I doubt Alec is addressing this

Well said.

I disagree with this a bit. I think in the short-term, players without ethics are at an advantage, but in the long-term players with ethics are at the advantage. Sooner or later bad ethics catches up to you. It could be not getting into invited into a game because players don't trust you, not getting a business deal because of trust, not getting favorably rulings because of your rep, not getting backing, etc, etc. Your word being bond is very advantageous in the poker world.

I see players go significantly north in a game (<$100 north I don't care much about), and I start to wonder what other rules they're willing to break. Yeah, maybe the rule isn't the most important, but it's still a rule. I wonder what other rules they don't view as important. I say keep following the rules and you'll do better off in the long run.

Can someone that is well spoken type a non-troll, factual "Controversy" section to his wikipedia page so it's up there permanently? Alec strikes me as the type of guy that takes a lot of pride in having a wikipedia page.

I guess I'll just just simply disagree. There are cameras, dealers and floor staff that are supposed to enforce the rules of their casino/cardroom. Probably a bit of a derailment here but I would not stand for anyone going north in a game to cover a whale, nor would I attempt to do it myself. I'd rather not risk embarrassment, removal and/or a ban from a game or Casino. HOWEVER, I have been a part many games where the entire table is informed or asked by the re-buyee that he would like to reload to an amount above the max buy in and the entire table agrees. I've also seen a floor allow this and I've seen a floor immediately shut it down, even citing gambling laws in the state as the reason (true or not, I don't know).

Anyhow, as usual, I think the points Doug makes in his vid are 100% spot on. Surely the PNIA staff is going to have to act on this situation, amirite? There's no way Torelli is allowed back, is there?

Great idea.

Have crossed paths with Alec a couple of times. Always seemed ok, but obv loved himself and has a huge ego. Which I'm sure comes across in his YouTube videos.

I don't have social media. Have 888 been informed? Might be worth linking them to the thread/tweets as he was recently freerolled into some bowl live festival.

I found the 888 thread and posted there, as I don't have any social media.

Would be good if someone who has FB/twitter let their live event team know too. Would be pretty disgusting if this kind of person is given more free tournaments.

Crush Live Poker should distance themselves from this douchebag.

fwiw I agree with both you and lost but the reality is it's super hard to enforce. People take big chips with them to the bathroom then they come back and there's a few extra 1k chips than they left with. I'd have to be pretty confident to ever say anything there, and even if I was confident and then they disagree what am I going to do demand they stop the game and go to the cameras? Then there's the fact that there's 8 other people at your table if someone does it while another hand is going on or simply when everyone else is on their phone, are you going to remember everyone's stack size? As in the previous example will you ever be sure enough to actually call them out on it? Again I'm not saying it's right, but just the way poker plays it's an extremely difficult rule to enforce in games where big chips play, and I've never played in a 5/10 game that properly enforced a cap. Most of the time if you try to immediately buy into the game with too much the dealer will say something, but after that it's just super difficult to police.

It's a bit different in a televised game where apparently they actually had a board with stack sizes, so that makes it a lot more scummy of Alec imo.

It's not much, but when I see behavior that I disapprove of at the poker table, whether it's an angle or being rude to a waitress, I study that player intently to try to get a read on them and I note their betting habits, etc, so I can take their money faster.

Not trying to sound like a dick, but you should really be doing that with everyone. Regardless of how you feel about them.

One's area of attention and energy levels are finite. Fortunately, some people just motivate me.

Aside from this and as far as I can tell, I think I'm usually the hardest working person at the table(paying the most attention).

Really? How'd that work out on PNIA where Alec went North in front of TV cameras, producers/staff/audience, and subsequently stacked a player in a huge hand where there was already significant controversy about his chip stack and yet it wasn't until recently that someone realized he went North.

There are a few potential factors at play here:

1) Other players may not see the player go north (old hide the big chips behind the big stack trick)

2) Other players may not want to hurt the game by pointing out that the pro went north. i.e. if you point this out you are pretty much telling the whale he should leave because there is some shadiness going on

3) Other players are scumbag pros that will just go North as well. Also, there is a bit of I'll rub your back and you'll rub my back when I do some shady ****.

4) Some players try to avoid conflict

5) Dealers/Floors often favor regs as these are their main customers. It's very easy for dealers to throw a blind eye at this given they were only in the box for 30 minutes so they had no clue how much the player had in chips.

Final results are yet to be seen. Not looking too good so far though. Pretty much destroyed his own rep in a single instance.

Not part of the Alec brigade, but wasn't his rep already tarnished before this?

tarnished before, totally destroyed now.

+1. Also, anyone who doesn't think he was angling, needs to rewatch the video 10x over and see how he pulls the 5K chips from behind his stacks. They were clearly hidden from view. No live pro, or even live semi-pro, or frequent player wouldn't know the rules about big chips, especially if they are of such denomination. eot

and then lied TWICE to the floor when they asked him where the chips were.

nh,wp

@Clarence.

Previously I had said that you need to make sure how much you're jamming for before you jam and I do stick by that, "You got about 16k?" If he says yes and turns out to have $16.9k then you've prolly just gotta be a bit tilted at him but if he says yes and then turns out to have 20k well then you're perfectly in your rights to say you're only paying him 16, IMO. IT is a mistake you made just gotta learn and move on, you'll likely never do this again, we've all been there.

All that being said, the facts you make about him adding chips when you're supposed to inform the production, coupled with the fact he'd been losing I can see how you made the mistake

It seems to me he was losing big in the game, snuck chips onto the table so people wouldn't think he was losing, not defending him from the accusastions but it does feel like this was an ego driven decision not an attempt to cheat. What a clown though, playing HS for years has he never lost 400-500 big blinds in a live game before, pretty sure Ivey has gotten buried a few times in his career and he's widely considered to be quite the cardsman.

What is HORRENDOUS though, is when he approaches you to "sort this out" - you assume he's going to offer you some of the money back (although stupid to do this before the hand as you could have won the pot) the equity share of the extra money seems very fair offer from you actually, he offers you the chance to BUY A PIECE of him in an upcoming cash game...

Jesus christ what a huge bellend.

if there was ANY justice whatsoever you'd have just won the pot. This is why I don't go to church.

He should be absolutely finished in the community after this. How to you borrow someone like him $$ after this? Or invite him to a home game? This is inarguable video evidence of him being an absolute scumbag. If he's not universally shunned it makes us all look bad.

Nice try Alec; thought you woulda made up something better than that lame-ass justification tho.

The angle wasn't that Torelli placed his big chips behind his stack. That seemed accidental.

The angle was that after realizing that his opponent misread his stack, he tried to probe him to get a read on his holdings and then play out the hand, rather than trying to rectify the situation by agreeing to have Wolf pull some of his bet back and check it down, or something like that.