by Kate
27. August 2010 08:20
We already had a post about the Negreanu/Duke insult throwing silliness earlier on this week. And now, for the sake of having a frivolous Friday we’re going to propagate the gossip and the rumours.
Here goes:
Negreanu recently referred to Duke as a “f***ing c***” in an interview but it seems this is only part of a stream of verbal abuse that has been going on between the two poker pro's since before fame was even a twinkle in their respective eyes. It seems it all started over a decade ago when they first joined the professional poker circuit in the early 90’s. Duke got there first and apparently when they were first pitted against each other Duke was extremely critical of Negreanu and his style of play.
Fast-forward to the beginning of the ‘naughties’ when the feud became public on the rec.gambling.poker forum where a particular exchange between the two took place after they had played against each other online. Negreanu insulted Duke via chatbox and Duke responded by reporting to the support of the online poker site and Negreanu then sent a hostile email to Duke. At this point Duke’s brother, Howard Lederer, decided to get involved by posting Negreanu’s email on rec.gambling.poker where it remains in the archives to this very day.
After this the criticism continued on occasional blog posts but nothing too salacious, UNTIL the clash picked up again this summer- see our recent Negreanu takes another dig at Duke! post.
Howard Lederer is now back on the scene, saying the following on Twitter soon after Negreanu’s insult about Duke: “Hey Daniel, nice job representing poker and reinforcing that our attitude towards women is still Neanderthal,”
Negreanu is ranked number one and Duke is ranked fifth meaning that Negreanu is the top male player in the world while Duke is the top female player in the world and perhaps this is where the tension is coming from. With both of them at the top of their game who is ultimately the better player? Claws Out!