[HN Gopher] After chess, cheating rows rock poker and fishing
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       After chess, cheating rows rock poker and fishing
        
       Author : mjirv
       Score  : 94 points
       Date   : 2022-10-02 18:40 UTC (4 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.bbc.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.bbc.com)
        
       | jwie wrote:
       | The cheating accusations need to be a lot less dramatic. Removing
       | cheaters from competitive play isn't a public activity. Magnus
       | throwing the chess equivalent of a tantrum in public, and a woman
       | being bullied into undoing a lucky win aren't going to solve
       | anything.
       | 
       | Unless you catch someone red handed go through channels. Unless
       | of course the object is to create a bunch of hype and
       | engagement... then I suppose accuse more people of cheating
       | without evidence in the noisiest way possible.
        
         | mod wrote:
         | Knowing about a cheater and not telling other poker players
         | about it is a really good way to destroy your reputation in the
         | poker world.
         | 
         | Poker players, in the almost 20 years I've been playing, have a
         | pretty standard policy of outing guys who cheat, steal, angle,
         | and owe. Particularly in the high stakes world.
         | 
         | The cheating accusations did not originate with the players in
         | the game, anyway. Garrett maybe told a story with his eyeballs
         | --he's maybe uniquely qualified to do that. But his first
         | mention of "cheating" was after it had already blown up, trust
         | me.
         | 
         | It was on a livestream, it wasn't a subtle event, and people
         | love controversy.
        
       | joekrill wrote:
       | All these accusations of cheating without any concrete proof are
       | really worrying to me. I've read a few of these threads now, and
       | not once have I seen any actual, _real_ , _explicit_ evidence for
       | cheating.
       | 
       | It looks very similar to the vote rigging claims we're seeing a
       | lot more of recently in the U.S. Don't like the outcome? Just
       | blame your opponent of cheating! No need to show any _real_ proof
       | - just make up some vague claims of what _could_ have happened!
       | And just keep repeating it. And this all seems to working pretty
       | well - THAT is the scary thing
       | 
       | Obviously none of this applies in the case of the fisherman, who
       | seem to have been caught red-handed.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | mylons wrote:
         | you're insane if you think there's no proof in the chess and
         | poker. you have no basis to make the judgement and are yet
         | another arm chair expert on HN. Robbi is a liar. she
         | embellished her career, and her poker game. there's no way any
         | player would give the money back after a "bad" play like that.
         | she can't even talk about the hand -- she doesn't remember her
         | cards correctly. the list of tells is endless if you have any
         | depth of knowledge in the game.
        
           | stale2002 wrote:
           | Then show the video of her cheating.
           | 
           | Show the metal detectors, finding a hidden device that
           | transmits signals to her, about what the other person's cards
           | are.
           | 
           | That is evidence. Nothing that you mentioned is actual
           | evidence of cheating.
        
             | mylons wrote:
             | a player at the board could be signaling her. she might be
             | able to see his cards. she removed a ring after the hand in
             | question. why does she have to have a device? why does it
             | have to be metal? you're creating a straw man.
             | 
             | if you're in a whiteboard interview and a candidate can't
             | explain their solution they regurgitated, do you think they
             | know anything about that solution?
        
               | stale2002 wrote:
               | So then no, you have seen no device giving her signals
               | from the outside. You see no accomplis telling her what
               | her opponents cards are.
               | 
               | That would be actual evidence. Give the name of the
               | person who was giving her signals, and then use the video
               | footage, from the 30 different cameras that were pointed
               | at everyone.
               | 
               | Show the video, of the hand signal. Directly say which
               | person, in the room, was giving her info on her opponents
               | cards. And explain exactly how it was done, with video
               | evidence.
               | 
               | > why does she have to have a device? why does it have to
               | be metal?
               | 
               | I was giving an example of what evidence would actually
               | look like.
        
               | mylons wrote:
               | i mentioned a potential device. have you even played
               | poker before in a casino?
        
               | stale2002 wrote:
               | > i mentioned a potential device.
               | 
               | Ok great, have you looked at the device? You say it was a
               | ring, then prove it. Show me the picture of the internals
               | of the ring, and show me how the ring was giving her
               | signals.
               | 
               | Thats evidence. A picture of you opening up the ring, and
               | showing a hidden computer or whatever you think the
               | cheating ring is doing, is evidence of cheating.
        
               | mylons wrote:
               | lol. you've made it clear you're not capable of
               | evaluating the situation.
        
               | stale2002 wrote:
               | And you are admitting that you can't show evidence.
               | 
               | If you had evidence, you'd have shown it.
               | 
               | So things like a picture of the device giving her answers
               | would be evidence.
               | 
               | A video recording of the specific other person in the
               | room, giving her info on the other person's cards, would
               | be evidence.
               | 
               | And now you just say "lol" proving that you do not have
               | actual evidence here.
        
               | mylons wrote:
               | i mentioned a slew of ways she could be cheating. all
               | you're doing is begging for hard evidence without being
               | able to defend or rationalize what happened. this isn't a
               | court of law. there's no presumption of innocence.
               | 
               | your responses indicate you've likely never played poker
               | at a high level. you may have never even played in a
               | casino. what basis do you have to defend this person?
               | 
               | i don't think anyone in poker who won a hand they played
               | badly just offered to return the cash. that alone tells
               | me everything.
               | 
               | edit: someone also paid for her entry into this game and
               | she's an amateur playing with phil ivey and GMan. https:/
               | /twitter.com/haralabob/status/1576643133583937537?s=2...
        
         | luckylion wrote:
         | > I've read a few of these threads now, and not once have I
         | seen any actual, real, explicit evidence for cheating.
         | 
         | You usually don't get these with elections either, unless the
         | cheaters are lazy and just add 1000 votes in a 100 citizen
         | area. Usually, you'll see weird things that are very
         | implausible which will lead to investigations, i.e. a perceived
         | battle ground state going 99:1 to one side. It's possible,
         | there's no clear evidence of cheating (yet), but it's extremely
         | unlikely.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | ransom1538 wrote:
         | I think she should hand over her ring over to the casino. The
         | one she _removed_ after the amazing call. She isn 't obligated
         | to, but, that is so weird to remove a ring under the table - it
         | would help stop doubt.
        
           | wsinks wrote:
           | https://itsgame7.com/exact-moment-poker-fans-think-robbi-
           | jad...
           | 
           | So.. is 3:45 the point where people think Robbi smacks the
           | table and removes the ring?
           | 
           | It looks to me that the slap just moved the ring to the side.
           | At 3:58 There's something that appears to be the red ring
           | still on her hand. Not to mention that before that moment, I
           | can only make out one ring on her middle finger, and that
           | ring band is still on her finger after.
           | 
           | I imagine they'll look into that ring during their
           | investigation. It'll be interesting to see what comes of it.
           | 
           | This is definitely quite the statistical anomaly.
        
         | latortuga wrote:
         | The person Carlsen accused of cheating has a documented and
         | admitted history of it. Officials literally found weights
         | inside the fish. Both of those are in this story.
        
           | joekrill wrote:
           | > The person Carlsen accused of cheating has a documented and
           | admitted history of it.
           | 
           | So what? Just because someone has cheated in the past does
           | not in _any way_ prove that they 've cheated in this
           | particular case. It only proves they've cheated in the past.
           | Is it suspicious? Sure. But any accusations of cheating are
           | still pure speculation.
           | 
           | > Officials literally found weights inside the fish. Both of
           | those are in this story.
           | 
           | And I specifically mentioned this in my comment.
        
             | mylons wrote:
             | statistical analysis of Hans play indicates he's cheating,
             | especially against Magnus' style. your comments indicate
             | you lack any depth in poker or chess.
        
               | roflyear wrote:
               | This isn't true at all.
        
               | mylons wrote:
               | Hans makes the most +EV plays against unconventional
               | Magnus openings. He's either the greatest chess player
               | alive, (and like Robbi can't even explain his game, and
               | admitted to cheating in the past) or he's cheating. i'm
               | happy to bet quite a bit of money that Hans is a nobody
               | in 5 years in chess.
               | 
               | what evidence do you have for your position?
        
               | whimsicalism wrote:
               | If you think making engine moves at the level Hans is at
               | is evidence that he is cheating, I think you are just not
               | very well informed about chess.
               | 
               | > He's either the greatest chess player alive
               | 
               | Ridiculous, nothing about his play suggests he's the
               | greatest chess player alive.
        
               | mylons wrote:
               | how do you defend Hans, then? you're just doubting what
               | i'm saying without substance
        
               | whimsicalism wrote:
               | The burden is to show that Hans is cheating OTB. I don't
               | really know whether he is cheating OTB, although I think
               | it is unlikely - but AFAIK there hasn't really been any
               | statistical evidence of Hans cheating OTB and I'm not
               | really sure what such evidence would even look like for a
               | super GM who one would expect to routinely play engine
               | moves.
        
               | whimsicalism wrote:
               | Would love to see what you are referring to, as I have
               | yet to see any convincing case of this.
        
               | stale2002 wrote:
               | So then no there has not been any evidence shown of him
               | cheating over the board?
        
             | threatofrain wrote:
             | > So what?
             | 
             | Getting caught for cheating has an impact on credibility.
             | Credibility is a big deal and a hard problem. The boy who
             | cried wolf is not a story of no wolves. Are you surprised
             | that cheating impacts credibility?
             | 
             | In a court of law we might have standards like
             | preponderance of evidence or reasonable doubt. In everyday
             | human relations everyone is free to develop their own
             | theories of credibility and to act upon their freedoms
             | accordingly. You are free to judge whether Microsoft is
             | trustworthy even without proof that they will betray your
             | trust in the future, which nobody really knows.
        
           | Andrew_nenakhov wrote:
           | > The person Carlsen accused of cheating has a documented and
           | admitted history of it.
           | 
           | So what? He was 16 yo kid who did a stupid thing playing
           | online. How exactly does that relate to top-level over the
           | board tournament with anti-cheating measures which organizers
           | deemed sufficient to stop cheating? So far there is nothing
           | but allegations.
        
             | Pyramus wrote:
             | > He was 16 yo kid who did a stupid thing playing online.
             | 
             | If chess.com is to be believed this is not the case, and
             | they have informed Niemann about it. According to them
             | Niemann has cheated more often and more recently than he
             | admitted, and lied about it when he made his statement.
             | 
             | > How exactly does that relate to top-level over the board
             | tournament with anti-cheating measures which organizers
             | deemed sufficient
             | 
             | Professional chess has a huge cheating problem: It is very
             | easy to cheat, chess tournaments are under-funded, and
             | anti-cheating measures are expensive. There are worlds
             | between, say, chess and cycling, or chess cheating and card
             | counting.
        
               | Andrew_nenakhov wrote:
               | chess.com has a lot of false positives in their cheating
               | detection method, and they are in business relationship
               | with Carlsen, so any testimony they migth give will
               | likely be biased. I am actually very surprised to see so
               | many people throwing away any notion of a due process and
               | calling for immediate harsh punishment like lifetime ban.
        
             | joshuamorton wrote:
             | He's currently 19, and there are apparently more recent
             | cheating things per chess.com. This isn't like "he cheated
             | long ago and has made amends", it's guy whose cheated
             | recently, and whose coach was also banned due to a history
             | of cheating was found to be acting and playing suspiciously
             | well in recent otb tournaments".
             | 
             | Maybe it's nothing, but it's not as nothing as you're
             | making it out to be.
        
               | Andrew_nenakhov wrote:
               | 16 and 19 is a far greater age difference than it would
               | seem by numbers only. Online play and over the board play
               | are greatly different too. In sum, we have no hard
               | evidence, and many allegations. I'd suggest ignoring
               | allegations until we see some more substantial evidence.
        
           | roflyear wrote:
           | Not of OTB cheating which is another thing entirely.
        
           | jlportx wrote:
           | Niemann has admitted to cheating online on chess.com before
           | 2020, like at least 50 other titled players. Niemann has
           | denied ever cheating over the board.
           | 
           | After the win against Carlsen, chess.com removed him from one
           | of their online tournaments, and a couple of chess.com
           | adjacent streamers insinuated the online cheating. Under that
           | pressure, Niemann mentioned a coordinated attack and admitted
           | to to cheating at the age of 12 and 16, but not in prize
           | money tournaments.
           | 
           | To see how easy it goes online, here is a video of Carlsen
           | taking a move from Howell during a prize money tournament in
           | Lichess:
           | 
           | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NrOv8hxN6g
           | 
           | It can't be compared to deliberately using an engine, but
           | clearly the standards are different online.
           | 
           | chess.com has announced that it will release an additional
           | investigation into Niemann soon. The involvement of an online
           | company into an OTB tournament is unprecedented and comes
           | after the takeover of the "Play Magnus" group.
           | 
           | chess.com also released a private cheating conversation with
           | Dlugy, from whom Niemann had taken lessons a long time ago.
           | 
           | So, out of the 50 cases only those who are "involved" in a
           | win against Carlsen are being targeted. I assume that
           | chess.com will keep the rest of the files for future "use".
           | 
           | FIDE, the real official organization, is investigating as
           | well but will probably not find any OTB cheating cases.
        
           | greggsy wrote:
           | The video is damming
        
         | friedman23 wrote:
         | Finding evidence is very difficult. A year or two ago there was
         | an infamous case with a man named Mike Postle. There was 0 hard
         | evidence of him cheating but his decision making was so
         | statistically improbable that the entire poker community is
         | _certain_ that he cheated.
         | 
         | These players, especially in poker absolutely need to be
         | paranoid or they will be robbed.
         | 
         | At a certain point we are going to need to subject suspicious
         | players to cavity searches.
        
           | joekrill wrote:
           | > Finding evidence is very difficult.
           | 
           | That doesn't make it right to accuse people of cheating
           | without any evidence beyond "well a _normal_ person wouldn't
           | have done something like this, so they must be cheating!".
        
             | chrisseaton wrote:
             | It's not a Crown court and he's not being accused of a
             | crime - it doesn't haven't to be beyond all reasonable
             | doubt. If someone's acting weird at your event you can just
             | go off your gut if you want to - your event.
        
               | roflyear wrote:
               | We're ruining the guys life and career. Magnus has
               | nothing beyond "I feel" statements. If he said "I saw him
               | messing with something in his pocket" it would at least
               | be something. But we don't have that.
        
               | jstx1 wrote:
               | > Magnus has nothing beyond "I feel" statements.
               | 
               | It's much more nuanced than this. Magnus said that
               | there's more he'd like to say but he'd want Hans'
               | permission to speak openly - https://twitter.com/magnusca
               | rlsen/status/1574482694406565888
               | 
               | Just because he can't immedially dump all the information
               | that he has doesn't mean that he's obliged to keep
               | playing chess against someone he believes is cheating.
        
         | _the_inflator wrote:
         | There is a lot of money involved. So I presume there is
         | cheating involved, similar to doping.
         | 
         | Also the cheating schemes are hard to understand sometimes.
         | Here is an example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edge_sorting
        
         | gretch wrote:
         | I see what you are saying and understand the point.
         | 
         | But there should be a balance somewhere.
         | 
         | Lance Armstrong cheated in cycling and won 7 championships. The
         | fact that he came out as a cheater later absolutely demolished
         | the integrity of the whole sport. And I feel really bad for
         | anyone who competed honestly all that time with zero chance of
         | getting anything done given that the field is rife is cheaters.
         | 
         | So that extreme is also pretty devastating and chess lovers
         | done want chess to fall into that state either
        
           | jurassic wrote:
           | Cheating in chess seems somehow worse than what Armstrong
           | did. There could be a version of cycling where everybody
           | dopes and it becomes a level playing field --- there's still
           | strategy in the rides, they still suffer up the climbs, etc.
           | Doped athletes are still incredible to watch.
           | 
           | But in chess if you're outsourcing decision-making to the
           | algorithm... why even have human players at all?
        
             | Consultant32452 wrote:
             | I'm amazed people still believe there's such a thing as
             | "clean" professional sports. I assume everyone is doping.
             | 
             | I agree with your assessment about Armstrong vs outsourcing
             | decision-making. It wouldn't surprise/bother me to find out
             | chess players are taking ritalin or whatever to increase
             | their focus, but using a computer is troublesome. That
             | would be like Armstrong riding an electric bike.
        
         | jstx1 wrote:
         | You're asking for more than just evidence though, you're asking
         | for concrete proof which is very different. You can have
         | evidence that changes your belief - people acting suspiciously
         | their behaviour being consistent with cheating, lying, changing
         | their story, having history of doing this in the past - all of
         | this is perfectly valid evidence that can change your own
         | belief about what's happening, and you should be able to speak
         | to speak about it.
         | 
         | Imagine that we're flipping a coin and it keeps coming up heads
         | every time, and I make a statement that I don't think the coin
         | is fair. By your standards I shouldn't be able to speak until
         | we examine the coin directly and no number of further flipping
         | will convince you that the coin is biased (because it's
         | technically possible that a fair coin does this too). Well,
         | sometimes in real life we can't weigh/measure/scan the coin
         | directly, we can only make judgments based on the flips that
         | come out and we should be able to say that they look fishy.
        
           | mind-blight wrote:
           | I think that's hyperbolic. Evidence doesn't have to be
           | concrete or prove anything. It just has to convince a
           | reasonable person that the thing being claimed _may_ have
           | happened.
           | 
           | But, I have yet to see any evidence besides Carlson's claims
           | of cheating. I'm not even looking for "how", but I'd like to
           | at least hear what Carlson thought was so strange in the
           | match that it could imply cheating.
           | 
           | Him showing up for a single play of a rematch and then
           | quitting after the first move seems mostly like a tantrum.
           | 
           | I'd be much not sympathetic to something like "these 4 moves
           | we're so it of the ordinary that I can't see a way he would
           | have taken them besides computer assistance"
        
             | Pyramus wrote:
             | I think you are missing the bigger picture here.
             | 
             | The question is not whether Niemann cheated in this
             | specific game against Carlsen (he likely didn't) but to
             | what extent Niemann has cheated in the past, how (online)
             | cheaters should be treated when it comes to over-the-board
             | chess and if the chess profession will finally take
             | cheating seriously, i.e. introduce anti-cheating measures
             | similar to other professional sports or gambling.
             | 
             | As has been stated several times in this thread: Niemann
             | has a history of (online) cheating, admitted to it, and
             | while doing so likely lied about the extent and recency of
             | his (online) cheating.
        
             | parineum wrote:
             | > Him showing up for a single play of a rematch and then
             | quitting after the first move seems mostly like a tantrum.
             | 
             | I'm not a chess expert at all but, from my understanding,
             | he is known for some unconventional play. I could see
             | Magnus having done a calculation ahead of time of a very
             | unconventional opening and, seeing the counter being the
             | exact optimal choice, being convinced of cheating.
             | 
             | All that I really know is he has a lot of credibility and
             | the person he's accusing does not. I think it's a big story
             | because it's dramatic no matter how it turns out.
        
           | joekrill wrote:
           | > You're asking for more than just evidence though, you're
           | asking for concrete proof which is very different.
           | 
           | There is neither of these, though. There is only people
           | speculating that they MUST be cheating because they didn't
           | behave exactly as they were expected to.
           | 
           | > By your standards I shouldn't be able to speak until we
           | examine the coin directly [...]
           | 
           | I never made any such statement or made and indication of
           | specific "standards".
           | 
           | We should absolutely look at the coin if it's behaving this
           | way. But we can't just conjecture that it must be weighted
           | with zero evidence of that.
        
             | jstx1 wrote:
             | > But we can't just conjecture that it must be weighted
             | with zero evidence of that.
             | 
             | I don't think any of the accusation that have been brought
             | up in this thread have been with zero evidence. I think we
             | have very different understanding of what's evidence and
             | how much of it sufficient to speak up, and we're kind of
             | talking past each other (the last part seems very likely).
        
       | 323 wrote:
       | Dumb question, but if she was cheating, where is the information
       | sourced from? How could her accomplice see the other player's
       | card to pass to her? I never saw this part explained.
        
       | SCAQTony wrote:
       | Faith in the athletic sprit of fair play and may the best win
       | probably never existed.
       | 
       | "...Anonymous surveys done after elite athletics events in 2011,
       | in which 57% of competitors admitted doping compared to under 4%
       | in WADA test results..."
       | https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2017/aug/29/sport-doping-s...
       | 
       | "...In addition, of the 81 different riders who finished in the
       | top-10 of the Tour de France during this period, 65% have been
       | caught doping, admitted to blood doping, or have strong
       | associations to doping and are suspected cheaters. ..."
       | https://www.businessinsider.com/lance-armstrong-doping-tour-...
       | 
       | "...For a nearly year Serena Williams was allowed 'Therapeutic
       | Use Exemptions' (TUEs) which involved LOTS of steroids. Date for
       | use/Date given/Substance
       | 
       |  _Oct 2010 - Mar 2011 /23 Dec/Hydromorphone _Dec 2010/23
       | Dec/Oxycodone _Nov 27-Dec 1 2010 /23 Dec/Methylprednisolone
       | _12-19 Mar 2014/13th Mar/Prednisone _21-30 Mar 2014 /2
       | Apr/Prednisone _7-21 May 2014/8 May/Prednisone _10-17 Nov 2014 /3
       | Dec/Prednisone, Oxycodone _5-10 June 2015/8 Jun/Prednisolone
       | https://www.tennis.com/news/articles/tandon-a-closer-look-at...
        
         | sputr wrote:
         | Prednisone, that's Medrol right? Wrong kind of steroid. This is
         | an imunosupresor that destroys skeletal muscles, bone strength,
         | etc.
        
         | berberous wrote:
         | Does Prednisone or Oxy really give you a performance boost? I
         | feel like if so it's marginal and she really was taking them
         | for a medical reason?
        
           | SCAQTony wrote:
           | WADA has restrictions on Prednisone: "...Prednisolone &
           | prednisone within 10 days of a competition."
           | https://www.usada.org/spirit-of-sport/key-
           | changes-2022-prohi...
           | 
           | "...Oral corticosteroids reduce the pain and inflammation
           | that often occurs with extreme exertion. Athletes have
           | reported that corticosteroids help them push through the pain
           | of extreme exertion and allow them to recover faster for the
           | next event..." https://truesport.org/clean-sport/5-facts-
           | about-corticostero...
        
       | alasdair_ wrote:
       | I saw the poker event live. I genuinely think she was not
       | cheating. She was only 47% to win the hand after her call of the
       | all-in bet and while the play was marginally +EV, it wasn't much.
       | 
       | Far more likely was she misread J4 as J3, especially as she
       | literally said "threes are good, right?" during her
       | deliberations.
       | 
       | Cheating in this spot just makes no sense and there has been zero
       | evidence to indicate it was anything more than what she said -
       | she misread a 4 as a 3.
        
         | baobabKoodaa wrote:
         | > She was only 47% to win the hand after her call of the all-in
         | bet and while the play was marginally +EV, it wasn't much.
         | 
         | That's not what it means to make a +EV call. Expected value is
         | estimated based on the opponent's presumed range. In this case
         | the EV of the call was extremely negative EVEN IF we assume
         | that the all-in was a bluff 100% of the time. Problem is that
         | jack high usually doesn't beat a bluff in this scenario. If you
         | adjust that 100% to something realistic like 60% or 30% or
         | whatnot, it becomes even more severely -EV.
        
           | alasdair_ wrote:
           | >That's not what it means to make a +EV call. Expected value
           | is estimated based on the opponent's presumed range.
           | 
           | My point was that if she was cheating and knew what his cards
           | were, there is no range to care about. And even then, it's
           | not significantly +EV.
        
             | friedman23 wrote:
             | It's extremely +ev to call. If she folds she loses close to
             | 35 thousand dollars of ev
             | 
             | edit: closer to 20k, i didn't remember the exact pot size
        
               | mod wrote:
               | Your conclusion is correct, and your math is wrong.
               | 
               | She loses her share/EV (47% per the graphics) of the pot
               | (41.7k per the graphics) if she folds.
               | 
               | So it's worth more like 20k to call, if she knows his
               | exact hand.
        
               | friedman23 wrote:
               | I didn't remember the exact pot size. I thought she
               | raised 12k into 40k then got raised all in
        
               | mod wrote:
               | He bet 10k into 11.7k, she clicked it back to 20k, he
               | shoved covering her 129k total to start the turn.
        
             | baobabKoodaa wrote:
             | Ah, sorry.
        
         | strangescript wrote:
         | She didn't misread her hand. She checked it before calling. She
         | was starting to realize she was way over extended with her
         | cheat and was trying to find a viable explanation.
         | 
         | Most likely all she knew was she had the better hand at the
         | time of his all in via someone spying his hole cards and some
         | kind discrete alert system, like a vibration. She just wanted
         | to make a play for the cameras but didn't think through how it
         | would look.
         | 
         | The intention was most likely for her to get it first, then
         | even if he called it would just look like she tried a big
         | bluff. Would have looked great for clips and streaming...
        
         | melling wrote:
         | "Lew ended up returning Adelstein his chips, saying she had
         | been "threatened" - something Adelstein denied."
         | 
         | That's a lot of money to give back
        
           | silisili wrote:
           | That's what makes me feel like something is fishy. The dude
           | immediately was calling her out, saying all but she cheated.
           | 
           | If she beat him fair and square, any reasonable person would
           | call him a sore loser and be happy to have taken his money.
        
             | Waterluvian wrote:
             | This logic gives me a very ugly feeling and reminds me of,
             | "why didn't you scream? Why didn't you fight?"
             | 
             | A lot of comments in this post are applying the commenter's
             | context to her situation when judging her actions.
        
               | WastingMyTime89 wrote:
               | All the discussion surrounding cheating allegations these
               | past few weeks gave me a very ugly feeling.
               | 
               | I have personally lost all respect for at least two
               | communities. Supposedly intelligent people apparently are
               | all too ready to turn into a mob too.
        
             | rplst8 wrote:
             | Because in poker if you don't play the way people think you
             | should play, they get snooty. Especially "pros".
        
               | silisili wrote:
               | As a counterpoint, why did the 'pro' go all in on a junk
               | hand, then?
        
               | alex_young wrote:
               | He didn't go all in, he forced his opponent to go all in.
               | He also had a ton of great scenarios at that point which
               | were a lot better than a junk hand. It didn't work out,
               | and usually that's just chalked up to how things go. Odd
               | to get so upset about one hand IMO.
        
         | mod wrote:
         | > Far more likely was she misread J4 as J3
         | 
         | Per Robbi herself, " i ran it twice because i didnt think j
         | high could be good".
         | 
         | https://youtu.be/9NNKjWscKWo?t=717 (says it at 12:00)
        
         | mod wrote:
         | It makes sense if her signal is binary.
         | 
         | "you have the best hand" buzzing in her pocket
         | 
         | Calling with J4 doesn't make sense in any other scenario, so
         | it's hard for us to say "well it doesn't make sense to call in
         | the flip scenario."
         | 
         | It makes way less sense to call with J4. She did something that
         | doesn't make sense.
         | 
         | She also announced that she did not have a pair of threes, out
         | loud.
         | 
         | Also for anyone else who wants to watch it, it was
         | livestreamed, so it doesn't matter if you watch it live or now.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | codeflo wrote:
         | Just so I get this right, she made a play based on an error,
         | and got lucky? I mean, stuff like that happens, and is usually
         | a great story. Watching humans play games is exciting precisely
         | because we aren't robots.
        
           | baobabKoodaa wrote:
           | No, there's virtually no chance of that happening in this
           | case.
        
           | spiderice wrote:
           | That is what GP is suggesting. GP's theory doesn't make much
           | sense though. It doesn't account for the things she said
           | during the hand that make no sense if she just misread her
           | cards. Or the fact that she gave the money back.
           | 
           | Much more likely to be cheating, imo
        
             | agar wrote:
             | How could cheating help her when he still had a reasonable
             | chance of pulling either a straight flush, flush, or a pair
             | in the river?
             | 
             | What would be the logic that a calm, rational, 3rd party
             | (that could even be using a computer to calculate odds)
             | would use that would justify risking $100K+ on that hand?
             | 
             | Also, don't you think that if someone's cheating they would
             | be careful to play relatively conservatively so as not to
             | cause this kind of attention?
        
               | __blockcipher__ wrote:
               | > How could cheating help her when he still had a
               | reasonable chance of pulling either a straight flush,
               | flush, or a pair in the river?
               | 
               | Because her call was +EV. Not knowing Garrett's cards, it
               | was an insanely stupid call that threw away money. But if
               | one knew Garrett's cards, they'd know it was a healthily
               | +EV call.
               | 
               | The fact that Garrett had outs is very irrelevant here.
               | You seem to think that one would only cheat by knowing
               | that the opponent is drawing completely dead. But that's
               | nonsense. You just need to know if your call is +EV or
               | not.
        
               | albedoa wrote:
               | > Also, don't you think that if someone's cheating they
               | would be careful to play relatively conservatively so as
               | not to cause this kind of attention?
               | 
               | If this is the first poker cheating scandal that you have
               | followed, then you are forgiven for not knowing how funny
               | that question is.
               | 
               | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stones_Gambling_Hall_cheati
               | ng_...
               | 
               | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cereus_Poker_Network#2007_c
               | hea...
        
           | [deleted]
        
         | 300bps wrote:
         | She said a lot of things. Many of them made no sense. For
         | example, "I thought you had ace high!" as an explanation for
         | why she called him while she had jack high.
         | 
         | It was either a colossally dumb mistake on her part followed by
         | implausible explanations or she bet a ton of money somehow
         | knowing she had him beat with jack high.
        
           | alasdair_ wrote:
           | I think tv cameras and commentators and having tens of
           | thousands of people watching you can totally mess with how
           | you think when you have just made a mistake for six figures.
           | 
           | Without any actual proof of cheating (especially in this
           | terrible spot) my money is on a fuckup.
        
         | jstx1 wrote:
         | > Far more likely was she misread J4 as J3, especially as she
         | literally said "threes are good, right?" during her
         | deliberations.
         | 
         | If you watch the video, you'll see that she knows that she
         | doesn't have a 3 - she checks her hand before she calls and
         | also a player at the table asks her if she has a 3 and she says
         | no. Then afterwards she did an interview in which she explains
         | how she thought she had a 3 but that doesn't match what she
         | said at the table.
         | 
         | > She was only 47% to win the hand after her call of the all-in
         | bet and while the play was marginally +EV, it wasn't much.
         | 
         | It's not marginally +EV to call given the pot odds and she
         | doesn't need to know her exact equity to be cheating, she could
         | be getting binary "you're good" / "you aren't good" signals
         | (and that's much easier to transmit and read without being
         | noticed).
         | 
         | The play on the turn is way too ridiculous. The other thing is
         | why did she return the money after the hand if she won it
         | fairly? Sure, maybe she was intimidated but to me it looked
         | like she cheated, she realised that she's in over her head and
         | tried to make the whole thing go away by returning the money
         | and coming up with a story about the hand she thought she had.
        
           | deanCommie wrote:
           | Re: giving the money back
           | 
           | Daniel Negreanu [0] has the opposite read from you:
           | 
           | "The fact that she gave him the money back isn't an admission
           | of guilt, but likely the contrary.
           | 
           | A money hungry scumbag cheat isn't likely to give money back
           | in that spot.
           | 
           | Felt like she didn't want to deal with conflict and can
           | afford it."
           | 
           | [0]https://twitter.com/RealKidPoker/status/157572668111701196
           | 8?...
           | 
           | Re: 3 vs 4. I think both the cheaters and the non-cheater
           | followers of this story believe that she was rattled and made
           | a bad move. Even if she was cheating and KNEW his hand, she
           | had no way of knowing that her _Jack-high_ would hold up,
           | unless people believe the entire casino is on in it and she
           | knows all the cards coming.
           | 
           | If we accept that she was rattled, and stressed, and made a
           | rash move, and got away with it, then it's equally believable
           | that in the moment she briefly got confused and remembered
           | the wrong hand. Memory isn't foolproof, and in the emotional
           | decision to decide to call she confused the last 2 hands or
           | ipso-facto justified what she could tell was a terrible
           | decision but needed to cover up with bravado because the game
           | had to continue after this hand.
           | 
           | Once you understand all of the above, it's clear she didn't
           | need to cheat to wind up in this position, and in fact it
           | makes LESS sense.
        
           | thereare5lights wrote:
           | > The other thing is why did she return the money after the
           | hand if she won it fairly?
           | 
           | Hm why would a woman when confronted with an enraged man
           | threatening her seek to minimize conflict...
        
           | generalk wrote:
           | > It's not marginally +EV to call given the pot odds and she
           | doesn't need to know her exact equity to be cheating, she
           | could be getting binary "you're good" / "you aren't good"
           | signals (and that's much easier to transmit and read without
           | being noticed). [...] The play on the turn is way too
           | ridiculous.
           | 
           | I watched the hand. I've been in that spot. You think you
           | have a good read on someone such that your not-great hand may
           | actually be best, say, they're chasing an open-ender and your
           | high card is good. (Which it would be, barring cards folded
           | by other players.) You're nervous, you're facing an all-in
           | decision, you know the safe move is to fold and move on, but
           | damn all you just can't shake the feeling, and you have to
           | gamble.
           | 
           | Poker player trusting a soul read is the Occam's Razor answer
           | here.
           | 
           | You didn't say this, but I fear that if this were someone
           | like Daniel Negraneau monologuing about what to do and
           | stating his read aloud ("I'm pretty sure you're chasing. I'm
           | probably beat but if you're holding 8 9 I'm beating you right
           | now. I'm right aren't I? _sigh_ I call. Show me I 'm beat.")
           | then this wouldn't be an issue at all.
           | 
           | > The other thing is why did she return the money after the
           | hand if she won it fairly?
           | 
           | "He cornered me & threatened me. If he has the audacity to
           | give me the death stare ON camera, picture what it's like OFF
           | camera. I was pulled out of the game & forced to speak to him
           | in a dark hallway."[twt]
           | 
           | Shit, if I was in that position, and producers/officials
           | pulled me out of the game and put me in a room with my
           | opponent where I was accused of cheating and told to return
           | the money, damn good chance I'd return it just to make a
           | scary situation stop. Maybe you're different, but that
           | doesn't mean intimidation doesn't work pretty damn well.
           | 
           | [twt]:
           | https://twitter.com/RobbiJadeLew/status/1575758837465812992
        
             | c7b wrote:
             | > Poker player trusting a soul read is the Occam's Razor
             | answer here.
             | 
             | I suppose Hanlon's razor is adequate here - "never
             | attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by
             | stupidity".
        
             | gnicholas wrote:
             | Did she make predictions this specific? I couldn't hear
             | everything that was said in the clip, but I don't remember
             | her saying anything this specific.
        
               | generalk wrote:
               | Oh no, the stuff I put in quotes was not Robbi speaking
               | during the hand, but my imagining of what Neganeau would
               | have sounded like in his typical confident chattery
               | thinking aloud.
        
             | jstx1 wrote:
             | > I'm pretty sure you're chasing.
             | 
             | Right but chasing what - she can't beat J8, QJ, KQ, any
             | high flush draw. Let alone value hands (she's drawing dead
             | against a 10). So she has to put him specifically on 78
             | (which he had), 68 or 67. That makes it more suspicious,
             | not less.
             | 
             | The intimidation thing makes sense if you believe her
             | story. I can only guess what happened between the two of
             | them after the game. I know that I've seen her change her
             | own story about the hand that she thought she had. If
             | you're questioning someone's credibility, you can't really
             | go with their own story about what happened as a reason to
             | exonerate them.
        
               | generalk wrote:
               | > Right but chasing what - she can't beat J8, QJ, KQ, any
               | high flush draw.
               | 
               | Fair, there are definitely semi-bluffs that beat J4 here,
               | and of course if Garret had a made hand she's toast.
               | 
               | There's also (and I think she says this at some point,
               | "purely a bluff-catcher" IIRC) tons of pure air bluffs
               | that J4 beats.
               | 
               | I simply do not understand the stance that if a poker
               | player makes a call with a crap hand that turns out to be
               | good, and then holds up, that she must be cheating. Not
               | for nothing, but I have never heard such accusations
               | leveled at a male player like this.
               | 
               | > If you're questioning someone's credibility, you can't
               | really go with their own story about what happened as a
               | reason to exonerate them.
               | 
               |  _I_ am not questioning her credibility.
               | 
               | Because there is no reason to.
               | 
               | The only reason anyone thinks she might be cheating is
               | because her heads-up opponent angrily accused her of it.
               | Not even after a bad beat! After his hand, which was
               | never ever the best hand of the two, failed to make any
               | of its draws over a river _that was run twice._
               | 
               | I question the credibility of the accusation. Garret has
               | every reason to accuse his opponent of cheating,
               | especially given that he successfully intimidated Robbi
               | into returning his chips, which to me is just insane.
               | 
               | Why the conversation isn't "poker player doesn't catch
               | his outs, demands his money back" is beyond me.
        
               | nwienert wrote:
               | But again it's not uncommon to believe your opponent is
               | chasing a card especially in this case - straight and
               | flush draw and the straight is below your top card. If
               | it's a straight draw they have, you know you have them
               | beat. And going all in pre-river on your draws is the
               | main tactic you'd expect to see.
        
           | gregw134 wrote:
           | Plus Garrett asked if she had a pair and she said no. Also,
           | she went from playing $300 buyin tournaments in March to
           | suddenly playing live stream for hundreds of thousands and
           | winning $100k two showings in a row.
        
           | Guvante wrote:
           | > You'll see that she knows that she doesn't have a 3
           | 
           | I haven't played running it twice but it looked like there
           | was still importance to secrecy before the second river was
           | flipped given the way they were acting.
           | 
           | > The play on the turn is way too ridiculous
           | 
           | Assuming the cheater doesn't know the deck (which would be
           | extremely hard to pull off). How is cheating in this case
           | logical? She had the losing hand at the time she called by a
           | few percentage points.
           | 
           | Sometimes you call bluffs with a face card figuring it will
           | win. It isn't a good bet but it isn't a terrible one as this
           | hand shows.
           | 
           | Also insinuating that no one would return money when
           | threatened is weird.
        
             | __blockcipher__ wrote:
             | > She had the losing hand at the time she called by a few
             | percentage points.
             | 
             | This tells me you don't understand the basics of poker.
             | Which is fine, but you might want to be clear about that
             | before opining :P
             | 
             | While the expected percent change of her winning the hand
             | was slightly worse than a coinflip, her _pot odds_ made her
             | call +EV. In other words by calling that allin, she stood
             | to profit. Your comment was implicitly assuming that she
             | can only win as much money as she puts in with the final
             | bet.
             | 
             | So yeah, 53% of the time she's going to lose the hand, but
             | her actual expected value of making the call is positive.
             | 
             | > I haven't played running it twice but it looked like
             | there was still importance to secrecy before the second
             | river was flipped given the way they were acting.
             | 
             | I'm a bit confused by this, could you explain this in
             | another way? If you're saying that there was maybe a reason
             | to maintain secrecy (as far as what hand she had) after the
             | first run, that's not true because she already won a hand
             | therefore she will have to show her hand regardless of how
             | the second river goes.
        
             | alasdair_ wrote:
             | >How is cheating in this case logical? She had the losing
             | hand at the time she called by a few percentage points.
             | 
             | It's +EV because of the money already in the pot.
             | 
             | Not by a lot though, and she played badly in other spots
             | previously.
        
               | tux1968 wrote:
               | Not saying it's the case here, or even that anyone has
               | suggested it's remotely suspected, but some cheating
               | involves knowing what card the dealer is going to play
               | next.
        
               | Guvante wrote:
               | Her odds were 47%. To claim she needed to know she was
               | ahead to possibly win makes zero sense.
               | 
               | He was behind and needed an out. So many outs existed he
               | was more likely to win but "high card beats almost
               | flush/straight".
        
               | tux1968 wrote:
               | I hesitate to reply, because it's not a very important
               | point I was making. But to be clear, if she was cheating
               | by knowing for a fact what card the dealer was about to
               | play (and her opponent's hole cards), then none of those
               | odds you mention, matter.
               | 
               | Edit: And again, not saying this is remotely a
               | possibility here, or has been suggested by anyone. But
               | all the cards were in fact known by the television
               | program covering the table, and there have been cases of
               | someone in the control booth feeding info back to a
               | cheater at the table.
        
               | mod wrote:
               | She's also not losing the hand at the time she called,
               | percentage wise, unless you factor in the cards folded by
               | the other players. We don't know if she had that
               | information.
        
               | Guvante wrote:
               | Nothing you said makes sense in the context of cheating
               | in this game. How could she know only his cards? Or how
               | could she know the rivers without knowing anyone else's
               | cards?
               | 
               | It was effectively a coin flip given how many outs he had
               | and the fact that her hand was better at the turn.
               | 
               | Saying she needed to cheat to win a coin flip is just
               | weird.
               | 
               | Also the fact that it is a coin flip is well known in the
               | poker community. If you haven't heard people bitching
               | about losing to JX you haven't played enough.
        
               | mod wrote:
               | Her call is good even if she knows his hand. Amazingly
               | good, since almost no players have ever called with jack
               | high, no draw. Ever.
               | 
               | I think if she cheated (I don't have any strong opinions
               | on whether she did), that her signal was binary. It makes
               | the most sense given her actions, and inability to
               | explain them.
               | 
               | Buzzer that buzzes when "you have the best hand right
               | now" makes a lot of sense and is easy for a bad player to
               | understand.
               | 
               | It's a coin flip, but she's 55% favorite unless she knows
               | the discarded/dead cards. If she knows them, she has 47%
               | equity which makes her call very profitable given the pot
               | size of 40k.
               | 
               | This is basic "pot odds" or EV calculation, I encourage
               | you to do it.
               | 
               | If she didn't know his exact hand, her play is
               | unspeakably bad. She has virtually zero equity against
               | Garrett's range here. He's holding one of the two or
               | three hands she can beat given his line. Most of his
               | bluffs are crushing her.
        
               | Guvante wrote:
               | If she pegged him as going for a straight her odds
               | probably weren't bad making the move a decent +EV.
               | 
               | And it would also match her banter of "you probably got
               | me".
        
               | __blockcipher__ wrote:
               | She specifically said she put him on ace high at one
               | point, at which point Garrett retorts that (paraphrased,
               | despite the quotes) "if she thought he had ace high why
               | would she call with jack high?"
        
             | mod wrote:
             | > I haven't played running it twice but it looked like
             | there was still importance to secrecy before the second
             | river was flipped given the way they were acting.
             | 
             | No, there isn't.
             | 
             | In tournaments, players are forced to put hands face-up
             | when no more betting can take place. This is in part so
             | people can see there's no cheating/collusion going on, and
             | in part because it's better for TV.
             | 
             | In cash games, there's no such requirement. Players often
             | don't show their hand because they don't want to give away
             | information to the other players. There's rules about who
             | has to show first, but if she had lost the pot, she could
             | have folded without showing.
             | 
             | > Assuming the cheater doesn't know the deck (which would
             | be extremely hard to pull off)
             | 
             | The insinuation is exactly that, that she knew the deck.
             | (Rather, that software knew the deck and alerted her to a
             | favorable position)
             | 
             | If you're not up-to-date on how that can happen, I suggest
             | you review the mike postle scandal, and other proofs of
             | concept where people are, in fact, reading the state of the
             | entire deck.
        
               | Guvante wrote:
               | What evidence is there that she did? Literally half the
               | deck was a win for her in this situation.
               | 
               | The presumption that people don't call with JX is a weird
               | one, unless you have never played poker before.
        
               | mod wrote:
               | > The presumption that people don't call with JX is a
               | weird one, unless you have never played poker before.
               | 
               | This assertion belies your mistakes. Giving you the
               | benefit of the doubt, I think you're talking about
               | playing J4 preflop. It's pretty bad, but whatever, people
               | do it all the time. And of course they can win with it.
               | 
               | They don't usually rely on calling a $109k bluff on the
               | turn with jack high to win, though.
               | 
               | > unless you have never played poker before.
               | 
               | I was a professional player before they shut down the big
               | 3 online sites.
               | 
               | Also you're calling out a whole lot of top professional
               | players with that statement.
        
             | threatofrain wrote:
             | How do you know that threats have been made?
        
               | Guvante wrote:
               | I don't but I doubt there is evidence to the contrary
               | either. So any positing requires considering both sides
               | as being the chances current evidence provides.
               | 
               | Given bad bets leading to threats of violence is not
               | unheard of presupposing the threat wasn't made is
               | baseless.
        
               | generalk wrote:
               | https://twitter.com/RobbiJadeLew/status/15757588374658129
               | 92
               | 
               | "He cornered me & threatened me. If he has the audacity
               | to give me the death stare ON camera, picture what it's
               | like OFF camera. I was pulled out of the game & forced to
               | speak to him in a dark hallway."
        
         | pmoriarty wrote:
         | _" Cheating in this spot just makes no sense"_
         | 
         | When there's money involved there will be people who cheat.
         | 
         | Even when there's no money involved, some people will cheat.
        
         | nathanaldensr wrote:
         | The fact she keeps changing her story is the most intriguing
         | aspect of this whole incident, far moreso than any particular
         | action in the hand. Why would someone change their story so
         | much _after just winning this massive pot_?
        
         | gregw134 wrote:
         | Weird thing is she checked her hole cards during the hand. I
         | guess it's possible to misread your hole cards twice but
         | difficult to do.
         | 
         | Giving the money back is also a bad look.
         | 
         | The other odd thing is she's a very new player suddenly playing
         | some of the biggest stakes in the world, and she's now won
         | $100k in back to back appearances, while presumably making
         | amateur mistakes like calling $130k with Jack high.
         | 
         | I agree there's no convincing evidence but it's enough to raise
         | my suspicions.
        
           | girvo wrote:
           | How in the world is giving money back a bad look. I swear
           | some of the people here are working backwards from their
           | already concluded "she's a cheater" and twisting anything
           | they can to fit it. It's wild to see, as someone with zero
           | stake in it either way, but a _cheater_ would not give the
           | money back when asked.
        
           | noncoml wrote:
           | > Giving the money back is also a bad look.
           | 
           | I wouldn't read too much into this, it can be either.
           | 
           | I've given back money during disputes just to avoid drama and
           | because I was certain one way or another the money would come
           | back to me anyway.
        
           | alasdair_ wrote:
           | >I guess it's possible to misread your hole cards twice but
           | difficult to do.
           | 
           | With TV cameras and thousands of people watching every tiny
           | thing you do, for hundreds of thousands of dollars, I can buy
           | it. I've been in televised card games before and it is so
           | easy to make dumb mistakes just because of the pressure of
           | the cameras and audience.
        
       | draw_down wrote:
       | The poker one doesn't make sense to me in any direction. Even if
       | she was cheating and had full knowledge of the other player's
       | cards, her call still doesn't make sense. Giving back the money
       | to the other player was a really suspicious move though. It seems
       | like she mostly just didn't really understand what she was doing.
        
         | jstx1 wrote:
         | > her call still doesn't make sense.
         | 
         | It 100% makes sense to call the shove on the turn if you know
         | Garett's hole cards. In fact the problem is that it _only_
         | makes sense if you know his hole cards.
        
           | deanCommie wrote:
           | How??
           | 
           | The hole cards aren't enough - there are more cards coming on
           | the table.
           | 
           | Even if you know that your nothing beats his nothing you are
           | risking a lot on a small advantage that his nothing won't
           | turn into something.
        
             | alasdair_ wrote:
             | There is no more betting to go, so it does make sense. You
             | are 47% to win but it's +EV because there is already money
             | in the pot so the pot odds favor you.
             | 
             | That said, there are far better spots to do this and her
             | other plays earlier were less than great.
        
             | jstx1 wrote:
             | > How??
             | 
             | After the shove on the turn the pot is $161k, she needs to
             | call $109k. She needs 109/(109+161) = 40.3% equity to break
             | even. So if she has more than 40.3% equity, she should
             | call. If you plug in their cards on the turn into an equity
             | calculator, you'll see that she has 54.55% equity (not
             | accounting for dead cards like the stream calculation but
             | either way it's the same outcome) so it's +EV for her to
             | call.
        
             | mod wrote:
             | If Garrett turned his hand face up, she makes about 20k by
             | calling on the turn.
        
           | bena wrote:
           | This is what I kind of don't like about all of the analyses.
           | They pretty much admit that Garett's hand is weaker on the
           | table. He has more outs, yes, but if the hand were to stop
           | right there, he'd lose. If he doesn't hit his outs, he loses.
           | Which is what happens. On both rivers.
           | 
           | His response to the call feels a bit like Michael Scott in
           | the episode Casino Night. "I went all in, you should fold, I
           | have good cards". Ok, that's why you play the hand. If all
           | the responses are going to be dictated on rails, then why
           | bother. Deal the cards and let the computers sort it out.
           | 
           | And it's not like it was guaranteed that he wouldn't hit
           | either his straight or flush. I know the cards have RFID in
           | them, I don't know if they're sensitive enough to tell the
           | exact order of a stack of cards. Because that's what she
           | would have had to know, his cards, and the next cards in the
           | deck in order.
        
             | jstx1 wrote:
             | > His response to the call feels a bit like Michael Scott
             | in the episode Casino Night. "I went all in, you should
             | fold, I have good cards".
             | 
             | You're misunderstanding. His response (and the response
             | from the rest of the poker community) isn't based on any
             | call, it's based on a call with her specific hand. That's
             | the suspicious part (and her behaviour after the hand).
             | Garett has bluffed and been called and lost many times and
             | not accused the other player of cheating.
        
             | mod wrote:
             | > Because that's what she would have had to know, his
             | cards, and the next cards in the deck in order.
             | 
             | She would only have to know that if it was an absolute
             | requirement that she wins the hand.
             | 
             | It's not--she can take a positive expectation, which
             | includes a coin flip, and still be wildly profitable.
             | 
             | The outcome of the last two cards isn't overly important,
             | just the state of the game when she committed $109,000.
             | 
             | > He has more outs
             | 
             | You've made a fundamental error here. He's the only one
             | with outs, as outs refer to cards that will improve your
             | hand to be the winner. She doesn't have outs, because her
             | hand is better than his at every single point.
             | 
             | I think your points are reasonably well thought out,
             | they're just missing some fundamental knowledge required to
             | make any kind of valid determination.
        
       | remote_phone wrote:
       | The cheating claims for the poker example are absolutely stupid.
       | Only people who know very little about poker would claim that.
       | 
       | What is obvious is that the lady made a mistake. If someone were
       | helping her cheat, there's no way they would have told her to
       | call, especially after the flop.
       | 
       | She was behind the entire hand after the flop, and even after the
       | turn she still had a disadvantage. She shouldn't have called it
       | at all and there was no reason to even think about it. If she
       | were cheating her accomplice would have told her under no
       | uncertain terms to fold. Who would advise anyone to make a 6
       | figure bet on a coin flip???There's no circumstance under which
       | her actions make sense except in the case of her making a
       | mistake.
       | 
       | She made a mistake and got lucky, that's all there is.
        
         | gregw134 wrote:
         | > The cheating claims for the poker example are absolutely
         | stupid. Only people who know very little about poker would
         | claim that.
         | 
         | Doug Polk is suspicious of cheating here, and Tom Dwan called
         | this one of the most suspicious plays he's ever seen.
        
         | csa wrote:
         | > The cheating claims for the poker example are absolutely
         | stupid. Only people who know very little about poker would
         | claim that.
         | 
         | A not small number of well-known pros don't think it's so
         | simple:
         | 
         | https://preview.redd.it/e4x1y513wer91.png?width=1409&format=...
         | 
         | Most of the pros think it was just a new player who did
         | something stupid that she didn't understand, having seen that
         | at the table many times before. I don't think that's an
         | unreasonable take.
         | 
         | That said, she has several other issues that need to be
         | addressed beyond making that specific hero call.
        
           | mod wrote:
           | > Most of the pros think [she didn't cheat]
           | 
           | I don't have that impression. I follow about 100 pros on SM.
        
             | csa wrote:
             | That may be true.
             | 
             | I'm just basing it on what I've read on Twitter.
             | 
             | I have not read a random sample.
             | 
             | There are plenty pros (as shown in the linked list) who are
             | not convinced more than 50% that she cheated.
             | 
             | Given the circumstances, I doubt there will be a smoking
             | gun unless someone confesses. As such, I think it's really
             | tough to fully rule out either side of the discussion.
        
               | mod wrote:
               | I agree it's way up for debate, there's no consensus
               | among pros, or anyone besides people with political
               | agendas.
               | 
               | I also doubt this will resolve, it's going to be the next
               | Postle scenario.
        
               | bombcar wrote:
               | Postle at least had acres and acres of evidence. One bad
               | call on one hand is nothing compared.
        
               | csa wrote:
               | > Postle at least had acres and acres of evidence. One
               | bad call on one hand is nothing compared.
               | 
               | It's way more than one hand.
               | 
               | 1. She used a time bank chip to tank a turn bet by
               | Garrett when she had J8 (no pair no draw -- same J-high
               | situation) against Garrett's made full house. In that
               | case, there was an over or two on the board, so it was
               | even more ridiculous to
               | 
               | 2. Her changing story is not a good look. It could be
               | because she was lying. It could be because she had no
               | idea what she was doing and was just making up poorly-
               | constructed possible explanations on the fly.
               | 
               | 3. If you've ever played poker at a competitive level,
               | her reaction when she makes an absolutely super thin hero
               | call and is good and just sort of smiles is different
               | than every other hero call I've ever seen. It's super
               | suspicious. To be fair, she could have been on something
               | (Xanax?), so that's a possible explanation.
               | 
               | 4. She played really tight the other two sessions she
               | played on HCL. Why was she all of a sudden including
               | super thin value calls for this session? There are many
               | good possible explanations, but someone deviating this
               | much from their normal strategy _and be right both times_
               | is suspicious.
               | 
               | 5. Her undisclosed backer who was also at the table
               | mouthed something to her during the session. What was
               | that about? I was super suspicious, but could just be
               | something simple.
               | 
               | I mean, a simple explanation is that she is a relatively
               | wealthy person who was on a heavy dose of Xanax, and she
               | was tired of getting bullied by Garrett (a top notch
               | pro). She made a stand at a relatively random time, and
               | she happened to be right. If that was her story, no one
               | would bat an eye.
               | 
               | But she's going with various whackadoodle stories that
               | don't really make much sense unless you start engaging in
               | some random theorycrafting like she's a narcissist who
               | can't admit that she had no idea what she was doing
               | (possible, but who are we to say?).
        
         | baobabKoodaa wrote:
         | > The cheating claims for the poker example are absolutely
         | stupid. Only people who know very little about poker would
         | claim that.
         | 
         | Well, I can offer a counter-example that proves you wrong. I
         | played professionally for a decade (so I'm not a person who
         | "knows very little about poker") and I am claiming that she's
         | cheating. I would be very confident making this claim based on
         | her turn call alone, but when you add in the contradictory
         | follow up explanations and the fact that she RETURNED THE
         | CHIPS, I'd rate her cheating at >99% probability.
        
           | deanCommie wrote:
           | Daniel Negreanu [0] has the opposite read from you:
           | 
           | "The fact that she gave him the money back isn't an admission
           | of guilt, but likely the contrary.
           | 
           | A money hungry scumbag cheat isn't likely to give money back
           | in that spot.
           | 
           | Felt like she didn't want to deal with conflict and can
           | afford it."
           | 
           | [0] https://twitter.com/RealKidPoker/status/15757266811170119
           | 68?...
        
           | alasdair_ wrote:
           | Some people are easier to bully than others.
           | 
           | I paid for college partly through poker. Early in my career I
           | used speech play to tilt a guy and get him to call when he
           | shouldn't, winning a big pot.
           | 
           | The guy was furious and cornered me afterwords, yelling "we
           | don't do that here. You better give me my fucking money
           | back!" And so on.
           | 
           | I was 19 and not used to defending myself against angry adult
           | men and I gave him the money back, despite definitely not
           | having to.
           | 
           | I wouldn't do that now, but if you have a loud angry man
           | yelling at you, it's definitely possible to just want it to
           | stop.
           | 
           | (And I'm six two and was heavy into martial arts at the
           | time.)
        
           | fzeroracer wrote:
           | Why does her returning the chips matter? Are you not familiar
           | with how chronic cheaters operate in pretty much any other
           | field?
           | 
           | From fighting games to Donkey Kong to fishing to whatever
           | else you can think of, people that chronically cheat often
           | have the mentality to double down and/or muddy the fields to
           | try and disprove that they're cheating. Because the best
           | counter to any sort of cheating accusation is to never fold.
           | This is even when they're explicitly countered with hard
           | evidence of the cheat.
        
             | mod wrote:
             | How do you equate "giving the money back" with "doubling
             | down"?
        
               | fzeroracer wrote:
               | I didn't? I said that a cheater isn't going to give the
               | money back because they're never going to do anything
               | that makes them look like they're giving up.
        
         | friedman23 wrote:
         | > Only people who know very little about poker would claim that
         | 
         | At least half of the best professionals in the world believe
         | she cheated.
         | 
         | This is why poker is a great game. People like you that presume
         | to understand poker very well and are so confident in what they
         | believe. Please keep playing.
         | 
         | And btw, I'm 50/50 on her cheating or not. It would be
         | extremely simple to cheat in this environment.
        
           | mod wrote:
           | As an ex-professional player and a software engineer, gotta
           | agree here. There have actually been proofs-of-concept for
           | reading cards off these RFID tables. It's not hard to believe
           | someone improved on that technology and put it all together
           | with a buzzer in her pocket saying "you have the best hand."
           | 
           | Agree that these levels of bold, decisive claims are signals
           | about what makes poker a great game.
           | 
           | Nobody has near enough evidence to be sure. I think the play
           | is incredibly suspect, and I think I've met many players at
           | the tables stupid enough to make it. It's not common, but
           | they exist and keep playing.
           | 
           | What is exceptionally stupid are the guys saying "it would be
           | a mistake to call here if you were cheating" while still
           | believing "she called with J4 because she's really bad."
           | Their logic requires her to make a (massive) mistake with J4,
           | but assumes she wouldn't make a much more nuanced mistake
           | doing an EV calculation.
           | 
           | I personally think if there was cheating involved, it was a
           | binary signal ("you have the best hand") and she's too dumb
           | to understand the implications of calling with J4 in the
           | spot.
        
         | draw_down wrote:
        
       | dylan604 wrote:
       | "Lew ended up returning Adelstein his chips, saying she had been
       | "threatened" - something Adelstein denied."
       | 
       | This seems like a very suspect thing to do in my opinion. The
       | threats must have been very specific and meaningful for me to
       | even consider returning chips that I was claiming to have fairly
       | won. Returning them just seems like a guilty move.
        
         | indigodaddy wrote:
         | I disagree. A cheater would desperately attempt to latch on to
         | anything they can to show they are not a cheater. So they would
         | generally refuse even more to give back any money and just
         | repeat the "not cheating" mantra ever more and more-- and would
         | definitely never give back the money that they cheated so hard
         | to get... just my opinion. The fact that she gives back the
         | money (and I see no reason to disbelieve that she was likely
         | cornered and intimidated in the hallway) shows that she's not
         | really that concerned about it and doesn't really even care
         | that much. A cheater would be grasping on to those chips at all
         | costs/odds.
        
           | jstx1 wrote:
           | Unless you're bad at cheating and get caught and then panic.
           | Not everyone has the personality to double down.
        
             | late2part wrote:
             | I've probably played around 10k hours of poker.
             | 
             | On the one hand, crazy shit happens all the time, and folks
             | win by sucking out or by insane bluffs.
             | 
             | On the other hand, it's not considered honorable to win by
             | mistake. Winning by catching a 3% is luck - but just
             | screwing up isn't cool.
             | 
             | So, even though $130k (or whatever it was) seems like a lot
             | of money - there is honor among (some/most) poker players,
             | so it seems totally honorable to me that she gave him the
             | money, as she doesn't feel she deserves it.
             | 
             | I don't know how she would have cheated. Maybe she did but
             | it doesn't seem to me like she did.
        
               | jstx1 wrote:
               | The honor thing doesn't play - she doesn't claim that she
               | won by mistake. She claimed that
               | 
               | 1) she thought he had ace high (still doesn't make sense
               | to call with j high)
               | 
               | 2) she thought she had a 3 (that's when she changed her
               | story after the game)
               | 
               | > I don't know how she would have cheated.
               | 
               | It's a streamed game, there's an RFID system that reads
               | everyone's cards. You don't need magic to cheat, you just
               | need an inside person.
        
               | [deleted]
        
               | dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
               | The RFID only works at a few millimeters distance. It's
               | useless when trying to read a deck of cards since you'd
               | get multiple responses and would be unable to determine
               | the order of cards.
               | 
               | The inside person doesn't bear scrutiny either. What
               | would this inside person do to pull this off exactly?
        
               | ScoobleDoodle wrote:
               | At the time of calling the all-in, she was more likely to
               | lose. So she would also need to know the next cards to be
               | played. It seems even less likely the house or dealer are
               | in on it. How would RFID know the top cards yet to come?
               | They are still in the deck.
        
               | jstx1 wrote:
               | > At the time of calling the all-in, she was more likely
               | to lose.
               | 
               | This is based on the equity shown on the stream which
               | takes into account the dead cards, if you only know the
               | board and their hole cards, she has 54.55% equity. Either
               | way she should call because she needs 40.3% equity to
               | break even (109/(109+161)), any equity more than that is
               | a call and she doesn't need to know what cards will come
               | for that call to be profitable.
        
           | dylan604 wrote:
           | Admitedly, I have zero experience of this level of cheating,
           | so I honestly don't know what someone would do. However,
           | "from the movies" (ha!) professional cheaters expect to be
           | caught on occasion and consider it cost of doing business.
           | For cards, I'm thinking about Rounders as an example.
           | Hollywood wouldn't lie to us, right?
        
         | thereare5lights wrote:
         | Woman is confronted by an enraged man threatening her with the
         | "crazy eyes".
         | 
         | How you would react is no where near the standard she would
         | have used.
        
           | dylan604 wrote:
           | sadly, yes, this is something I did not consider.
        
         | dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
         | This sort of attitude is how people are wrongly convicted. A
         | person's behaviour can reflect any number of things. Where is
         | there any actual hard evidence of cheating? Or even a
         | _practical_ explanation of how it could be done.
         | 
         | Personally, I feel guilty when I'm (wrongly) accused of
         | something merely if it's possible that I could have done it. It
         | makes no sense but that's how my mind works. If it were up to
         | you I'd be convicted every time.
        
           | dylan604 wrote:
           | I'm just saying it looks like a guilty move that would beg
           | for more investigating, so that someone would be convicted on
           | the looks of guilt.
           | 
           | People are jumping to conclusions here.
        
         | mellosouls wrote:
         | It's also the sort of thing somebody in a panic or under severe
         | stress _just because of the pressure of the spotlight and the
         | thought of being thought dishonest_ might do.
         | 
         | Don't underestimate the power of mental self-sabotage of the
         | innocent.
         | 
         | Even more so given the power dynamics here.
        
       | toomanyrichies wrote:
       | Coming soon to ProductHunt- Faraday underpants.
        
       | hsbauauvhabzb wrote:
       | Check out 'Mike postle' in the poker world - he was accused of
       | cheating based on hundreds of hours worth of evidence but no
       | actual proof, the evidence was substantial enough to basically
       | prove guilt beyond doubt.
       | 
       | The current poker drama doesn't offer enough evidence to prove or
       | disprove anything. I think largely the poker world is addicted to
       | drama, unsure if the objective is to remain in the media or just
       | because drama sells.
        
       | aml183 wrote:
       | Adelstein is one of the best poker cash players in the world. He
       | has a sterling reputation in the community and to my knowledge
       | has never made an accusation like that before.
       | 
       | If you play poker, that call was either the greatest hero call of
       | all or extremely suspect.
       | 
       | There is absolutely no reason to call in that spot considering
       | the fact that many bluffs could be ahead of her hand such as AcXc
       | for a flush draw.
       | 
       | Furthermore, she was backed in that game meaning that she doesn't
       | have the money to play in it. Who is backing you if you are
       | calling over $100K pots with Jack high.
        
       | furyofantares wrote:
       | I think the only reason this drama is going around is because of
       | the chess drama. It's in the zeitgeist and it's good clickbait
       | right now. It's made clear by articles like this that are using
       | the chess drama to make their article interesting, including an
       | even more tenuous link to some fishing drama.
       | 
       | Go back an hour in the footage, and she's calling with Jack high
       | on a KQK board against the same player, and she calls for extra
       | time before eventually folding a bet on the river when she still
       | has Jack high. It's apparently not unlike her to be trying to
       | catch bluffs with hands that lose to the bluff. She's new to
       | poker and playing against sharks on TV. She's nervous and
       | embarrassed and doing and saying things that don't make sense.
        
         | bombcar wrote:
         | Playing jacks is exactly what you'd expect from a player who
         | hasn't memorized all the odds.
         | 
         | Especially since it works sometimes, it can become a huge trap.
        
         | neaden wrote:
         | I think the fish one, with the dramatic reveal of the first
         | weight followed by the absurdity of pulling more weights and
         | fish fillets out all while an angry crowd gathers around would
         | have been a sensation no matter what. I agree with you on the
         | poker though.
        
         | throwawaysleep wrote:
         | The fish one went viral on its own. It's been on the front page
         | of Reddit in one sub or another for a couple days.
        
       | SV_BubbleTime wrote:
       | > Local media report that the [fishing] pair were disqualified as
       | winners at an event last year, because one of them failed a
       | polygraph test.
       | 
       | wtf? That is definitely not how to use a polygraph. First off,
       | why would you ever submit to that? Second, they are notoriously
       | questionable, and something tells me the fishing championship
       | didn't get the world's leading expert to run it.
        
       | yumswiss wrote:
       | How do you even check if someone has a wireless vibrating device?
        
         | 323 wrote:
         | X-Ray person, X-Ray all items on person.
        
       | friedman23 wrote:
       | Let me give you all a quick crash course in poker exploitation.
       | Exploitation is taking advantage of inaccuracies in the other
       | player's strategy to maximize the amount of money you win.
       | 
       | When you bet or raise in poker you need to do this action with
       | some combinations of hands that are good (we refer to these as
       | value hands) and some combinations of hands that are bad (we
       | refer to these as bluffs).
       | 
       | If you ever have too many value hands the opponent can exploit
       | your strategy by folding all hands that are worse than your value
       | hands. If you ever have too many bluffs the opponent can exploit
       | your strategy by calling with _all_ hands that beat your bluffs.
       | 
       | The problem with this J hi call is that it does not beat the
       | majority of Garrett's bluffs. In this situation Garrett has at
       | most 2 combinations of hands that are worse than J hi, those
       | hands also have 50% chance of winning due to half the deck
       | improving them on the river vs J hi. In this situation Garrett
       | could have three of a kind, a single pair, a full house, or maybe
       | just Ace hi (which beats J hi).
       | 
       | So this call is terrible, even if "you have a read".
       | 
       | So the only explanation is that she's extremely stupid or
       | cheating. Both explain the shifting story for why she called
       | because nobody wants to admit they are dumb and they definitely
       | don't want to admit to cheating.
       | 
       | edit: She could also just have poor emotional regulation under
       | pressure which compelled her to call despite knowing it's bad.
        
         | mod wrote:
         | I think one of the best arguments that she didn't cheat is that
         | it requires a lot more.
         | 
         | Option 1: She didn't cheat and made an incredibly bad play
         | because she's very stupid.
         | 
         | Option 2: She did cheat and she made an incredibly bad play
         | because she's basically showing off that she's cheating, which
         | makes her very stupid.
         | 
         | So option 1 requires that she's really stupid, and option 2
         | requires that she's really stupid AND she cheated, making
         | option 1 more likely.
         | 
         | That being said, it ignores a lot of the poker nuance. That's
         | going to be lost on the discussion here, unfortunately, in
         | spite of your comment.
         | 
         | I've long found you can't have any serious poker discussion
         | here.
        
       | mensetmanusman wrote:
       | The future is full body x-rays or large magnetic fields that will
       | kill your if you have metal in you.
        
       | scombridae wrote:
       | The chess world is loving Niemann right now, but even more so
       | Carlsen for his high-profile indignation. P.T. Barnum's chestnut
       | about bad publicity applies most to "sports" desperately seeking
       | spectators.
        
       | neaden wrote:
       | The fishing one is the outlier, since in that case th cheaters
       | were caught red handed in dramatic fashion in front of a crowd.
       | With the chess and poker it's much less clear if anything
       | happened and what to do about it.
        
         | gunshai wrote:
         | I know this is HN, but that guy yelling
         | 
         | "WE GOT WEIGHTS!" felt out of a movie. Those dudes were MAD.
        
           | owlninja wrote:
           | Rightfully so, those tournaments have very large buy-ins and
           | the cash + prize rewards are pretty great. I get the feeling
           | many other contestants thought they were cheating in previous
           | wins, I am surprised they don't have more advanced measures
           | for detecting cheating. I've seen some people comment that
           | the eyeball test on some of those fish's weights was
           | laughable.
        
           | wyldfire wrote:
           | I couldn't quite understand but it looked like the cheater
           | just stood there and witnessed the revelation unfolding
           | without saying anything in confession or in his defense.
        
             | neaden wrote:
             | Probably the best move, I mean what can you say? An
             | immediate apology isn't going to be credible and you can't
             | really claim innocence at all.
        
               | drexlspivey wrote:
               | I would expect him to just leave
        
               | neaden wrote:
               | I would want to stay near the authority figure and on
               | camera if I had that many people that mad at me.
        
       ___________________________________________________________________
       (page generated 2022-10-02 23:01 UTC)