action. He has apparently had experience with this, and has been reimbursed through legal action. He has openly invited anyone who feels they are owed money by Ware to step up and join him in his legal battle. Even a website under the address of www.stevenwareisathief.com has been opened up, threatening jail time to the alleged thief. Ware has yet to make any sort of public comment on the matter. In fact, many posters on the forum are very upset because many posts about the matter are being deleted by Ware. He has even gone back and deleted his own posts to cover up any belief that he may have the money to pay back the debt. In an updated post posted on Thursday, new claims have come out accusing Ware of losing the money in big cash games at Bobby’s Room in the Bellagio as well as that casinos sportsbook. Ware has also asked that posts about him be taken down due to the damage that could be done to him personally. Ware has also now claimed that due to the circumstances forced on him by the debacle going public, that he now is unable to pay his debt to ‘Admo.’
The saga doesn’t end there. In the post on 2P2, ‘Admo’ revealed two others who had claimed they were also owed money in some way by Ware. ‘JP OSU’ claims that he was left ousted of $12,000 in a staking agreement gone wrong. Also, ‘aufzuckerter’ claims that he has been scammed out of $1850 in a debacle that involved a World Series of Poker ticket transfer. Steve ‘Cornell Fiji’ Ware has been silent, although everyone knows what seems to be going on with these accusations. Will he pay the money back? That remains to be seen. What we do know, however, is that this ongoing story can’t be pleasing those in charge over at Two Plus Two.

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