Questions surrounding the WPT Borgata counterfeit chip scandal...

[TightEnd]

In case you haven't seen

"The $560 buy-in event was suspended before play was scheduled to resume on Friday with just 27 players left from the starting field of 4,814. By early Saturday, organizers had decided to cancel the event entirely and freeze all unpaid prize money until they finished their investigation. There’s been no statement on whether players who’d already busted out of the event might have their buy-ins refunded. "

full details at http://calvinayre.com/2014/01/18/poker/wpt-borgata-winter-open-bogus-chip-scandal/ and http://www.pokerstrategy.com/news/world-of-poker/WPT-Borgata-event-cancelled-after-cheating-scandal_80577/



I was asked these questions for an article, and I found them difficult to answer

What would your answers be?

1) Do you think all the players who played this event but didnt cash should be compensated in some way?

2) How do you think the remaining 27 players prizes should be handled? Play on? Equity chop? Even payouts?

3) What measures should be in place to have prevented this happening in the first place? How do you think the event was able to go so deep before this was detected?

4) Is it unrealistic to get exclusive chips made for high profile events that would only be used once? I presume this is not cost effective?

[BorntoBubble]

To me it should be a case of see what the investigation throws up and then decide. If its one player throughout the tournament with bogus chips, and he is still left in then his prize money should obviously be withheld and then the other 26 paid out on equity chop or something similar. Online i would say his money suspended and then redistruibted to all players involved in the competetion equally but if say his chop is worth 100k and yuou have to distrbute $20 to 5000 players this is a logistical nightmare so in the live areana i am not sure how i would go about this possible offer a discount for that player of future buy ins?

If it was more than one person or a group of people and many are left in the event then same sort of process should hold up their money is suspended remaining players that are not involved get a chop of the money.

It is going to be very hard to say who is involved or not because whos to say the bogus chips where not brought in by a "mule" and then smuggled to another player across the table. It is as much players responsibility to keep an eye on stacks as it is dealers/TD's and its a suprise that if the chips were different they were not spotted

[Mohican]

How 1 milli's worth of these chips got into play before they were detected is quite staggering to me. They are not even close to the original.

[maccer2613]

I guess one of the problems they have now is the players with the fake chips may not be the ones who introduced them as they will of been passed around between players? Although if that's the case you'd of thought it would of been detected earlier than it was ??

[AndrewT]

Yeah - the whole thing's a mess. Unless they find video footage of those introducing the chips there's no way to punish the offenders without punishing the innocent.

As far as I can see, the only thing to do is payout on chip counts now and just accept that some scumbag has made some $$$ and some innocent people who got knocked out have been screwed over.

[Mohican]

Yeah - the whole thing's a mess. Unless they find video footage of those introducing the chips there's no way to punish the offenders without punishing the innocent.

As far as I can see, the only thing to do is payout on chip counts now and just accept that some scumbag has made some $$$ and some innocent people who got knocked out have been screwed over.

If you're gonna accept the chip stacks as is, playing on is the thing to do??

[AndrewT]

If someone has cheated to get more chips, it's likely they'll accumulate more chips as play goes on (as a bigger stack make it easier to go deep where the big money is).

By paying out now, it means a cheater doesn't scoop the top prize.

[bergeroo]

Yeah - the whole thing's a mess. Unless they find video footage of those introducing the chips there's no way to punish the offenders without punishing the innocent.

As far as I can see, the only thing to do is payout on chip counts now and just accept that some scumbag has made some $$$ and some innocent people who got knocked out have been screwed over.

If you're gonna accept the chip stacks as is, playing on is the thing to do??

Some of these people might no longer be in Atlantic City, the logistics of organising the remaining 27 people could be tricky, probably need to just payout a chip chop when you have identified as best you can any of the 27 aren't involved.

[theprawnidentity]

Usually I think things like a this are pretty clear cut, but  

I have a few ideas, but none of them feel right.

[theprawnidentity]

Usually I think things like a this are pretty clear cut, but  

I have a few ideas, but none of them feel right.

Yeah its like I blurbed all that out...but I think every solution leaves alot of people unhappy. Huge moral dilemma on organisers parts and if anyone has to take a hit it should be them.

It is really horrible for all concerned.  I'm not sure that there's much the organisers can do.  If was 1/27 at this point after several days of play I'd be really pissed off.  Probably a lifetime opportunity for some and they get a buy in back and travel expenses.  As for the organiser, can they ask the dealers to go through every stack and check the chips are genuine?  That kind of seems unfair too.

If they can retrospectively look though footage and find out who brought the chips to the table, then maybe let the tournament run to the end and witholding all payouts till the footage was reviewed?  Of course people will argue that they may have unfairly got stacked by cheating players so that makes it difficult on that front.  I'm sort of swaying towards playing the tournament out but can't really get my head round why.

[scotty77]

First hand accounts of this tournie on 2p2 is pretty shocking.

Dealers taken from the pit, no idea about poker, racks lying around.

Someone posted a good point that we pay for 'insurance' against this kind of thing in the rake, to ensure that the tournie is played fair and to a good standard of floor/dealers.

I think the best way to go about it would be to chip chop and also refund every single entrant their rake fee minimum.  Maybe even the entire BI as there will have been dozens of people who got knocked out in this tournie by people who had their stacks boosted by these fake chips.

[maccer2613]

Not sure on the expense involved ( though I'm sure WPT could afford it) but they need chips with electronic chip in them which identifies them.....also helps with chip counts etc?

[bobAlike]

I would wait and see what the investigation throws up, BUT the whole integrity of the tournament (staff, organisers and players) is undermined. It has no doubt had an effect on how the final 27 were determined and their stack sizes. Without couterfeit chips in play who knows how different the final 27 would be? Controversial but I would declare the whole tourney null and void; return all buy ins. I'd also look to compensate all players in some way, as no doubt they have all made considerable travel & subsistence outlays.

At the end of the day I think the casino has to take the hit on a compensatory package, as it was their responsibility for the security and integrity of the tournament and players.  Naturally once they find out who/how this happened they then take action towards those individual(s).

Final 27 - as above, just buy ins back with compo package.

Prevention Measures? Each dealer to check chips at table and floor managers to check too and check dealers.  But I'd guess that for this level of cheating there'd have to be some inside help. Could also make it a player responsibility, with a rule that any player caught with counterfeit chips is at risk - that way players inspect stacks/scooped pots themselves (and highlight issues immediately). Perhaps chip counts at the end of each day all added up to check against known chips in play?

Surely a custom set could be made for 'Borgata Open' - and then locked away until the following years event?

This is surely the best way to deal with this. Highly unfair to the honest remaining players but without these chips in the outcome would have been different and the players who got eliminated may not have done.

The organisers take the hit, arguably deserved for lack of control.

[Junior Senior]

i say play it out as is.  Replace the counterfeit chips with real ones for completeness then refund all players that entered their buy in and reg fee.  That way everyone is compensated in some way and the rest of the players still in get to carry on and play it out.  There might be no cheats at all in the final 27.

After the event they need to look hard at this and ensure measures are taken to stop it happening again.

[MC]

i say play it out as is.  Replace the counterfeit chips with real ones for completeness then refund all players that entered their buy in and reg fee.  That way everyone is compensated in some way and the rest of the players still in get to carry on and play it out.  There might be no cheats at all in the final 27.

After the event they need to look hard at this and ensure measures are taken to stop it happening again.

How exactly could you both play out the event and refund everyone's buy-in and reg fee