Written by Thomas | Friday, December 31st, 2010

In a shocking announcement made earlier this week, it looks as if poker legends Phil Hellmuth and Annie Duke have simultaneously left UB, one of the biggest online poker sites in the world! Both Hellmuth and Duke have been synonymous with turning UB into one of online poker’s elite superpowers, especially after the company had to weather the storm of several well-known cheating scandals in which evidence pointed to the original owners and former employees being apart of the incident.

It was rumored that Hellmuth was going to be parting ways with UB long before the official announcement was made, especially when he was seen at a few major poker tournaments without his usual UB patches on. Rumors ran wild on poker forums and other informational sites that the beginning of the end was near as far as Hellmuth and UB were concerned, so when it was finally confirmed that he was no longer going to be with the company came at no big surprise to the poker community.

It is not known though whether Duke had planned on leaving the company as well in the weeks leading up to this news, but it seemed like she may have been wanting to move on to other things in her life after a recent Twitter post announced she was engaged to Joe Reitman, an American actor who was formerly married to actress-turned-poker player Shannon Elizabeth. The move to get remarried for both players may have hinted at other future plans that didn’t exactly involve UB at the moment.  Speculation has already run wild that Annie may join her brother Howard Lederer over at Full Tilt Poker – nepotism much?

In an interview that was conducted by PokerNews.com, Team UB player Joe Sebok (also the son of famed poker pro Barry Greenstein) said the split was 100% amicable and that a new announcement regarding who will be filling Duke’s and Hellmuth’s slots will be made within the next week. This could just be filler talk though at the moment, especially since it was obvious that UB was shifting its team of pros to much younger tournament pros like Eric Baldwin and Maria Ho – a move that was also reminiscent of what Team Bodog did when they let go of David Arieh and David Williams (who are both in their 30’s and haven’t won a ton of notable tournaments in the last 18 months).

Sebok did have one quote from his PokerNews interview that should leave all of us in suspense for the next few days in regards to who Team UB will be signing to replace Hellmuth and Duke:

“I will tell you that the newest member is going to be a big surprise and is really going to shake our team up. People won’t see this one coming.This signing is a big statement saying, “UB is here. We aren’t going anywhere, and also we are going to be shaping the online poker experience for a long time to come.”

Who could it be?!?!?

One Response to “Annie Duke and Phil Hellmuth OUT at Ultimate Bet (UB)”

1. Prahlad Friedman Signs With UB - Forgets to "Practice Avoidance" Says:

   […] poker legends Phil Hellmuth and Annie Duke leaving UB recently, Friedman steps into some rather large shoes. But he is bringing with him a reputation of being one […]

   
   January 8th, 2011 at 7:05 pm