Poker pros Tom Marchese and Randy Dorfman have ended their relationships with Ultimate Poker and are no longer members of the online poker room’s “Team U.”
Dorfman had signed on with Nevada’s first legal, regulated intrastate poker site in June of this year, along with Gavin Griffin, Lauren Kling, Dan O’Brien, and 2012 World Series of Poker November Niner Phil Collins. Despite a relatively short live tournament resume for someone respected enough to be sponsored by an online poker site, Dorfman has racked up more than $1.4 million in live tournament earnings. The vast majority of that came from two huge cashes: $601,546 for a second place finish in the 2009 European Poker Tour €25,000 European High Roller Championship and $321,432 for a fifth place finish in the 2011 Aussie Million Main Event.
His departure from Ultimate Poker appears to be “irreconcilable differences,” in a manner of speaking. On his Facebook page, Dorfman wrote (credit to PokerFuse for the quote), “I have resigned from Ultimate Poker as their Team Pro. At this point in my life there are more important and creative things for me to be involved with. To have your ideas and experiences from the game I love fall on deaf ears while you bust your ass to build a game for a new Company just was extremely frustrating to me.”
He added, “I wish UP [Ultimate Poker] the best and I hope things do turn around for them. I met some great people there and hopefully the chemistry between all involved gets straighten [sic] out soon.”
It is not known exactly what issues Dorfman had with Ultimate Poker, but he did hint at some dissatisfaction earlier this month when he made his first (and only) post on his blog, saying, “…UP has not performed up to players expectations with their software in this early phase of release. In fact, it has been a disaster for all involved with UP as they expect the very best.”
Tom Marchese had only been a member of Team U for less than two months, signing in early September. He did not post anything about the situation, but Dorfman posted on Twitter that Marchese “left 4 many same reasons I di [sic] #deafears #stillcrashing.”
Marchese has won more than $4.6 million live tournaments, total which includes a $1.3 million score from winning the $100,000 Super High Roller Event at the 2012 WPT World Championship. He has two other final table finishes on the World Poker Tour and one final table at the World Series of Poker.
Their departures leave Ultimate Poker with a stable of Collins, Jason Somerville, Jeremy Ausmus, William Reynolds, Brent Hanks, O’Brien, Jeff Gross, Kling, and the original member of Team U, Antonio Esfandiari.
