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Big name poker pros have become increasingly disgruntled with the world’s largest real money online poker room, PokerStars. Most notably (and publicly), Bryn Kenney went off on his Facebook page, expressing his own displeasure with the site.
Kenney writes:
So of course nobody is happy with anything pokerstars is doing. Not only do they cut all costs now and give nothing to the players but they dont even honor their agreeements. They have said that in the 10k+ tournaments it will pay only 15% of the field and in a small 10k today they show a payout sheet that pays on average 20% of the field. I think they think everyone is stupid but what they dont understand with their high rake and terrible service soon they wont have an event at all outside of barcelona. Sad days for poker tournaments, good thing other tours are adding some nice tournaments because they all see how bad pokerstars is fucking up. This is such a small part of what their doing bad, changing payouts, booking out hotels beforehand and charging more for the rooms, cutting support, cutting security. All of the things that people loved about pokerstars has disappeared even their reliability for keeping huge amounts on stars as they have had some bad cashout stories like fulltilt has had. If u guys wanna fix everything and save ur business give me a call but i understand u would rather watch it burn than listen. Their lucky they have the best staff but well see how long that lasts for when their squeezing every cent. If u agree with me here play florida instead of macau show them they cant do whatever they want and have people still showing up, I wont be going for sure.
Some pros have responded by suggesting players avoid PokerStars sponsored live tournaments.
From HighStakesDB.com:
Chris "Big Huni" Hunichen, who final tabled four events at PSC Panama, including 4th in the $10.3k High Roller, was actually the first big name to weigh-in, name checking PokerStars most recently named pro, Igor Kurganov, replying to Kenney:
"Igor is a pro now... It's time he stands up for everyone and makes it known that they need to make changes to help the players!!!" to which Kenney replied, "People who work for them have tried they dont listen."
Poker pro Paul Newey also weighed in:
"I am certainly planning on less Pokerstars trips and more on other tours. Panama has been absolutely awful in every way except the local staff have been friendly and tried their best. Poor turnouts, terrible hotel, 5.5% tax at cage, uncapped rake on cash games, worst lifts in the world, crap wifi, crap food, most hotel staff can't speak a word of English, power cuts & I had to pay almost $500 a night just to get a room with a bath tub!"
Sites the likes of Americas Cardroom have slowly begun filling in the void left by PokerStars apparent discouragement of professional players.
- Ace King, Gambling911.com
