Is this really true? Unlike FT where player funds were used for distributions, I thought in the UB situation, the money went straight to Russ Hamilton, or whoever it was that stole it. A subtle difference maybe? Or did UB do basically the same thing in the end?

it must really suck for him to only be privy to half truths, never investigate further or find his moral compass, protect his own financial interests, and then have the entire story leak out one day showing the whole world how poorly he made decisions every step of the way.

Won't somebody think of the hellmuths for a change.

nice, good job phil well said

How did joe sebok not protect him better than that.

ya this is all that matters. so funny to see how many of you fall for an "official statement" of fake sentiment. phil only cares about phil, that should be obvious. its also obvious that his lawyer wrote this and it is 0 percent from the heart.

or he just realises that he can no longer claim ignorance in what was really going on.

This statement just looks like PH covering his ass tbh.

Teflon phil moves on, tbh he has albi he was to self absorbed to notice.

What I don't get from Phil's story is if he was told him staying with the company would help the chances of people being repaid, shouldn't that have set off warning bells in his head that UB clearly did not have much money in the bank...? So he hears this from then, then decides, "ok, keep paying me my money and I'll keep staying on."

It seems like an ethical person would have wanted to dig deeper into the situation to try to find out the extent of what it is they're being asked to continue to represent, or a truly ethical person says "I can no longer accept money from you, it's clear you don't have much money, this money should be going to the victims, not me."

ya know I mean it's just so sick

Strange, isn't it? Phil does not name anyone.

Who lied to you Phil? Who actively decided to keep you in the dark?

I think this is a good lesson on why its never good to hide something. No matter what the truth is, there will now always be speculation.

Once again we have a poker pro giving a statement after the fact, pretty useless.

Not really, the names are out there. If he's referencing the tape there's no ambiguity as to who he's talking about.

Do we have proof that he was paid from player funds and/or stolen money? If not, then it seems we can't expect that at all.

Anyways, Phil seems a lot like a former employee to me. In that way he'd stand to incur a net loss and become just another victim. Fighting among victims over who should be left holding the bag doesn't sound like justice.

The scumbags who are actually responsible still have assets. They should pay.


reads more thread... so there's at least something like proof... but it doesn't even sound as damning as the case against full tilt.

I wonder how many people can honestly say they put money on UB because of Phil Helmuth, I know I didn't.

Schneids makes a good point and if Phil was as concerned as he says he was, he should have said to UB, take what you would have paid me going forward and pay everyone back. Once, everyone is paid and this is behind us, we can resume payments he would receive. Had he done this, he would have a lot more credibility but like so many others, he apparently couldn't resist the easy money

Celebrities wouldn't be paid millions of dollars to advertise products if it wasn't effective. Think outside the realm of the typical 2+2 member.

Indeed. The amount of ego and lack of situational awareness among the segment of poker players who relentlessly self-promote themselves is disgusting. This applies to several of my friends and peers, and is something that saddens me about the poker community.

Agree, the words are nice. But words are words. And as many have said, this is nothing but a tactic aimed at tricking naive, uninformed people. Just look at all the posters who have responded favorably to this PR statement. It's sad that Phil can do this and have it work on such a large number of fans and players. What makes Phil Hellmuth so successful is his ability to profit off of the bottom tier of players. He is simply doing what he always does, and he is very good at it.

ding ding ding. The answer is never, which of course is the point.

Throughout UB's existence, including the entire duration of the cheating scandal, Phil has only ever used his name and stature to personally profit. Expecting his actions to change now is fruitless.

ding ding ding

He did not bother to name anyone.

"They lied to me" refers to something that was not on the tape.

It "disgusts and infuriates" him, but it is left as an exercise for the reader to figure out who it was.

I did. Hellmuth's book was the first poker book I ever bought.

He said many times throughout the book that UB was the only trustworthy site in a sea of scam sites.

But I was a total noob, I barely knew the rules and which hand beats which at that point.

well in phil's mind if the money didn't go to him it would go to the people who were actively involved in stealing from the players so he HAD to keep receiving his distributions so the crooks wouldn't get it...HOW NOBLE OF PHIL!!

Link to tape recording he is referencing?

I had met Daniel Negreanu at the Borgata in 2005 when I first started playing poker tournaments and introduced myself. Anyways, he told me AT THAT TIME 8 YEARS AGO, that he didn't go to the WPT event in Aruba because UB sponsored it and that the company was very SHADY. I asked him to elaborate but he had to leave and didn't go into further details.

Now, if DN 8 years ago knew that UB was not reputable and shady, you guys really believe Phil Helmuth was completely in the dark about the company and its practices???

Bottom line though, who the heck really knows what any of these guys knew back then??? I am sure however that if DN boycotted Aruba because of UB, Phil knew why and what was truly up with the online site he promoted. Nice spin by his agent though, lol and the vast majority will probably not know any better and believe the statement.

If you listen to the tapes, and I have listened to all 5 hours, Russ repeatedly rationalizes his stealing in that he used most of the money to fund company operations and pay buy ins (mentions a tournament in Aruba frequently). ignoring the fact that fat Russ's logic that stealing to pay ub pros isn't stealing (bizarro climinal thinking), the realization is that they were using stolen money to fund the company.
Is Phil ever mentioned as directly receiving stolen funds? No, but if the companies budget is x dollars, and y was funded by stolen dollars, it seems irrelevant to me whether he was paid out of pool x or y. Player funds were stolen to pay operations. Phil received a huge amount of these operating dollars.
Dollars he couldn't have received if they weren't stealing s-loads of player money.

I agree, I cant help but think that the people harmed the most by the UB fraud are the winning players who were least influenced by Phil and the ones who were influenced by him were more likely to be donators who were not likely to win anyway.

I'm not saying it makes it right what UB did or Phil didn't do, it was merely something that came to mind, food for thought, something to discuss....or not.

In before Phil announces his new signing with a US facing or based poker site.

http://www.pokerxanadu.com/ub/

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