Dan ‘Jungleman’ Cates this week accused Tom Dwan of behaving “wildly unethically”. He asked where the“line between justice in vengeance is, and how far I should go…” as the decade long fallout from the Durrrr challenge reared its head again.
Daniel Cates vs Tom Dwan – A Neverending Story?
We’ll get to the ‘how far should I go’ threat shortly, but Cates commenced his slapdown of Dwan after Joey Ingram had joked about Phil Galfond and his current challenge match against VeniVidi1993…
It seems impossible because @PhilGalfond knows what honor entails @TomDwan
— Daniel Cates 🇺🇸 🌎 (@junglemandan) February 9, 2020
As most will know, Cates has spent the last few years trying to convince Dwan to finish off their heads-up match, or at least pay compensation.
When Black Friday ended their ‘Durrrr Challenge’battle prematurely, Jungleman was up by roughly $1.2million after 19,335 hands of the 50,000 they had planned to play.
Since then, Jungleman has regularly called out Dwan on his unwillingness to either complete their match or pay up, including last year’s tweet…
Well seeing something about @TomDwan bragging about how he 'cleverly' and 'fairly' tricked me is a bit annoying considering how he begged me to play props back then and our current misunderstandings involving me being owed over a million dollars.
— Daniel Cates 🇺🇸 🌎 (@junglemandan) April 28, 2019
The Pending $1.5 Million Sidebet
Payments and penalties have appeared in dribs and drabs, about $700,000 paid by Dwan, but that leaves an awful lot of money still owed. A huge $1.5 million sidebet between the pair is still on the tab.
Yesterday, in a now-deleted tweet, it seems that Cates has finally reached the end of his tether with Dwan…
“I have no problem calling @TomDwan out for behaving wildly unethically. Not just with me but with others he owes money to including his friends who have no real power. The real dilemma I have in my mind is where the line between justice in vengeance is, and how far I should go…”
That is the harshest attack yet on Dwan. The ‘justice and vengeance’ shot is perhaps the reason he eventually deleted the tweet – a too-thinly-veiled threat one presumes.
Famous Sports Bettor Haralabos Voulgaris is also waiting for his money
Who the ‘others’ Cates claims Dwan owes is unclear, but a couple of years back Doug Polk suggested that legendary sports bettor Haralabos Voulgaris may also be waiting for ‘a seven-figure sum’.
In 2017, Voulgaris had tweeted: ‘Hey @TomDwan been trying to get a hold of you (I’m sure you can guess why) can you msg me with your correct contact info?’
High stakes amateur Voulgaris certainly doesn’t come under the title ‘his friends who have no real power’. So there may well be others that Dwan owes who are not in a position to collect or put pressure on him.
Dwan has never responded publicly to the regular callouts from Jungle. such as with this one when Dwan was named Triton Poker ambassador in 2018.
@TomDwan Hey, haven't heard from you in a while. Don't you think it's time to give everyone an update on the durrr challenge, started in 2010?
— Daniel Cates 🇺🇸 🌎 (@junglemandan) December 30, 2018
…and although the duo shared a table that year in the Triton Poker Montenegro stop, it seems on this week’s evidence that any promises Dwan may have made are proving rather hollow.
The big question remains: How far should Jungleman go to collect his debt?
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