
Poker players have been taking to their keyboards to express outrage on TwoPlusTwo over a sponsorship deal that former Ultimate Bet representative Joe Sebok has signed with the World Poker Tour.
Sebok joined Ultimate Bet following the Super User Scandal in which UB admitted that company insiders cheated by using unauthorized software that displayed the hole cards of players. Sebok had vowed to expose any internal cheating uncovered, but never came through on his promise, which caused him to fall out of favor with a number of professional players.
One such pro is Isaac “ike” Haxton, who minced no words in detailing his feelings for Sebok. “He was a paid representative of UB, spun that role as some sort of ‘I’m gonna get to the bottom of this!’ bull****, learned nothing, and then turned around and assured people that it was safe to play on UB,” Haxton wrote on the popular online poker forum. “The people who believed him lost every dime they had on the site when the **** hit the fan. He’s never even made a proper public apology or admitted his role in helping UB rob more people. The fact that poker related businesses continue to pay him money to use his name in association with their products is mind-blowing.”
Many other posters have replied to Haxton’s tirade by expressing similar vitriolic criticisms on the decision of WPT to hire Sebok. No response has yet been made by the WPT.
Sebok is the co-host of PokerRoad Radio and previously hosted Pokerwire Radio, as well as Poker2Nite on the Fox network. He is the stepson of poker Hall of Famer Barry Greenstein, with whom he founded Pokerroad.com, and has won over $1.8 million in live tournaments.