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BGonline.org Forums
Punta Cana story
Posted By: Robert Wachtel
Date: Wednesday, 9 November 2011, at 8:01 p.m.
As a participant in the mutated event that grew out of the advertised Punta Cana "high-roller" backgammon tournament, I'd like to offer a basic description of what went down here. For information about the resort and the results, take a look at Paul Weaver's posts of the last few days.
Betchris, a successful and established Costa Rican poker site, ran a poker tournament at the Hard Rock Hotel last year. That tournament, to some degree or other, was the brainchild of Ivonne Montaleagre, a convivial Costa Rican woman who used to work for the ill-fated backgammon site, Truemoneygames. Truemoneygames sponsored Chiva' Portugese Open in 2009, and Ivonne was there as its representative. She and Chiva had kept in touch since.
Chiva says that Ivonne contacted him early this year about the possibility of him directing a backgammon tournament in conjunction with the poker tournament which Betchris was again sponsoring in the Dominican. The bg tournament would have a $5000 entry fee and a $100,000 guarantee to match the poker tournament's $500,000 guarantee. Those guarantees, Chiva says, came not from him or the hotel, but from Betchris. But, says Chiva, his only contact with Betchris was through Ivonne. They had long discussions, he says, on Skype, in which Ivonne assured him that everything was in order.
According to one Betchris representative who was in Punta Cana, he was present in the Betchris offices in Costa Rica when Ivonne made the proposal to the Betchris boss, a fellow named Ron. Ron did not like the idea and said he would only allow Ivonne to run the backgammon tournament if it was certain that it would not cost the poker site a penny. He did not approve of the 100K guarantee.
I arrived at the Hard Rock on the afternoon of the 7th, a few hours before the tournament was due to start. It turned out that we had rolled a few anti-jokers. There were a number of no-shows, including Ron, the Betchris big cheese himself, who had been detained by immigration authorities in the Dominican and sent back to Costa Rica. Ron was to have been one of the tournament participants. As to the details of who the others were who didn't show and why, ask Chiva for that information. He mentioned it, but I don't quite remember. Apparently it amounted to 5 or 6 players. The tournament was scheduled to begin, and there were only 15 players paid. Because Chiva was collecting a $500 registration fee from each of us, leaving only $450 in the pot per player, the $100,000 figure would only be attained if another 8 players (making a total of 23) signed up.
That was not happening, and apparently it was at this point that the Betchris reps announced that Ivonne had acted without authority in offering the guarantee. Chiva was in heated discussion with them, but they insisted that they had never approved the guarantee and would not honor it.
We players waited, and after a few hours more of negotiation, Chiva gathered us together and announced that we had three alternatives, apparently based upon some concessions that Betchris had made. All involved no 100K guarantee. They were:
(1) Start on time (that evening) and allow rebuys the next day with some possibility of the delayed players showing up and/or poker players buying in at a discount.
(2) Start the next day, with Betchris adding four horses of their own (a few of whom, we guessed, would be something less than world class). This would add 20K of semi-dead money to the pot.
(3) Start the next day with no extra horses, but Betchris would comp up to five nights stay at the hotel, a value of from $600 to $1000 per player, adding about 15-20K to the pot.
Ivonne was present. She apologized, but said things were out of her control.
The players' mood was dark, and our discussion chaotic. But after an hour or so we agreed to reject all three proposals, and to convene at breakfast the next day to discuss strategy. Paul Magriel said he knew the casino owner, who might be willing to intervene on our behalf.
We met the next morning, but the Magriel alternative did not materialize. As we congregated in the tournament room, we learned that Betchris had sweetened the pot. They now offered us alternative 2, with one more player and a $200 cash payment to each player. So we would reach a field of 20, and have an extra 4K in the pot.
This was their final offer, and 11 of us 15 decided to take it. Mochy, Matt, Dave Wells and Toby declined. The final field was comprised of 16 players, 5 of whom were Betchris horses. One of those horses was Chiva himself. Chiva knocked off Magriel in the first round but did not get any further.
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