Moving Forward After Black Friday -- Bryan Devonshire

In this new series on Card Player, we present to you a top poker pro who has had his or her world turned upside down by the events on Black Friday. In this edition we bring you Bryan Devonshire.

The 30-year-old pro has racked up over $1.5 million in career earnings and an accomplished list of cashes that include two runner-up finishes at the World Series of Poker, a WSOP Circuit title and a second-place finish on the World Poker Tour.

Devonshire is mad. In fact, he’s down right furious. But he’s not mad at his former employer, UB, who was forced to lay him off as a site representative. Nor is he mad about the fact that he currently has over $30,000 in limbo in untouchable, frozen accounts. He’s mad about Black Friday and the government that failed him.

“The number of people affected by Black Friday is staggering and goes way beyond the tens of thousands of online players who called poker their profession,” he said. “We live in a country that has the largest incarceration rate in the world, yet we have the nerve to call ourselves free. We spend way too much time and money on legislating morality and convicting people of victimless crimes.”

Devonshire’s frustration doesn’t just stem from the actions taken by the Department of Justice on April 15, a day that is now widely known as Black Friday within the poker community. It stems from the original implementation of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA), which was passed as a “midnight drop” on the last day before Congress adjourned in 2006 and attached to the SAFE Port Act.

“The conservative, moral right snuck it in at the last minute in very subversive and almost questionably unconstitutional way,” he added. “For the DOJ to continue pursuing it and then decide to enforce it nearly five years later just makes it all the more infuriating. This is the same office that could have instead chosen to pursue litigation against the people that ran this country’s economy into the ground. We’ve been begging them to tax and regulate us as an industry for years, but instead of doing that, they bring about an indictment.”

The former Henderson, Nevada resident recently made the move to Frisco, Colorado thanks to the availability of online poker, but admitted that Black Friday is forcing him to reconsider his options.

“I just recently got engaged and was looking forward to starting a new chapter of my life in Colorado, but now, my whole world is upside down,” he said. “Black Friday forced me into a four-week long unpaid vacation. It’s stressful, scary, and it has shaken me to the core. Nobody knows what is going to happen. It’s really hard to make important life decisions at the moment and without all of the facts or even a glimpse into what the future might hold, a lot of us are flying blind.”

The fallout continued on Monday, when Blanca Gaming, UB and Absolute Poker’s parent company, announced the termination of their U.S. sponsored pros. The layoffs affected 11 players in total, Devonshire among them. Despite his new found unemployment, Devonshire isn’t angry at the site that let him go.

“I mean, if you think about it from any logical sort of perspective, then it’s kind of hard to be upset,” he said. “They were paying me to promote their site, particularly to the U.S. market, where I live and play. If the U.S. market is nonexistent, then in their eyes, I really don’t serve a purpose anymore. Why would they continue to pay me? As far as UB is concerned, I have no ill will whatsoever. None of us saw this coming, not me, not UB. This was an action taken by the U.S. government and that is where my ill will lies.”

When asked about his frozen online funds, over $30,000, Devonshire expressed confidence that he’d eventually get it all back. “I think that myself and the rest of the U.S. players on UB will be getting our money back at some point. Obviously, there are some concerns because U.S. players did make up a sizable portion of the UB player pool, but I would assume that the site will continue to operate for other parts of the world. The company is restructuring and doing what it can to stay in business. Honestly, I’m just guessing here based on what I’ve been told, but I have no reason to believe that my money or any other player’s money is in danger.”

Devonshire had originally planned on a quiet May spent in Colorado, fly fishing with his fiancé and playing online to gear up for June’s World Series of Poker, but was forced to make the drive to Las Vegas prematurely to find some action.

“It’s depressing to have to commute for hours, get there, wait on a list and then play 1/15 of the hands I would normally play online, but it’s what I have to do,” he said. “Poker is still my job and has been since August of 2003. That won’t change anytime soon.”

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