After more than five years out of the tournament poker spotlight, one of the men involved in the demise of Full Tilt Poker and the “Black Friday” scandal returned to the World Series of Poker stage on Saturday.
Former World Champion Chris Ferguson, the man formerly known as ‘Jesus,’ entered the $10,000 Seven Card Stud World Championship on Saturday afternoon, marking the first time that either he or one of his alleged cohorts, Howard Lederer or Ray Bitar, have set foot in the Rio since “Black Friday” for the WSOP (meaning Ferguson hasn’t been at the event since 2010). The tournament was a natural for Ferguson to make his return at, with his first WSOP bracelet being won in 2000 in a Seven Card Stud event, but there were still titters as the lanky frame of the former World Champion ambled through the Rio’s tournament rooms.
About as quietly as possible, Ferguson entered the tournament prior to the closing of late registration and it appears that there is plenty of rust on the tournament game. His stack immediately plummeted after mixing it up with Stuart Rutter, where Ferguson admitted he misplayed his hand, but he was able to quintuple up a few hands later with only a pair of eights against Max Pescatori and Owais Ahmed, among others. That 10K in chips quickly disappeared and, slightly after midnight (roughly 90 minutes after entering), Ferguson strode towards the exits, eliminated from the tournament.
Ferguson wasn’t particularly talkative while he was “inside the ropes” at the WSOP, which has been his nature since the “Black Friday” incidences. PokerNews.com’s Marty Derbyshire attempted to draw some comments from what WAS one of the more gregarious individuals in poker, but could only elicit a “I’m just here to play poker” comment from Ferguson. There were no comments about why he was away for so long, no comments as to why he chose the $10K Seven Card Stud event for a return nor any mea culpas for his part in the “Black Friday” scandal.
Derbyshire was able to draw comments from poker professional (and former Full Tilt stablemate) Layne Flack on Ferguson’s return, which seemed to surprise him just as much as everyone else. “People…don’t know the whole story,” Flack stated. “(Chris Ferguson) has done a lot of great things for poker. He’s a standup guy and all the decisions made by Full Tilt Poker don’t fall on him.”
There are plenty in the poker community who would perhaps like to discuss that issue with Flack and Ferguson. The indictments of “Black Friday,” in which eleven men representing the then-three biggest online poker operations in the industry – PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker and CEREUS (UB.com and Absolute Poker) – were indicted for a litany of fraud and gambling charges. When the rooms were allowed to reopen in the United States to be able to pay back players, PokerStars quickly moved to settle all accounts.
The story was different with Full Tilt Poker, however (and the same would apply to the CEREUS Network rooms). The shutdown of players from the United States crippled the operation and, after investigation from several regulatory outlets, it was found that the owners of Full Tilt – players headed by Ferguson, Lederer and others – were taking frequent payments and loans from the business’ coffers. Basically, when it came time to pay the players in the U. S. with the money they thought was safe, the owners – Ferguson, Lederer and others – had left the safe empty. Full Tilt Poker would close its doors six months after the “Black Friday” indictments and its major players would go to court to negotiate settlements with the government; Ferguson’s settlement is reportedly to have cost him in the neighborhood of $40 million, while admitting no wrongdoing.
It was one of the big questions of the 2016 WSOP, but Ferguson wasn’t the player that people thought would make his return. Lederer, fresh off issuing a statement through Daniel Negreanu that he was responsible for the collapse of Full Tilt, was thought to be the player most likely to return to the WSOP felt. While Lederer may still make that foray, Ferguson might have cut the tension first by stepping up himself.