Daniel Negreanu has never been the type to keep his opinions to himself, especially when it comes to poker. The man they call Kid Poker is unabashed on speaking his mind, and when PokerNews released the ‘Howard Lederer Files’, a series of explosive video interviews featuring the controversial poker player and his role and involvement as one of Full Tilt Poker’s part owners, Negreanu wasted little time reacting to Hederer’s claims.
When asked by PokerListings on whether he believed Lederer was telling the truth in the interview, Negreanu wasn’t buying it the least bit, even referring to a post on reddit – ‘It’s 30% Truth, 30% Plausible Deniability, 30% Lies, and 10% Total BS’ – from a Full Tilt insider who also took offense to Lederer’s claims in the sit-down interview.
“That sounds about right to me, I heard several comments that I knew to be absolutely blatant lies in the attempt to make him look like the lone savior while throwing everyone else under the bus.”
Not one to mince his words, Negreanu also pointed out that the real crime regarding the entire Full Tilt Poker debacle occurred after the unfolding of Black Friday. “The crime I see as inexcusable is what happened post BF,” Negreanu tells Pokerlistings. “The company had no money, yet press releases were sent out claiming player funds were safe and secure.”
“Post BF they were, for lack of a better word, running something similar to a ponzi scheme,” Negreanu adds. “It’s fraud. It’s a crime, and this was their plan.”
With the entire industry still buzzing about the details, or supposed “truths”, Lederer revealed during his interview with PokerNews, Negreanu also took the time in his own exchange with PokerListings to defend some of the players Lederer supposedly threw under the bus in the Lederer Files, particularly John Juanda and Phil Ivey.
“First of all, I can’t wait until more people speak out so the whole truth comes out,” Negreanu said. “Juanda took great offense to Howard’s comments about him, and Juanda is 100% in the right.”
“I’ve spoken to Ivey, and I’m confident he will speak out as he is not in the least bit happy about the lies being told. When you hear Ivey’s side of the story, I’m extremely confident people will fully understand that Ivey wasn’t in the wrong at all.”
“He wanted no part of any criminal activity that Ray, Howard, and Chris were planning.”
