Somewhere around 5:37 when they are discussing how much money to take back Matusow said something like "I don't want to be unfair to him" while pointing at Jetten. Hellmuth immediately dismissed that comment and they moved on. Sounds like Matusow at least recognized the unfairness but didn't push back.

They should have given Jetten his 80% back just like they took their 80% back.

Or play it out with the full pot just like poker is supposed to be played.

Jetten said he didn't think they were colluding about this incident.

ProPokerTools Hold'em Simulation

37,010,358 trials (Exhaustive)

dead cards: ak

Hand	Pot equity	Wins	Ties
asks	36.84%	13,540,500	185,712
jsj	63.16%	23,284,146	185,712

this was a pretty ridiculous situation, jetten handled it well

it was clear to everyone at the table how bad a decision matusow was making though, gotta love the grinder offering to take the action

producers should tell him if he ever pulls that kind of stunt again he will never be invited back though

It's just a quick/easy way for Mike to take expensive insurance. If you're upset about what happened there you should be just as upset about insurance and multiple boards.

jetten knows clearly they're not colluding against him, they just dont like 200k variance

That's pretty skewed information there when even Jetten says it was hard for him to sit through the negotiation and not reveal his hand. He took insurance on a big flip, nothing more nothing less. If Jetten had JT would you be calling him a genius?

This whole senerio sucks and doesn't make sence on the surface. However, here's a reasonable explaination....

Mike & Phil are good freinds, historically Phil has staked Mike. I don't think its a stretch to think that was the case here.

Under my theory it makes it a little easier to understand WHY Mike would offer and make such a good deal to Phil. It's still not fair to Jetten, or the others, or the integrity of the game..

Well, there is quite a difference in this. Your chip equity does not change in any way if you run the board x times (with x being any number as long as there are enough cards in the deck), while if you take chips back from the pot that you are favorite in, you are actually losing money.

I have really no motivation to calculate this but in one of the older threads about this someone posted that Matusow gave up about $8,000 there.

I'd actually call this collusion after the fact. If they were chopping my money I would raise hell. I would still object even if I weren't in the pot. It's not poker; it's extremely bad for the game and the fact that it was televised is even worse.

I was playing a game where a guy limped utg and a bunch of other limped, then reraised his friend. After everyone folded they turned their cards face up and agreed not to bet. If the floor had not told them to cut it out, I would have left immediately. Why play in a game where until their heads up and then quit playing, satisfied that one of them gets the money? And their doing it on TV, representing poker as a community and a game...

You have to give up a pretty big edge to sit in a game where guys know they can get into a raising war, put dead money in the pot AND get a refund. It puts you at a disadvantage if your have to risk more than they do and quit playing speculative hands (or just keep donating dead money). It takes the gamble out of the game. Big pots, big winners and big losers are good for the game... this just kills the game.

Collusion is gambling with your money, not ours (two or more against one) and that's exactly what's going on here. Obviously; I don't think it's planned or it's as egregious as outright collusion, but in the end the effect is basically the same.

In the famous Greenstein-Dwan HSP hand, Barry asked Tom if he wanted to take money out of the pot after they were both all in. Tom said no and they ran it once with Dwan winning a huge pot when he spiked a queen on the turn. I know Eastgate had also put money in the pot before Barry and Tom raised and re-raised all-in.

You don't think your chip equity changes if you give/take insurance? Of course it does. It goes up if you give it and goes down if you take it. That's the same thing that happened here. Phil gave insurance and Mike took it.

Now you guys can still say nasty things about it, but just realize if you do you should say those same things about insurance deals.