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With the tide changing on the Internet poker sponsorship front, the folks at AintLuck.com ask the question: Is Greg “Fossilman” Raymer now extinct from PokerStars?
The world’s largest online poker room is seeing turbulent times on the payout and deposit front with a US federal investigation out of Maryland nailing one of its key processors.
Now PokerStars may be losing one of its more familiar spokespersons.
Raymer is a popular figure in the world of poker and often acts as a spokesperson for the game. He won the 2004 World Series of Poker main event.
Why the talk of a Greg Raymer departure?
From Aintluck.com:
Since launching himself onto the national stage over six years ago, Raymer has done a great deal of work to improve the state of the game of poker as a whole. He is a very active and vocal member of the Poker Players Alliance and he has enjoyed a consistent level of success at the tables which has distanced himself from other potential flash in the pan Main Event winners (Jamie Gold anyone?) The rumor mill got started yesterday afternoon when fellow pro Kathy Liebert sent out a speculative Tweet that said : “I heard that PokerStars was cutting many of their Team Pros’ compensation. Take it or leave it. Greg Raymer left it. I think it’s a bad business decision to cut their pay, but most won’t have a better offer, so they stay.”
The Tweet started a firestorm of speculation on top online poker forum twoplustwo.com with fans far and wide weighing in on the developing story. Attentive posters noted that Raymer’s photo no longer appears on the website, a telltale sign of a fractured relationship. At present time, neither PokerStars, nor Raymer has commented on the rumors.
So far this year, we have witnessed major shakeups in the online poker world, not withstanding the payment processing issues being faced by PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker.
Before the stroke of Midnight New Year’s Eve, both Annie Duke and Phil Hellmuth, long term spokespersons for the UB.com website, announced they were moving on to pursue other projects. Duke was named Commissioner of a newly organized professional poker league while Hellmuth’s future is still up in the air.
LockPoker.com appointed Eric Rizen Lynch to take its growing poker site to the next level while DoylesRoom.com announced Friday they were changing networks effective immediately.
- Ace King, Gambling911.com
