Is LlinusLlove a cheater?

A fellow high-stakes pro, Fiilismies, accused the online legend of using prohibited tools.

Linus 'LlinusLlove' Löliger has been on the top of the online NLH foot chain for several years now, earning the respect of his peers and fans alike. While almost everyone thinks his hands down the most talented cash game player in the world, another high-stakes NLH specialist now accused him of being a cheater.

Finnish, Pauli Äyräs, better known as 'Fiilismies' online, is a long-time high-stakes regular, playing the biggest cash games online. He recently made a post on an online forum, claiming the rise of the Swiss prodigy is more than suspicious. While he admittedly couldn't provide any evidence, he made some serious allegations, stating Linus uses real-time solvers to make his decisions.

His original forum post reads: "LLinusLLove is a cheater. This is my opinion and i have no definite proof. Although me and fellow high stakes pros think the same and most of us have reported him. I believe the only guy i accused for cheating is OBORRA and only after the 2+2 posts i made about him did he get banned.

Some years ago this new guy popped to high stakes nlhe games. His nickname was LLinusLLove. This guy used to play very loose agressive and while playing decently good he would be making tons of clear mistakes and spews. Overnight he started to tank every decision from preflop to river, even on spots where there was very clear decision. Very soon he was considered to be best player in the world - by far. Soon no one would play him. He was doing bunch of weird stuff that seemed not normal but every time i would put them into solver it appeared they were 100% perfectly played. Out of tens of thousands of hand i played with him i could not spot a slightest mistake. This is the same thing that alarmed me with OBORRA. In every sport the best of the best still make bunch of mistakes all the time. These guys just would not do a single mistake - ever.

After while of not playing and coming back to tables i have seen that he has stopped tanking and all of the sudden he is only your average reg at the table. Also on statname it appears his red line is not going up anymore and his win rate has gone down. Regs can spot playstyle changes easily and apparently many people have also noticed changes after and before his tanking.

Also one thing worth pointing out is that even when playing nl 20k ring games he would never play a single hand of heads up. I used to chase him out of partypoker 6-max lobbies because table starters there would have to play heads up and he wouldn't play a hand of that format. Overnight he started to play hu and instantly was best in the world at that format. Also some pros have messaged me about him crushing highest stakes plo overnight, but about this i am out of the loop.

I would hope that stars would review his play style and decision making time and compare it to what it was before and after tanking every decision.

I'm not sure how ethic it is to accuse somebody without definite proof, but having lost 100's of thousands to banned cheaters in poker is slowly driving me nuts. Also i'd like to make it clear that only time i accused someone of cheating was when i reported OBORRA in some of the previous high stakes threads. And people would tell me "he just studies harder than you guys"."

As Fiilismies is also a well-known and well-accomplished players, his post got the poker world talking. It didn't take time, until Linus himself showed up to react on the allegations.


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(click to enlarge)

Naturally, Löliger wasn't happy with this public attack, and denied all of the statements from Pauli, while also pointed out the emptiness of his claims.

The famous Youtube-channel Finding Equilibrium took on the subject and analyzed four hands, which Fiiliesmies used to prove his points. After walking the viewers through the theory behind Linus' decisions, they came to a conclusion. We don't want to spoil it for you, you can watch the full video below:

Do you think Linus really uses prohibited tools or is he simply this good? Let us know what you think in the comments!