“The Shuffling Incindent”

I am writing this in order to explain the events that occurred during my 
match with Ben Farkas in the last round of the swiss portion on Saturday at 
Pro Tour New York.  There has been much controversy over my actions, 
and it seems that I have now been labeled as a cheater by some, if not many 
Magic players.  But before I explain not only all of the events that occurred 
in detail, as well as my side of the story (the primary reason why I am 
writing this), I would like to explain why writing this article is especially 
necessary for me.
	When somebody is accused of cheating, or is in some way involved 
in an event that is deemed negative on their character, there are several 
ways to handle it.  It seems that the majority of accused Magic cheaters 
simply remain silent, hoping that people will simply forget as they often do. 
Perhaps they also feel that by defending themselves, they are simply 
informing more people of the incident, which is often true.  They may also 
feel that people can by so cynical that no matter what they say in their 
defense, they will not be believed.  Unfortunately, this is often true as well. 
However, despite all of these risks, that is not how I wish to handle this 
situation in any way.  I wish to handle all of my accusations completely 
head on, and to address the exact situation without hiding from anything.  
Also, I believe that there is a huge side of the story that most people are 
completely unaware of.
	I first will explain, for those who do not know what I’m talking about, 
the exact incidents that occurred in New York, from the perspective of the 
onlookers.  The spectators watching my final round with Ben Farkas 
(whereby the winner would reach the top 8 while the loser would not) saw 
the following:  they saw me sit down, lazily shuffle my deck for an 
extremely brief period, and then hand it to Ben.  By lazily, I mean that I sat 
down, and did some very brief ‘hand-clump’ shuffles which did not have 
any real randomizing effect on the deck, and then a few riffles.  My riffles 
were equally questionable.  I barely riffled the deck at all, with many of the 
bridges being mostly or completely broken as only a few cards, or clumps of 
cards were mixed into each other.  I then handed the deck to Ben without 
saying anything.  
	Now naturally, people would, and should logically conclude from this 
that I am a cheating bastard.  They would assume that I intentionally 
stacked my deck and pretended to shuffle in an attempt to dupe Ben Farkas 
into just cutting without shuffling, and therefore gain a tremendous 
advantage for myself.  And if that were the entire story, they would be 
completely correct.  However, there is far more to the story than this.
	When Ben and I sat down to play our match, we did not first sit down 
at our feature match table.  Rather, we sat down at table 41 (or was it 44?) 
and proceeded to shuffle for a solid five minutes straight (and I mean solid).  
During this time, I piled shuffled my deck in a randomized fashion at least 
four times (it was probably four, but maybe more).  I then thoroughly and 
honestly riffled for the remainder of the five minutes, only stopping to 
occasionally pile the deck.  But our conversation was even more important.  
I said to Ben, “Ben, this is obviously an extremely important match for us.  
When I’m done shuffling, I want you to shuffle my deck.  Even if you trust 
me, I’d rather there not be any doubt in your mind.  If I get a good draw, I 
want you to give it to me.”  I have said this quite same familiar speech quite 
often to many players, so many of you reading this might have heard that 
exact same speech in the past.  Ben completely agreed and said that we’d 
shuffle each others decks after our own shuffling.  
	After several minutes of shuffling and talking, Mark Rosewater came 
over and told us that we were a feature match for that round.  I told Ben that 
I was finished shuffling, and that when we got to the table, he could shuffle 
my deck, and I placed my sideboard under my bottom card, and facing in 
the opposite direction.  Along the way to the feature match table, we passed 
Mark Justice who informed us that it might be possible for us both to draw 
in.  When we sat down at the feature match table, we spent two minutes 
discussing the possibility of drawing, since we had previously thought it to 
be impossible.  During this time we were not shuffling, yet unknown to our 
newly formed group of spectators watching the feature match tables, we had 
already finished five solid minutes of shuffling at the old table.  When Ben 
and I finally came to our decision (I wanted to draw, but he didn’t, and in 
the long run, he was correct), I removed my sideboard from underneath my 
deck and I saw my bottom card in the process.  I told this to Ben, and I 
proceeded to lazily shuffle for about thirty seconds, in order to randomize 
where that card was.  However, as I said before, this was definitely not a 
thorough shuffling at all.  I knew Ben was about to shuffle my deck 
(something we had both insisted on), and I just wanted to mix my bottom 
card into the deck before he shuffled it.  Now remember, from the 
perspective of the onlookers, this was the only shuffling that they saw me 
do, and naturally, many of  them were outraged.  However, taken within the 
context of the match, I believe my actions were honest and fair.
	For those of you who believe that the Pro Tour is not cracking down 
on cheating, this is certainly not the case.  After our match (which I barely 
won, by the way, due to some incredible luck, and bad luck on Farkas’s 
part),  Jeff Donais asked if he could speak with me.  Jeff Donais had heard 
the complaints of the onlookers that I hadn’t sufficiently shuffled, and he 
took the situation VERY seriously.  He informed me that there was a 
definite possibility that I would be disqualified and removed from the 
tournament unless I had some definite proof that my actions were honest.  
Let me also say for the record that I completely understand Jeff’s position 
on the matter, and without trying to look like I’m kissing up to the powers 
that be, most people (myself included) believe that he is perhaps the best 
thing that WotC has ever done for the pro tour.  Anyway, I told Jeff that I 
not only shuffled before I reached the feature table, but that I also insisted 
that Ben shuffle my deck.  Jeff said that he would need to confirm this with 
Ben, and that I was not to leave until this issue was resolved.  Jeff then 
spoke with Ben and everything that I said was confirmed.
	Sitting down at a high table and barely shuffling at all was a very 
stupid thing to do.  It also would’ve probably been smarter to not shuffle at 
all, then to do half-hearted riffles which barely mixed the cards in any way, 
but none of this was going through my mind at the time.  I was simply 
thinking about the match that I was about to play.  I have done many stupid 
things in not only my Magic career, but in life as well, and I’m sure that I 
will do a million more.  That is the inevitability of life. But I am not a 
cheater and I never have been.  I have enjoyed having one of the greatest 
reputations in the game for as long as I have been playing, and I have 
worked hard to both achieve and maintain that. I do not blame anybody for 
thinking that I cheated during my match, as I would have felt exactly the 
same way about somebody else, had I witnessed the same thing.  If I really 
was a deck-stacker, then I wouldn’t have a history of manascrew in some of 
most important matches that I have ever played.  I could go on and list some 
of those matches, but I’m sure that my point has already been made.
	On a final note, I realize that as I am writing this, I know that there 
are many cynical people whose opinions of me will not change no matter 
what I say, or what explanation I have in my defense.  But if anybody is still 
skeptical, please keep this in mind:  Ben Farkas has no problem with what I 
did.  He knows, as do I, that nothing helped me win our match besides a 
little skill and a lot of luck.  And as important as it is to me to have the 
Magic community as a whole believe my honesty, the fact that Ben knows 
that he wasn’t cheated is even more important.  If any of you still have 
doubts, feel free to talk to Ben or Jeff Donais.  They will confirm anything 
that I have said in this entire article.  I rarely post to the Internet, and I never 
like being any center of controversy, but if anybody wishes to discuss this 
further with me, please feel free to e-mail me at  
jchinnock@worldnet.att.net.  Thank you for taking the time to read this, and 
I look forward to seeing you all at Nationals.

Sincerely,

John Chinnock