In a stunning sudden announcement from the online poker world, one of CardRunners‘ top teaching professionals and a part owner of the poker training site has decided to leave the company. The site itself is currently undergoing maintenance, with a new version announced for April 30th.
In an announcement on his blog yesterday, Cole “CTS” South revealed that, due to pressures in his life, he would no longer be teaching at the popular training site and would also divest himself of his ownership. “This decision has more to do with myself than CardRunners”, South explained in his post. “In the past year I have, at the same time, been a full time student, a professional poker player, and an owner/instructor of a poker training site, and I’ve found myself spread too thin. Leaving CardRunners has been an incredibly tough decision for me, but it will allow me to focus on playing poker and completing my degree.” South is a junior majoring in economics at Georgetown University.
South will depart CardRunners at the end of April, which is tomorrow, and CardRunners is apparently taking this opportunity to make a few changes to the online training site. When navigating to the site, users are met with a statement from the company that says, “Effective 11:59 PM EST on Friday, April 30th, we will launch a new and improved version of CardRunners. The website is currently undergoing maintenance.”
Along with this statement is the announcement of a list of new instructors. For those who peruse the names on the list, most notable is that of Matt Matros. Mostly known for his third place finish behind eventual champion Martin de Knijff and runner up Hasan Habib at the 2004 World Poker Tour (WPT) Championship, Matros is also the author of 2005’s “The Making of a Poker Player.” Since that 2004 finish on the tournament circuit, however, Matros has only broken six-figures once in the past six years.
Matros heads the No Limit Hold’em team at CardRunners, Tom “LearnedfromTV” Chambers offers his knowledge of Pot Limit Omaha, and other notable players handle such aspects as Omaha High/Low, Stud, Razz, Sit and Go strategy, and Limit Hold’em.
There have been questions about the timing of South’s announcement. On many forums, there are congratulatory posts, but others are looking a bit deeper into the situation. Poster “doncolo” on Two Plus Two speculated, “They’re (outside people) saying that before **** hits the fan, he’s taking his money and running.” Another poster, “utor,” echoed that sentiment: “Cole just might be leaving cuz he knows that some type of **** is gonna hit some type of fan for CR in the near or distant future. It’s somewhat difficult for me to understand that someone would give up ownership in a very profitable business for the ‘spread too thin’ reason he provided.”
Chambers came onto the thread to silence all the critics of South’s decision. “(The chance that South will create his own poker training site would be) vvv low based on my less than complete knowledge of things… Btw I was recruited for CR before the Isildur thing and they told me this (South’s departure) was a strong possibility… it has nothing to do with that or any other **** to hit the fan.”
South was well respected for his useful training videos and the non-stop assistance he provided on the internet about the game of poker. Once he completes his studies at Georgetown, perhaps Cole South will fully immerse himself in the world of poker once again.