ITH Poker Forum

[icfishies]

I am still amazed and beyond disgusted at what I saw and heard very late last night/early in the morning at Absolute Poker...and I don't even know what to do about it. The irony of this happening the night after my "poker ethics" post is too much, also:

Anyone who has watched the 75/150 game there knows that Mark Seif (who is the site's signature pro and part-owner) has been extremely abusive lately of the other players when he's at the table.......always banning other players' chat in an instant and threatening account closure, etc. He has lost a lot a money at that 75 game (the resident pros consider him the big fish there) and it's been pretty obvious lately that it was starting to get to him more and more.

Anyway......stuckinpgh (my good friend Mike) is one of a handful of high-limit players who have managed to get under Mark's skin in recent weeks. It was evident that Seif was not fond of Mike and would tilt sometimes. Only this time, it turned out to be a lot worse than harmless trash talk.

Last night, Seif was actually having a good session for a few hours at the 75 table. Eventually the game mostly broke up, and it was just Seif and Mike heads up. After some see-saw action, Mike started to get the best of him again and was ahead maybe 4 or 5 k for the HU time, I'd say. At that point, Seif says something like "one second punk"....leaves the table.....then comes back about a minute later and announces "I'm ready to take you down."

Play then started again......and I saw something that I never have before in all my on-line poker play: obvious manipulation. Every hand was a complete dissection based on whatever Mike was holding (third pair was capped by Seif if Mike was behind or bluffing, for example.) About 10 or 12 k was basically stolen in 15 minutes (over maybe 100 hands), and here's the kicker: he was so pissed and beyond rational thinking that he actually wanted Mike to know what was going on! For example, Mike had K9 on one hand and flopped a boat. Seif was first to act after the flop, and FOLDED OUT OF TURN just that time. I had heard that Seif was having some personal problems, but who would've ever guessed that he could be capable of this. Between that possibility and the abuse that he's taken from the pros (in chat, $ lost, and pride lost at the tables), he must've finally snapped and lowered himself THAT much to get some revenge. We were simply stunned, and all Mike could do at the time was leave the game and withdraw the rest of his money (which he did get already.)

I have never played in a game with Mark Seif myself (or ever said a word to him), so none of this information is based on anything personal between him and me. I'm only trying to help out a good friend here and to call some needed attention to what happened. If Seif is capable of this, then it's a scary thought to trust your money to that site. And to think I was just about to deposit to play the 75 game myself.

[wade]

If this is true AP is in a lot of trouble.

I'm still confused tho...does he work for AP? I thought site employees weren't permitted to play at their sites, let alone owners...

[icfishies]

Seif isn't just any ol' pro there.....he is the signature draw for the site (made a name for himself by winning back-to-back WSOP bracelets) and supposedly has a decent ownership stake there as well.

I don't think this is anything that happens regularly there (by any means.) I'm hoping it was a one-time thing that was done out of spite and a very bruised ego.

It's also fairly common for the really well-known names to play at their own sites (like Hellmuth at UB), so it was nothing unusual for Seif to be there. He's at the 75 game fairly often (at the table named for him, no less)

[checkmate]

At that point, Seif says something like "one second punk"....leaves the table.....then comes back about a minute later and announces "I'm ready to take you down."

Thats not good. Sounds like he flipped a secret switch. If he had it you would think he would use it more often and be killing the game.

Had it been mentioned by anyone else I would not take it seriously. This is not good for AP.

[Fumseck]

WOW!

I am not sure if AP reads this board (they probably do) but I hope they come up with some kind of explanation.

IC did you post this to 2+2 forum as well?

[Fumseck]

Also,

if your firend cannot get anything from AP I would suggest him to post the whole hand history to the forums.

[Viscant]

If this didn't come from a credible source, I would instantly dismiss it, but given the source, I have to admit I'm scared. Is this sort of thing even possible, even for an employee? I mean...if it's possible to rig a game (and I mean that's not an admission I want ANY PART of making) how could he do it, even as an employee?
I'm trying to wrap my head around this and not getting very far.

[thewave]

He might be able to get a hold of what his opponent's cards are, but he probably isn't able to change which hands are dealt, what kind of boards are dealt and that kind of stuff. When the cards are dealt I assume each player's hole cards are saved to a server which stores the hand histories, which Seif could possibly have access to. This is a pretty big accusation, and even coming from IC it's still a little unbelievable until some evidence is provided, like the hand history where he open folds against the other player's boat.

[Chevin]

That is really scary. If players as experienced as you and Reggie' thought it was that obvious then AP have some real explaining to do.

I've played plenty of 'Stars 30-60 with Seif. My experience is that he conducts himself like an idiot and at full ring LH is just another over-aggro donk.

I've never been comfortable with Absolute as a site. Their bonuses to all there players are too good to be true and I wouldn't have been comfortable having a reasonable banroll there even before hearing this.

[jrspm]

I think anyone who co-owns, endorses or is otherwise involved in a site and acts like that (even without the major issue of blatant cheating) is asking for trouble.

The fact that they would go to such extreme lengths is absolutely crazy. I'm sure its not a reflection on the site as a whole but it's certainly not a good advert!

[Viscant]

Ah, I think I understand now. Seeing the hands would be enough and there might be some way to do that, I suppose. I think what I was hung up on was the fact that he might be engineering the hands, but just seeing the other side's cards serves the same purpose.
What's the best evidence we have here, and can we see it? The K9 is super fishy, especially if he hadn't done that during the session. Did Mark lose ANY hands at showdown during this period? I want to know all I can about this.

[icfishies]

The word "manipulation" was a bit of a misnomer.....sorry for any confusion it caused. As some of you have guessed, the play occurred as if Seif could see the cards.

Viscant, Mike did not win one hand at showdown. Which made it seem even more apparent that Seif just didn't care if he knew and wanted to only prove a point. Because as someone else mentioned, he could do this anytime if he wanted to (and maybe never has before); this seemed to be a personal f-u to Mike.

And also, he is requesting all the hand histories. We'll see if they're sent

[Wenona]

Gee, this is very disturbing, I just returned to AP after a very long break.

I would say IC that you and the mods need to be very careful with what accusations are made on a forum like this. Again I can only speak from the Australian experience, but forums here are very strict on potentially defamatory accusations after a case where the site was joined with the poster in a lawsuit and both had damages awarded against them.

[icfishies]

Gee, this is very disturbing, I just returned to AP after a very long break.

I would say IC that you and the mods need to be very careful with what accusations are made on a forum like this. Again I can only speak from the Australian experience, but forums here are very strict on potentially defamatory accusations after a case where the site was joined with the poster in a lawsuit and both had damages awarded against them.

True.....it's up to the mods if they want to take this down. I don't want to take a chance of getting the site into any trouble. Especially since I believe that Seif is a lawyer.

I'll repeat though......this does NOT mean that anything else illicit has happened (or will happen) at other times at Absolute. It had the feel of an isolated incident. But still, it was very difficult not to say something!

[Viscant]

I don't think you need to request hands, unless you mean you're requesting all of Seif's hand histories.. At least for me it autosaves to C:/Program Files/Absolute Poker/HandHistory/(screen name) .