The difference being he chose to put himself in that spot.

What link? There is none in the OP

Not that it matters now

I cant help but believe ph lives in a fantasy world and in that world he believed the cheaters was caught and everyone would be made whole. Even though it defy's logic i do believe that or maybe i want to believe it idk

Rakeback and bonuses where therefor also paid by stolen funds, as were withdrawals, guess should ask for those back?

Hosting, electricity, taxes, utilities, rent, all that had to also have been payed with stolen money too.

You can't go back and undo everything and pretend it never happened. You also can't deny people what is considered to be just compensation for their labor, products or services.

So why go after the public figures even though there's no evidence of their involvement? Leverage. Attack their credibility and marketability unless they pay up. That sure sounds like blackmail to me.

Phil should have known better but so should have all the posters on here that still had money on UB after everything that happened.

Phil: do the right thing and do that interview with 11.

This sums it up nicely.

--

My first thoughts were: So which US regulated site is Phil going to sign up with in the near future?

man, you must not be from the US, this post makes me cringe from all the grammatical errors....sorry im being nitty but I just can't go without saying something

FYP

They kept him in dark and knew he would believe what they told him. Maybe he wanted to believe it or didn't care or maybe he is just so easy to exploit I don't know. yea I don't write to good. Maybe I just want to believe ph and im completely wrong.

Nothing special here, just standard Hellmuth arrogance, and face saving B/S. He was still getting paid into 2012 with what is obviously stolen money.

It's right in the OP

Companies aren't forking over billions of dollars in endorsements each year for no reason Advertising and endorsements affect us on both a conscious and sub-conscious level. There's lots of elements of an advert that are designed to make psychological inferences about a company ('they're fun', 'they're honest', 'they're innovative' etc) which drive people to purchase, without consciously recognising those as their reasons.

Let me follow this. PH is good friends with Russ. Plays poker with Russ many times. In PH's mind Russ is probably not a good card player. PH plays online with mixed success. Russ plays online on the same site against the same players and wins millions consistently and balls out of control buying hookers sportscars and whatnot. PH doesn't see anything strange about this....

So Phill Hellmuth, the self proclaimed greatest poker player in the world, is trying to convince us that he honestly believed Russ Hamilton was making millions each year by playing poker online?

Claiming to be naive is one thing, but being paid to be naive is another.

It would have been nice to hear from you when your company shut down and stiffed players out of $55million two years ago. Maybe something like "There's been a terrible fraud against players and I'm going to help them get some of their funds back". Instead nothing. Like you expect us to forget about all the money we lost when the company that you owned part of couldn't payout. Now, finally the most damning piece of evidence against your company is released and you make a statement in an attempt to be seen as a victim. You received such an enormous amount of stolen player funds over the years and chose not to ask questions, but no mention of that in your statement. Just that your "people reading skills" are not up to par. Tell your lawyer he did a superb job.

^^^^ Exactly. "nuff said.

That is how corporations manipulate PR though..

Using vague pronouns is extremely effective in keeping blame from being easily placed.

Its pretty much propaganda industry standards, even further alluding to the idea that the statement wasn't actually his and was completely doctored.

Didn't Barry G "vouch" for Russ early on? I think so.

Then PH kept representing (getting paid like Lederer/Ferguson) a crooked company that STOLE players money to pay themselves and the pros.

+1

Statement was obv written by or edited by a lawyer.

Phil obviously doesn't want to be pegged as someone responsible in any part of this, including the possibility of being a rat. The way the statement is worded deliberately protects himself and the "people" about whom he speaks. He makes no direct accusations, and his implications can't be used to hurt anyone in particular, not Russ, not Duke, not that rich CEO scumbag, none of them.

If you think Phil doesn't have a vested interest in keeping his thumb in the pie, reread that statement VERY closely. He's playing good guy to all parties involved, players and 'former UB founders' included.

You'd be pretty stupid to not run a statement like that by lawyers/PR people. It would be nice if he was more forthcoming, but you can't hold it against him that he's not just shooting from the hip and potentially exposing himself legally if he says the wrong dumb thing.

I'm trying to look at it as if I am Russ Hamilton reading the statement. His name isn't directly tied to anything Hellmuth said, so Russ still can either deny or ignore the entire debacle with relative impunity.

If you think Russ can deny the tapes with relative impunity, then he would be able to do the same if Phil substantiated the tapes in his statement. Plus, no one is going to do anything, anyway.

Boo Hoo Annie. With the millions you got for endorsing UB and running that corrupt Epic poker now you might be being falsely accused of something. Poor baby. Go back in your hole....you've disgraced poker enough for 5 lifetimes already you vulture.

Well yeah, he's been acting with impunity all along as it is... I guess my biggest point is that Phil's statement is only quasi-empathetic because it doesn't affect the status-quo in anyway, and I can't think of any reason for him to be that way other than it being in his best interests to maintain said status.

I understand.

Option 1 "They lied to me".

Option 2 "John Doe told me that there was no cheating. The software does not have that capability."

Whose interests did you think he had in mind when he decided to release a statement?

Anyone with a shred of integrity would have separated himself from UB the moment it was apparent it was a criminal corporation, yet he's trying to assert that he thought cashing millions of dollars in endorsement checks would help keep the corporation solvent and thus be able to pay back its customers who were victims of theft. Does not compute.