A little more than a week ago, Brian Stinger885 Hastings(pictured) became the first player to win multiple braceletsduring this year’s World Series of Poker (WSOP) after first winning the $10,000 Seven Card Stud Championship and subsequently winning the $1,500 Ten-Game Mix. Since then, Hastings has found himself immersed in a multi-accounting controversy after David Bakes Baker shared with his followers on Twitter.

“So after I FT’d the SCOOP 2k a bunch of well known pros messaged me telling me @brianchastings was behind the NoelHayes account on Stars”

Baker (pictured) followed this up with two more Tweets about Hastings multi-accounting:

“He was trying to ‘do the right thing’ and tell people about it including a PokerStars team member but I didn’t get that benefit”

“So to see this ‘angleshot’ get publicity when I was playing SCOOP-H and 100/200 8game hands vs a new acct that knew me, well”

Multi-accounting is serious on any level, but may even more so taking advantage of the nosebleed where the competition is fierce. A player should have a significant advantage if they are playing anonymously, yet know the playing styles of their opponents before sitting at the table.

A thread was created on TwoPlusTwoabout the allegations mentioned by Baker over social media, with many members expressing their concern and outrage. It was also alleged that Hastings played under a different account name on PokerStars to help him play from the US, violating another major rule at PokerStars.

It took over 250 posts before Hastings popped in. Initially, he neither admitted nor denied the allegations. Hastings instead tried to ask people not to talk about it:

“What I do care about is something like this being a major story in the poker world at a time in which the WSOP is in full force and we should be trying to promote and grow the game of poker, rather than drag it through the mud,” Hastings posted. “Think what you want about me, but one thing I have in common with most people reading this is that we love the game of poker and want to be able to play it freely in the comfort of our own homes.”

While he did not publicly admit any wrong-doing, Hastings did send Baker a private message admitting to the allegations, which Baker subsequently posted about on TwoPlusTwo:

“My intent was never to gain an edge from deception, just to be able to live and play in the USA, where I have a wonderful network of friends and family that I didn’t have when I tried to move to Canada.”

Some players are also upset about WSOP prop bets they made against Hastings, thinking he was rusty after not playing for a spell.

This isn’t the first time Hastings has found himself in hot water with the poker community. Back in 2009, Hastings was stripped of his Full Tilt Poker Red Pro status after being accused of utilizing a shared hand history databaseagainst Viktor “Isildur1” Blom after beating him for over $4 million.

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