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As we have recently reported, Daniel "mrgr33n13" Colman has called Phil Hellmuth a spineless whore and a cancer to this world. High stakes cash game player Dani "Ansky" Stern and Greg Merson, the 2012 WSOP Main Event champion have both given their opinion regarding the situation.
Dani "Ansky" Stern was on the following opinion:
"Hellmuth might be good for poker. In the Rio he draws huge crowds wherever he is, poker TV producers seem to think he is good for ratings, and every poker player and fan knows who he is. To all the people in this thread who have brought up the value that brings to poker, whether or not this is true is not really relevant to the problem some people have with him.
The main problem with Phil Hellmuth is that he either is, or was, close friends and associates with the main culprits of the UB cheating scandal and cover up. Afterwards, he continued to represent the site, which after Black Friday, stole the rest of our money that they hadn't yet cheated us out of. To be clear, I don't think Phil was complicit in the UB cheating scandal, and I think he may very well have known nothing about it. The point is that he has never sat down and answered hard questions with anyone about his knowledge of the events, or the characters involved. If my memory serves me, it wasn't until the "smoking gun" tapes were leaked that he issued any public statement or apology addressing his association with the company.
That Hellmuth is "good for poker" is questionable enough given that he promoted a site that literally robbed tens, if not hundreds of millions of dollars from the poker community. As far as the other side of Phil, the TV star, the popularity of his character and antics does not remove him from scrutiny regarding his association with the likes of Russ Hamilton, and Greg Pierson, and anyone else involved."
while Greg Merson, the 2012 WSOP Main Event winner wrote the following:
"I got to spend a bit of time with Phil off the table over the past year and have to disagree with some of the comments in this thread. I stayed a couple nights at his house and was able to meet his kids and see him in a much different light then the public eye. He is much more humble then he comes off in interviews or on camera. He also understands that his ego is an issue and has worked on becoming even more humble. Being an ultra competitive person who holds all the records in the longest standing tournament series in the world and having the connections that he has will make that task more difficult for sure. Of course he is a huge personality in poker and part of his antics are just for show in my opinion to stay as relevant as possible to make money in other areas. This makes me see him as an extremely smart business man that seized an opportunity to take center stage when poker was at its peak in popularity. He has continued to crush it even with the lack of sponsorship money in the game today.
I differ from him(just like almost everyone of you) coming from an internet poker back round where I never received any compensation for playing this game other than what I made at the tables. Now that I have been able to explore the business side of poker, I definitely view these guys differently(hellmuth, d-nags, esfandiari) then most people that just hate on them for being famous through poker and getting paid for it. They have put in a lot of time reaching that level of stardom and are certainly at least a small factor in the overall poker explosion. If they had internet kids with hoodies on, playing poker on TV in the mid 2000's who had no "TV personality"(including myself in this category) then would poker have become such a popular game? In my opinion no.
Hellmuth is a transcending person, you either love him or hate him. Guys like that are great for any industry. The most popular athletes and sports teams are always the most transcending.
I just wanted to chime in a little on this and show some respect to someone that has helped our game grow so much.
As for Colmans comments I disagree, but I have so much respect for his game and the way he has handled all this attention by not giving into main stream society. To each his own and I don't blame him for his views. From what I see, he has stayed true to himself throughout his entire run this year and that shows a lot of discipline."