Men "the master" Nguyen

$10.5 mill live cashes per Hendon Mob

http://pokerdb.thehendonmob.com/player.php?a=r&n=184

A poker player who has mastered the art of cheating !

Yeah, this has always been an obvious exploit that I always figured they must have some safeguard in place for bc it was so stupidly easy and obvious...but maybe not(??)

But isn't it somewhat trivial to at least determine how big of a problem this is by just comparing the chip counts of the final two players to how many chips SHOULD be in play? i.e. just multiply the # of buy-ins by the starting stack, and compare it to the # of chips left in play at the end. Won't tell you WHO may have brought in additional chips, but we could at least get a sense of how rampant of a problem this is / has been. In fact, we don't even need WSOP to do it...assuming chip stacks are being reported correctly couldn't anybody just do the simple math using the #'s reported by pokernews or whoever is tracking the tourney?

was there any truth to 5 mil in borgata 5k chips found at harras? saw it on twitter.
sounds like they may be closing in on the suspects

Ah thanks

See posts 842; 844 - 846 in this thread.

Does any one know if the bad chips have already been taken out of play, or if they (some, most, all) still are within the bags that have been tagged at the time of suspension? If they have all been taken out, then it is conceivable that they could restart with the 27, assuming of course, that they clear all remaining of having any involvement in the scheme. The problem is that the remaining players may head home (or done so already) for their real world responsibilities, etc. They could offer to restart at a later date, such as the spring open. If the bad chips are still in the players' bags, then they could restart by just deducting all bad chips from the remaining stacks as a condition for the 27 to play. Leave them out or forfeit the stack. Not good for the honest players who won the bad chips in the course of play; it is analogous to finding a counterfeit bill in your wallet - nice for you to turn them in to the govt but you can't get reimbursed for that - you are still out the money. The state can just impose that and say tough luck - at least you are ITM and still in the hunt. The player friendly variation on this is for the bad chips to be replaced with good chips 1 for 1, as long as all remaining are cleared, but the state may not want to have an overchip count situation to be perpetuated.

The other option the state and Borg could impose is that all remaining 27 get flatpaid at 27th place (assuming again that none are involved) and the remaining pool money goes for as many refunds of OTM as possible, with the Borg picking up the slack. Not a great solution for the 27, but the state is now in charge and they can pretty much dictate terms - the state may not be so concerned about who is the chip leader and the ranking of the 27, as they are about finding out who did it and then returning buyins to all those who bought into a tainted game. Again - all speculative thoughts - not advocating one way or the other, it is a mess for all the honest players.

Lol. You're a noob. :-)

The big joke on the floor at the tournament series is that Men "the master" did it.

Been reading posts for 2 days. The Borgata has some tough decisions to make. I can see a table of lawyers, management and public relations pros all trying to figure the way out or the cheap way out. This is there brand that doesn't stop at this event. It's there credibility that's on the line. They stand behind a slogan in there new online gaming launch of safe and secure. Either they will take the cheap way out or protect the field as a whole. 4500 plus pissed off customers or 4500+ customers for life. I fired three bullets in this event and if one 5k chip played a role in any of my hands I want my entry back. The borgata is guilty of past success but they got cheap and watered down the product. 1hour lines to register. Floor people covering up to 20 tables each. Dealers that were dealing blackjack in the day and for the first time poker at night. They knew they would have 4000 plus entries because the guarantee required it. Greed replaced competence. I witnessed the Bellagio which owned the poker tourney world from 2003-2008 blow there brand with bad decision making. I hope the Borgata looks at the big picture. How long do you think it's going to take to get 4000 people to join a lawsuit. Accounting 101 in poker tourneys is you reconcile the chips at the end of each day. Entries multiplied by starting chips. The end of day bagged chips should match. When you stretch your staff to the point of increasing the bottom line steps are missed. I paid 3 vig. Fees on my entries for the Borgata to run a clean event and they cut corners for profit. Just look at the 15% off food vouchers. We use to get $10 voucher then it went to 15% off. Now it's 15% off but can only be used at 2 locations. Can't even be used for the food company in the touney room.you keep cutting corners and you will become Harrahs.

Finding Humor In This Imbroglio

I suppose it's inevitable that in a situation like this, there will be a fair amount of gallows humor - and there have been a few really good ones in this thread. I especially loved: "There's no crying in poker!" with a link back to Tom Hanks chewing out Madonna for letting the tying run get on second. I wonder what the equivalent to Tom Hanks insulting the umpire would be in this case? Perhaps one of the final 27 saying to Tab: "You know what you remind me of? A dick masquerading as a Tournament Director!" (I imagine a barb like that would probably get the player ejected - just like Tom Hanks ...)

The state forcibly canceled the tournament. It can never be restarted under any circumstances. All you can hope for is refunds for everyone who busted and a fair chop for the final 27.

Borgata should eat the costs of the above since it failed to safeguard its own tournament. The whole event was a mess -- three different rooms in three disconnected parts of the property, dealers dealing poker for the first time ever (in a $2 million event!), old and new chips mixed together. It was a ****-show even before they discovered the counterfeit chips.

And it took the Borgata TD and staff till the final 27 of 4812 entries to finally stop the tournament? When there were rumors and talk of bogus chips days before that?

This is 100% Borgata's fault, it was preventable, and they need to make things right.

To everyone who keeps saying it is now out of Borgata's hands. When the state comes up with the solution , nothing can stop Borgata a private company to go an extra mile on their own to make all participants in this fraudulent tournament that they hosted happy.

If the state finds that there was some kind of cover up and that TD knew there were fake chips prior to day 3 and did not want to do anything about it until it got too big and too obvious when chip counts did not add up... the TD should not only be fired obviously but should also face criminal and/or civil charges

The Borgata has more to lose than their poker reputation but Weather or not they can be trusted to run a reputable online gaming business. Safe an secure. Hogwash

Agree and we all want to see Borg do right for the honest players. But at this point no one knows who the good and bad ones are - you wouldn't want all the counterfeiters to be made whole and 'happy'. Thus the investigation will run its course. In the meantime if Borg can find a temporizing solution for all you good guys and gals, that would be welcome and expected.

No, because people adding chips in the early stages and others taking them off in the late stages, cancel each other out.

Borgata was going to have another re-entry tournament today according to their schedule for the Winter Poker Open. Did they start this up or cancel it? If they are having it what changes are they going to make so they don't see the same fake chip issues they had a few days ago as these re-entry tournaments are suspects for corruption?

Sorry if this was answered already but I didn't see it when I looked over the thread and just saw other events to go on but wasn't sure if that meant re-entries.

There really is only "****ty" options. That said, I believe they should take the remaining prizepool and cut it in half and distribute evenly between the 27 players (assuming none of the cheats are remaining). Then take the second half of the prize pool and chop it using ICM. This would reward those who were able to grow a large stack, but not completely penalize those shorties. Like I said, there isn't a good option, anything will be ****ty at this point.

An Expensive (But Fair?) Resolution For The Final 27 ...

Not that I think there's any realistic chance of this actually happening, but we all know that anything can happen in tournament poker. Every one of the remaining 27 players (even the short stack) can make a valid argument that they had a legitimate shot at winning the tournament - along with the $1,000,000.00 plus first place prize money. Any one of the 27 (and certainly one of them for sure) got cheated out of the opportunity to become a millionaire. I have a feeling for the majority of those final 27 players, a one-million-plus payday would represent life-changing money, so it's perfectly understandable that each one of them feels (justifiably) that they've been screwed.

Since any one of them could have been the winner - and we'll never know who the actual "winner" would have been since the state of New Jersey cancelled the tourney - the only fair solution would be for the NJGCB to declare all 27 of them the winner and order the Borgata to pay all 27 the equivalent of first place prize money. (In exchange for this proposed settlement, all 27 of the players would have to agree not to sue either the Borgata and/or the state of New Jersey in exchange for the money.) Of course, I doubt if the NJGCB would impose such a costly and draconian punishment on the Borgata, but such an enforcement action would send a clear and unmistakable message to operators all across the country: "Get your act together - or be prepared to suffer the consequences!" (It would also give operators a strong incentive to do the same thing with poker cheats that they have been doing for years with blackjack cheats - establish a Griffin "Black Book" of known poker cheats to be barred from poker rooms.)

The beauty and elegance of this solution is that it rights a wrong done to 27 [potential] prospective millionaires. Also, in the long run, it might actually save the Borgata money as they are sure to face civil lawsuits from (at least) one or two - if not all - of the 27 who got shafted. It only takes one or two of those lawsuits being successful for the Borgata to get stuck with a potentially huge liability. Also, if Borgata's top management wants to do something positive PR-wise to salvage their shattered reputation, they might go ahead and do this on their own initiative without being forced by a NJGCB edict. (The Borgata might eventually be able to recoup some of their loss by going after the criminal perpetrators - once they are identified, arrested, and prosecuted.) It's the only way I know of to try and make right a wrong in a truly meaningful way.

When I watch a football game, I know that some percentage of the players are on performance enhancing drugs and cheating. When there is a lot of money on the line, some people will try to cheat.

In an event of 4,800+, I expect someone to try to cheat in some way shape or form. I don't like it, I don't want it to happen, but I know from reading accounts of past poker tournament cheating scandals that there are things that can be done that are very hard to prevent/catch.

I played 1B and started in the main room. There were probably 10-15 tables in the main room, there were also (guessing based on table numbers) 20 in the Signature Room, which I've never been in so I have no clue what the camera coverage is. If the cheaters were smart, they wouldn't introduce chips in the main room with all the cameras, they'd try to wait for a table change or just gamble it up and rebuy and go to a new table.

Risking equity when you are that deep in a wsop event by possibly getting caught cheating would be really really stupid.

yea but you are wrong about THE BIGGEST THING..LOL ITS NOT 1 MILLION FOR 1ST

First place was ~370K.

what was the total prize pool? is first place only like 10-15% of prize pool? if so , come on borgata

I think we all should sue borgata let us all run into cheaters and took awayy potential chance of winning this.