Norman Chad calls out Isai Scheinberg
One of this year's nominees for the Poker Hall of Fame has called out another just a week before this year's inductee is revealed.
The fact that Isai Scheinberg has been left out of the Poker Hall of Fame for a decade has been a contentious issue for poker players. Now that he has finally at least been nominated it doesn't look like the arguments will stop.
Veteran WSOP commentator Norman Chad, who is also nominated this year, took aim at Scheinberg's nomination this year. Chad normally has a vote in the Hall of Fame but it is restricted to previous winners this year.
He pointed to the fact that Scheinberg knowingly operated in the US illegally, something he eventually pleaded guilty to this year.
PokerStars had an undeniable impact on the growth of online poker, as did PartyPoker. When U.S. law changed in 2008, many operators stopped serving the U.S. market (most significantly, PartyPoker). Scheinberg chose to continue and benefited from the good actors stepping aside.
— Norman Chad (@NormanChad) December 21, 2020
Essentially, PokerStars attempted to violate federal bank fraud and money laundering laws for years in order to operate in the U.S. The government ended up dismissing with prejudice all civil complaints, with PokerStars admitting no wrongdoing for its past U.S.activities.
— Norman Chad (@NormanChad) December 21, 2020
We would not give a poker cheater the game’s highest honor; we shouldn’t reward a businessman who cheated the system with the game’s highest honor.
— Norman Chad (@NormanChad) December 21, 2020
Speak to most online poker players and they think Scheinberg should be a slam dunk for the award. By founding PokerStars he not only grew the online game but the live one too, especially the World Series of Poker in the early boom-years which received a massive influx of online qualifiers. But, as Chad points out, he did so by breaking US laws when other operators stepped aside.
Chad is no stranger to controversy and speaking his mind, he has a famous feud with Daniel Negreanu and has never held back when the WSOP does something he disagrees with. He spoke to Dara O'Kearney and David Lappin this week on The Chip Race about this very subject of speaking truth to power:
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🇺🇸 Columnist & WSOP Commentator @NormanChad
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— 🎙 THE CHIP RACE 🎙 Sponsored By Unibet Poker (@thechiprace) December 18, 2020
Does Norman Chad have a point? Let us know in the comments:
