Chris Ferguson may become the best player at WSOP 2017! Really?
Chris Ferguson may become the best player at WSOP 2017! Really?
Long dark hair, well-groomed beard, cowboy hat, slim body structure – those are the features that allowed a poker player to receive nickname “Jesus”. Chris Ferguson is one of the key figure of Full Tilt Poker scandal – he returned to poker a year ago and made a fuss on WSOP 2017 making ITM for 16 (!) times!
“Let me explain you something, Chris. You were a part of the company, a very important part – people trusted you and therefore trusted the company. You’ve earned millions of dollars on it and just hid when the things went wrong. You didn’t say a word about it – nor then, nor now.
Whether you’re guilty or not, you kept silence, and that makes you guilty. You asked about players’ trust, but don’t you think they deserve some sort of an apology? Any decent man would feel himself owed to do it”.
Those are the words of Daniel Negreanu he told almost a year ago at World Series of Poker 2016. This was the first time Chris Ferguson showed on public after 5-year absence. Together with Howard Lederer. They were looked down at by everyone back then/
They got they “F* u” bombs in the open. There were calls for poker “executions”. For instance, Greg Merson demanded ruthless slowroll:
https://twitter.com/gregmerson/status/740370036611653632
This was massively discussed; a lot of anger and filth was forwarder towards them.
Ferguson continued to stay silent. In his interviews, he only claimed: “I am here to play poker”.
In reality, not all the details of Ferguson’s deal in terms of Black Friday are known. He insisted he is innocent and didn’t know about the mayhem in Full Tilt Poker.
Let us remind you that the owners of the biggest poker room stole $444 million dollars from their players with the help of real Ponzi scheme. Ferguson was the face of the company, was close to top management, participated in creation of Full Tilt software (his deep knowledge of computer science helped him here).
But was Ferguson really guilty?
Chris’s breakthrough on WSOP 2017
16 times! This is the number of times “Jesus” made it to the money this World Series. Now he is placed fourth in “The Best WSOP Player 2017” rating, but was number one there not so long ago!
Rating seems to be not updated in time as the second place of the American in $10,000 Seven Card Stud Championship wasn’t included. So Chris will fight for the title of “The Best Player of the series”.
He was only at two final tables so far – the aforementioned one and his 4th place in $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha Hi/Lo Championship.
Anyhow, this is a remarkable result to say the least. Only couple of players were better or equally successful with Chris – including John Racener who was ITM 17 times and won a golden bracelet of the series
The participation of the duo Ferguson-Lederer in team tournament $1,000 Tag Team caused another wave of intolerance towards them.
https://twitter.com/TWKftw/status/871954399060303872
https://twitter.com/tjurk44/status/871940959579144192
https://twitter.com/RyanLeng9/status/871951317039669248
Unlike Chris, Lederer has made some attempts to make apologies. He officially apologized (whether it helped him or not). “Jesus” still plays poker with two open cheeks ready for slaps of those who suffered from top management of Full Tilt Poker.
The truth is out there as usual. One thing is for sure: Ferguson still has professional player’s grip in him. His results will tell you that 100%.
Should he become the best this year, we will face the precedent.
Finally, some words by Layne Flack, 6-time WSOP champion who played at the same table with Chris multiple times:
“We can’t point our fingers as we don’t know the full picture… It is easy to accuse someone, put labels when you are somewhere far away. When you’re close, you start to think, were there some proofs of their guilt.
Ferguson has done lots of good for poker. The decisions of Full Tilt Poker not necessarily touch him directly. I truly believe he didn’t stole a cent. He is not like that. He’d rather give away all that he has rather than take something from people.
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