The saying “money can’t buy class” has appeared yet again at the poker tables, with 2015 WSOP Main Event champ Joe McKeehen coming in for criticism after throwing his bag at a dealer.
McKeehen, who picked up $7,683,346 when he defeated Josh Beckley heads-up for poker’s biggest title back in 2015, was criticised for his behaviour on the 2plus2 forum.
“I’m no pro and I play poker for fun and I like the challenge of learning the game at a deep level, wrote JamesBond007$$$. “This experience with the pro came from a recent tournament played at Parx Big Staxx…”
“Sat down at the table for day two. This pro (former WSOP main champion) came and sat down … ripped open his bag … dumped his chips then proceeded to throw the bag at the dealer and throw his registration paperwork at her with his card.”
Shocked by the behaviour, the OP assumed the dealer and player, later revealed as McKeehen, must have been joking around. No such luck… “I have no clue who he is,” was the dealer’s reply.
“I couldn’t believe how badly he mistreated her. To my amazement he doubled down when she didn’t throw his bag out and said: “You can throw it out for me, I’m not doing it”.
“I was so angry, I wanted to strangle him… it just amazes me that this person who plays for a living, treated the dealer so bad.”
The post ends with an anecdote for the ages: “Funny side note .. he won $7.5 million and his wallet had holes and crumbs falling out of it, when he took his license out … I guess money can’t buy class or a wallet.”
From the comments that followed it seems that McKeehen certainly knows how to annoy people.
Another poster shared: “Last week Parx deep stack 1500 day 1B, Joe late reg. comes to my table and tosses his seat card to the dealer. Dealer asks for his ID and receipt and Joe clearly irritated gets into a fairly comical argument with the dealer and calls the floor over. Eventually he shows his ID and receipt and we play on.”
VincentVega wrote: “[McKeehen] appears to be a cheat at worst and a thoughtless person at best. Too bad the dealer didn’t have some choice words for him.”
While cheat may be too strong a word, the poster is likely referring to last year’s WSOP Main Event final table controversy which saw McKeehen and Dominik Nitsche helping eventual winner Jonathan Tamayo. The incident later became known as #2 on our Top 5 Poker Cheating Scandals of 2024 list.
Nitsche, McKeehen and Tamayo at the final table rail (courtesy of WSOP)Over the years, McKeehen has been probably the least forthcoming of all the Main Event champions, and earned himself a thread of his own on 2+2 entitled: “Is Joe McKeehen the worst main event winner in the past 15 years?”
From blaming the media for changing the start time of WSOP events to setting his Twitter to a private echo-chamber, few pros have less endeared themselves to the poker public.
Although arguably one of the best players to win the ME in recent years, the thought of having the 2015 champ as a coach clearly wasn’t to everyone’s taste, as evidenced by the replies below…
Welcome new #CLCcoach Joe McKeehen! He has EIGHTEEN 🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆TITLES including this one (⬇️) and can teach you about closing on https://t.co/vJGIYFBKoW pic.twitter.com/RyuvTbHvhV
— Chip Leader Coaching (@clcpoker) November 9, 2017
Naturally, on occasion the abuse dealers receive from players, famous or not, gets too much and the dealer snaps … but the warning seems to have passed McKeehen by…
Let us know on our socials what you think of McKeehen and those who mistreat dealers and fellow players.
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