Home / Poker News October 2012 / Howard Lederer Returns to Action
Howard Lederer Returns to Action
Posted by: Randy Williams - Sat, 2012-10-13 12:26
Many have speculated on the motivations behind Howard Lederer’s “Lederer Files” move, but at least one of those motivations was crystal clear from the beginning: to whitewash his image a little, in preparation for an eventual comeback. We’re not even speculating on that: he did actually tell Matthew Parvis during his “Lederer Files” interview that he did in fact intend to return to the green felt.
Lederer has been absent from the games for 16 months, and that is quite a bit of punishment in itself for a poker pro, a player who makes his living at the green felt. Lederer has been playing professionally for 30 years, and that’s pretty much what he’s best at, for better or for worse, so it was never really a question of “if” but rather one of “when”, for him to return to poker.
Several recent reports have emerged regarding Lederer’s appearances at the Aria and Bellagio, and one of the insiders has even tweeted a picture of Lederer playing in Bobby’s room with Eli Elezra, Huck Seed, Doyle Brunson and Nick Schulman. The action was hot even as the players watched the vice presidential debate while playing.
Obviously, the poker and
online poker community wasn’t particularly pleased to see “The Professor” back at the tables, especially since he still owes around $40 million to Full Tilt, money which had undoubtedly originated from player deposits. Full Tilt Poker customers in the US (or elsewhere in the world for that matter) have not yet been reimbursed, while Lederer plays in the biggest games, sitting on a fortune which he had amassed through traceable illegal activities.
The bottom line: even if the Full Tilt scandal sets one day and everyone recovers their monies, Lederer is not likely to regain any credit with online poker players anywhere.
