Poker World Reacts to Rumored UB/Friedman Deal

Published on 2011-01-03 18:37:00

Late last week, the poker world was startled to hear that both Phil Hellmuth and Annie Duke were out at UB.

Joe Sebok, who is now seemingly UB's most recognizable pro, recently took to his blog to talk about the recent changes. Sebok said that Team UB would be "restocking the talent" and that he was "crazily pumped" regarding the upcoming announcement of Team UB's newest pro. Sebok also offered that the newest signing would be "a bit of a doozy..."

On the day that Annie Duke announced that she was leaving UB, her bio page on UB.com was stripped of her information and temporarily replaced with an image of the name "Prahlad Friedman". This page was taken down a short time later, but UB had already let the cat out of the bag. While it has not been officially announced as of yet, it seems almost certain that Prahlad Friedman will named as the newest member of Team UB this week.

Why is this a big deal? Prahlad Friedman reportedly suffered the heaviest losses of anyone as a result of the Ultimatebet "superuser" scandal. Friedman ended up receiving a large refund when the scandal came to light (the exact amount of the refund is not known), but the damage to Friedman's game was severe. Mike Matusow, who also was one of the victims of Ultimatebet's "superusers", later said that the rigged games robbed him of his "heart" and caused him to doubt his game. Friedman must have felt the same way after watching his previously ultra-successful cash game strategies get easily defeated by a cheating superuser on the other end.

Because Friedman was one of the biggest victims of the "superuser" scandal, a number of people in the poker world can't believe that Prahlad would actually be entertaining the idea of signing a deal with UB.

One of those people is Daniel Negreanu, who has taken to his Twitter account over the last few days to express his displeasure with the rumored Friedman deal.

Negreanu had this to say on Jan 1:

"So disappointed in @prahladfriedman signing with the devil who stole millions from him.He was so "anti sellout" then he did the unthinkable."

"They must have paid him a lot to join the dark side and endorse the exact same people who ruined him. So sad and so mind boggling."

"The current owners of AP/UB are spending Prahlad's money, they must be mocking him at this point. Cheat the dude and watch him endorse us!"

A number of pros weren't too happy about Daniel calling out Prahlad. Here is a sample:

Tim West:

"@RealKidPoker I dont see how you think you can get off just calling people out like this. Why dont u get prahs number b a man and call him"

Matt Keikoan:

"i can see people like @RealKidPoker, sitting behind his 4mil a year ps contract, w/ his nose up in the air, judging other people. . ."

"@RealKidPoker ur rly acting like a worldclass a-hole. ironic, since uv clearly shown on TV that ur not even close to a WC cashgame player :)"

"@RealKidPoker its ok Daniel, if i had a 4 mil a yr contract, i would look down upon those i felt were morally inferior to me also"

"pls no more prahlad quotes i know exactly what he said i know him better than u do. my rant is not as much pro friedman as anti negreanu who takes the high-moral-ground when he should really just stfu. the guy is really just a punk who needs a-fixin. there, i said it. what?"

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It's getting pretty heated, and Prahlad Friedman hasn't even been officially announced as Team UB's newest member yet..


Photo: GreasieWheels.com

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Filed Under: Poker Room News