Russ Boyd

Russ “Dutch” Boyd (born 1980) is an American professional poker player from Culver City, California (originally from Columbia, Missouri).

Boyd claims to have an IQ of 150. He began attending college at age 12 after scoring a 23 on the ACT and graduated from law school at age 18. Despite finishing law school, Boyd opted not to pursue a career in law after experiencing law as an intern. Inspired by the movie Rounders, Boyd began playing online poker day and night through his last year of law school. After graduation, moved to California and began playing poker during the day and working for a department store at night. During this time Boyd and his brother decided to begin an online casino specializing in poker. He raised $50,000 from family and friends and began the PokerSpot casino, which would eventually fail resulting in a substantial controversy. After the failure of PokerSpot, Boyd suffered from a series of self-alleged mental problems, eventually leading to his commitment for a short time in Antigua.

Boyd received substantial media attention during his run at the 2003 World Series of Poker, where he finished 12th. Shortly after this, he founded a group of young poker players called The Crew that achieved notable success. In addition to playing poker professionally, Boyd is attempting to establish another online poker room which charges players a monthly membership fee rather than rake in order to play.

PokerSpot controversy

Prior to his professional poker career, Boyd was the president and co-founder of the PokerSpot online poker cardroom, which operated from May 2000 to late 2001. When PokerSpot ceased operations, the cardroom did not refund $400,000 of player funds. A substantial controversy has arisen from actions taken by Boyd and the staff of PokerSpot during this time.

According to Boyd, in January 2001 PokerSpot’s credit card processor was late in transferring player funds to PokerSpot. As a result, PokerSpot did not have all the player funds that were being used at their site. Eventually this resulted in PokerSpot being shorted 6 weeks of credit card deposits, which PokerSpot could not cover. Players were unable to cash out, and eventually the site shut down.

When financial problems began with PokerSpot, players who called PokerSpot customer support requesting withdrawal of their deposited funds were told many different stories, ranging from a 30-business-day hold to a promise that their checks were “already in the mail.” In an online newsgroup in November 2002, Boyd admitted that players had been deceived. Boyd stated that he told his Customer Support staff to, “… spin it so that the players don’t feel the need to make a mad rush on the cardroom OR the need to tell everyone they know that PokerSpot is going to hell in a handbasket. Spin it so that the players continue to just keep on playing.”

Boyd also angered many players by regularly sending e-mails and posting on the rec.gambling.poker newsgroup in 2000 and 2001, stating that PokerSpot would “make good on all pending cashouts.” As of 2007, this promise has not been fulfilled.

There is a disagreement regarding a potential PokerSpot buyout offer that might or might not have refunded all money deposited by former PokerSpot players. Although there is agreement that a buyout deal was discussed, there is disagreement over the identity of the online casino offering to buy the PokerSpot software and assets. Russ Boyd, who has never named a particular buyer, claims that the buyer reneged on an offer that would have returned all of the players’ money, and that he refused the new deal in order to pursue other buyout options, which later also fell through. In a newsgroup posting in 2007, Russ’s brother Robert Boyd claimed that CyberWorld Group/Golden Palace reneged after hiring away PokerSpot’s lead developer.

Prior to Robert Boyd’s posting, Burton Ritchie claimed that Boyd reneged on the deal (which he says would have refunded all outstanding player debt and paid an additional $200,000 for Boyd himself) because the deal contained a non-competitive clause, effectively forcing Boyd to leave the internet casino industry for a period of 2 or 3 years. These claims have never been legally settled.

In January 2005, Boyd claimed on his blog to have already refunded a small amount of money to some former PokerSpot players. This claim, however, has not been confirmed.

When Boyd was the chip leader for a short time at the main event of the 2003 World Series of Poker, he was asked if he would pay back the PokerSpot players with any prize money that he won. Boyd said, “If I win this tournament, I will pay off all the players. Anything less than that, I can’t do it.” Boyd placed 12th in the tournament, earning $80,000.

Professional poker career

Boyd has been playing poker since the age of eighteen. Boyd was a member of The Crew, a group of poker-playing professionals and friends which also included Scott Fischman, Robert Boyd, David Smyth, Joe Bartholdi Jr, Tony Lazar, and Brett Jungblut. Jungblut and Bartholdi officially left the group, and since 2004 it has not generally been considered to be an active association. On June 6, 2006, however, Boyd announced on his blog that plans had been made to bring The Crew back together for a reality show centered around their collective lives.

Boyd finished runner-up to

of the $1,500 razz event at the 2004 World Series of Poker (WSOP). He also finished in the money of the $10,000 no limithold’em main event in 2003 WSOP (12th) and the 2005 WSOP (177th) . He won his first bracelet at the 2006 WSOP in the $2,500 short-handed no limit hold ‘em event when he ended up heads up, with the monster chip lead against Joe Hachem. Boyd used the chip lead to repeatedly put Hachem all in.