The poker world has been ablaze over the last few days thanks to a post made by well-known Argentinian poker pro Nacho Barbero.
The whirlwind started on Friday January 31 when Barbero posted an image on his Instagram page that showed him playing in ACR Poker’s $8M GTD $2,650 Venom Mystery Bounty tournament with GTO Wizard open in the background, which is strictly against every online poker site’s Terms of Service (TOS).
This is a massive sticking point for many online poker players as the debate over using real time assistance (RTA) has been a significant one. GTO Wizard is a tool that helps players make decisions in real time at the optimal level. The use of it during an online tournament would be taboo, especially for an official ambassador of ACR Poker.
Barbero denied that he was using it as RTA as he does not play online poker and said that he had it open for poker coaching reasons, helping his Venom horses in a Discord call about certain hands after the hands were over.
Initial Reaction
The reaction to Nacho’s Instagram post was swift and widespread. The reactions were uniformly negative as many were aghast that an ACR Poker ambassador would have GTO Wizard pulled up while playing online at the same time. Many demanded answers from ACR on the incident.
ACR’s initial reaction was to quickly defend Barbero and to dismiss the idea that he would ever use GTO Wizard which, according to the online poker site, is evident through his style of play.
This post on X to defend Barbero garnered even more negative reaction than before as many saw it as a far too casual dismissal of a potentially huge issue. It looked as though ACR wanted the idea of Barbero using RTA to be laughed away but they also seemingly anticipated the negative reaction by turning the comments off.
That did not stop people from hammering ACR in the quote tweets, demanding an investigation or a more thorough evaluation of the situation. The memes were aplenty regarding the flippant ACR response.
Investigation
After seeing the backlash, ACR walked back their initial reaction. They made a more serious statement the following day that said they would investigate the matter.
On Monday they released the following statement on the situation and the investigation.
ACR stated that they found no evidence that Barbero used RTA for his own decision making or for others while he was coaching them. They also stated that they were confident that any other independent party doing an investigation would reach the same conclusion eventually.
As is often the case on social media, reaction to this remained negative as many refused to accept the results and believe that ACR doing an investigation of themselves was not exactly the most fair way to investigate.
Barbero also released a statement and an apology.
The big thing to mention in this statement is that Barbero forfeited the remaining stacks he still had in play in the $2,650 Venom, as he felt it was not appropriate to continue playing considering the circumstances.
The fallout from this incident is likely far from over as there will still be questions regarding Barbero and how ACR monitors their ambassadors.
There have been numerous questions about RTA in live poker including the WSOP adjusting their rules in response to their own recent scandal. This ties into the larger macro conversation about RTA in online poker in general and how it is negatively impacting the game.