Addressing the 'butterfly effect"

There have been a number of posts on here downplaying the impact of the fake chips on the outcome of the tourney. Skill will rise to the top and so on.

I agree that better players generally make up the majority of the top finishers.

But to say the"butterfly effect" is negligible doesn't address a fairly obvious fact.

Chip leader at the end of Day 1BC was Lusardi with 519,000 chips!!!!

This to me looks more like a "Mothra effect"

How does that apply here, they haven't taken a final score and said its been cancelled. Final would denote that an end has been reached, which it hasnt, as there are still people left in the tourney.

The event was cancelled. What part of the word cancelled do you not understand?


Yes. Because the event was cancelled.

It would seem the most logical resolutions, logistically and financially, for Borgata, will be:

1. Chip chop prize pool among remaining 27 after all known cheats are removed;

2. Equal 27 way chop for the remaining players.

As far as refunds, If Any, it would be more in line for a casino to offer a free entry to another event with the same buy-in in the future, and possibly some comps to go with it.

Make sense?

Very well said !

One of the most constructive post. I think one the 4 solution you thought ,ought to be the answer. No solution will make every one happy, but this is the best IMHO.

For the 4,000+ who busted out or cashed an ending was reached... Are you saying that football season isn't over for the patriots because there is still a superbowl to play?

If it is proven or league acknowledged that one or more team were always playing with 13 or more player on the field during the season.Yes then the season is not over for any team !!!

Not to derail further with sports analogies, but since poker strives to be a "sport" and at the least, can be considered a competitive game, can anyone name a cheating event in a major sport or competitive event that resulted in a cancellation of individual finishes because of the cheating? Every one i can think of simply drops the cheating participants and moves all the others up.....

Can pro golfers keep replaying their first round until they finally nail one? Can they win the same tournament they've already lost three times? As long as there are re-entries, the playing field will never be totally level. You could make the argument that cheating is just one more thing.

You have to consider that he probably only snuck in the 5k chips. 5k chips probably aren't "sneakable in" until he had a bunch of them. So the early levels and most of day 1 there was no advantage, I believe.

I think they are simply going to leave it as is before the issue was discovered (knocked out, too bad.. cashed, congrats). The remaining 27 will simply split by chip %. It's the only thing the casino will probably agree to, and I believe the only thing the gaming commis will come up with.

They can fine the Borgata for chip controls, but that's about it I think.

Borg aint forking up $2M to pay back entrants who got knocked out.

FFS what's all this arguing over "fair" payouts?

The Borgata F'd up in multiple ways and now they have to pay. THAT'S what's fair. Otherwise why would any venue do anything to stop cheating?

The gaming commission will most likely demand refunds to all who didn't cash, people who cashed keep the $$$, and they figure out some way to chop up the rest of the prize pool to the final 27 unless some of them are implicated in the scheme as well. Or they'll do something else, who knows. But 2+2's idea of "fairness" won't matter a bit.

He finished the end of day 1c with the chip lead. That would be an unbelievable coincidence if he just happened to play his way to the top AND THEN introduced chips.

Also can we pleeeeeease stop with the sports analogies.

Perhaps not the start of a well thought out post.

Ok I digress.. He prob added chips throughout the day.. adding a 5k chip when he had 5, adding 3 when he had 15.

He still had to play hands... did he add chips when he moved tables?

He still had to win hands for sure, I'm curious to see him explain how he snuck them in.

I still can't see the gaming comm forcing Borg to pay $2M in refunds. They may fine them $2M but they would keep the money-- lots of public projects in AC want $.

You may be putting too much emphasis on the word cancelled. I think the point others are raising, and you should consider, is that if the tournament was cancelled because of some event that happened after legitimate play, the legitimate play may not need to be impacted - so whoever busted during the legitimate play may not be entitled to anything, didn't lose anything, shouldn't feel cheated, etc.

Put it another way, if they were down to 5 people, and something caused Borgata to cancel the tourney at that point (earthquake hit and all the chip stacks were combined and the video was destroyed so the chip stacks before the earthquake could not be established) would that mean 4500 other people now get a refund because the event was cancelled?? Of course not, so saying the event was cancelled is not dispositive. It is just a factor. Another factor may be the duration of legitimate play - was it 5 minutes, 5 hours, entire day 1, etc.

Yes but the sanctity of the chips/play wasn't affected until the "event".

We can all speculate but it comes down to what the commis comes up with.. I expect it will take a few months to decide. The $ will be held in ecrow till that is done.

1. Knocked out players: refund buy-in or not
2. Cash winners: Do nothing or ask for $ back over initial buy in (not sure it's feasible to chase down 400 people)
3. Final 27: play out or ICM/chip % payout
4. Borgata: Force to refund kockouts and/or [hefty] fine

i went to the poker tourney room and asked one of the directors, iwas desperate for some sort of answer and he reluctantly told me, therefore i dont want to say, i dont want to be the cause of someone losing their job, the guy saw i needed some sort of answer...

Borgata is going to have offer refunds, if they do not they are going to be slapped with a bunch of lawsuits that will cost them more in legal fees and whatnot to defend.

If I played in day 1A and did not get a refund, you can bet for damn sure that I'm filing a lawsuit for the total of my entry fee + rake, any hotels accommodations I paid for, travel expenses and food expenses.

What would be more likely... the Boyd Gaming/Marina/Mgm (whoever) vigorously defending what could be a $1500 lawsuit in a small claims court or them just settling the lawsuit.

For people who are CPA's or have accounting degrees, this is exactly what a contingent liability is.

what is missing here is didn't a floor person have to count his chips to verify he was chip leader for the day before he bagged up

Please stop. Hiring a lawyer to recoup $500 is not anywhere near financially sensible.

On the next Judge Judy...

LOL at hiring a lawyer, filing and serving a small claims lawsuit for $1500 in no way requires the retention of an attorney. If you are dumb enough to the point that it does, you probably shouldn't be spending $560 to play poker tournaments.

Lusardi was the end of day 1 chip leader overall, but he was awarded the additional prize money for being day 1B chip leader.

On an unrelated note to the comments about Borgata (not borgota) paying prize money out of their pocket, I'm sure they have insurance, just not sure the insurance protects them from something like this.

Full disclosure - Yes I played this event, yes I fired multiple bullets, yes I played multiple flights.

If the previous cashers may be asked to return the money they cashed for, why wouldn't that be an option for the final 27?

Confused here. You are the one that suggested filing the lawsuit.

If you're suggesting that you are going to Atlantic County small claims court and you are A) going to have the case heard or B) beat the borgata in the unlikely event that it is heard... then lol