Full Tilt Poker Bans its Sponsored Pros from Participating in Non-Full Tilt Sponsored Event

[TomasJ]

Everyday we hear more stories about how competition between the major Online Poker Sites seems to be increasing constantly. More recently some aspect have started to appear to be quite negative and the one that has been making the tabloids recently is that, according to industry sources, Full Tilt Poker told their sponsored pros not to participate in some tournaments sponsored by rival sites.

There is no clear information about the territory that this "ban" will cover. The main idea behind it is that Full Tilt does not think it is a good idea for the site to have their players adding prestige to their rival's tournaments. It was also reported that Howard Lederer decided to step down the operational front of Full Tilt leaving Ray Bitar and co. to make decisions now.

ESPN poker blogger Gary Wise looks at the news and its' consequences to FTP and the game as a whole: "For the last eight years, 'good for poker' has been a unifying rally cry. The game and the online industry built upon it, fought for growth and acceptance... Are we seeing the increasingly corporate mentality of the industry bring an end to that chapter?" wrote Gary Wise, ESPN poker blogger.

Personally, I disagree with Full Tilt's move because it seems that they are placing a higher value on the money they make than on poker itself, which is reasonable for an online poker site but I do not agree with it.

[Fonzi]

This must be in response to Pokerstars telling their pros they can't play in Full Tilt's Poker After Dark. I'm not surprised and expect we'll see a lot more of these cat and mouse games.