UPDATE: Racener has released a follow up statement saying that he stands behind his “original claims of cheating on Sorel’s part” but now says that: ” This matter is being dealt with between Sorel and I, and I consider the topic to be closed.”

Sorel Mizzi, the 2010 BLUFF player of the year and a lightning rod for controversy in the world of poker, has been accused of cheating at the 2+2 forums.

The post at 2+2 by Shaun Deeb was the latest drama involving Mizzi, who had his “Imper1um” account unbanned at Full Tilt Poker last week. The post by Deeb is just second-hand (he says Racener asked him to post it) in which he recounts a story told to him by November Niner John Racener. According to Deeb’s post Racener and Mizzi were playing a game of Chinese poker at the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure in January, and Deeb alleges (via Racener) that Mizzi dealt himself a joker from the bottom of the deck. Some of Deeb’s post follows:

So they are rotating the deal and the dealer gets the 14th card in 1 of their hands. Racener has played a ton of live poker so he tends to know procedure and what to look for. He notices sorels shuffling is leaving the 2 bottom cards in place they haven’t moved from the deck. As he starts to deal he notices the first card he deals himself is the bottom card of the deck. He keeps watching sorel and once he’s done dealing john says hes going take the hand with 14 cards in it sorel goes into a tantrum saying it’s his hand his deal. John says I know what you were doing picks up the 14 card pile and shows the bottom card which is the joker. He tells sorel he’s not paying him whatever amount hes down 5-20k and that he’s a scumbag etc.

Later, Mizzi posted on 2+2 defending himself against the accusation (post here). He says he did play Racener in Chinese poker, but denies any wrongdoing. An excerpt:

The allegations in this thread are so absurd, far-fetched and severe that the magnitude of the lies almost make me at a complete loss of words. What makes me even more speechless is how many of you jump to conclusions in a situation where it’s one persons word vs my own. I guess I shouldn’t be too surprised when it comes to Me vs anyone else in the community its the other person who gets the immediate credit for telling the truth and people who play against me or I do biz with obv know this.

Later, Racener did an interview with quadjacks.com, which you can listen to here. Racener confirmed that Deeb’s story is basically what he told Deeb, and that he stands by the events as Deeb described them. Racener also alleged that Mizzi was “trying to get him drunk” and he said he believed that he was doing this to get an edge in Chinese poker. Racener has had more than one DUI case in his past, the latest coming in December of last year.

The entire situation amounts to “he said, he said,” as there appears to be no other witnesses to the events in question. It’s common for poker pros to play Chinese poker one on one to get some action during their off hours from tournaments and cash games.

This was not the only controversy involving Mizzi this week; was suddenly spotted playing in FTOPS events at Full Tilt last week. Mizzi had not played at Full Tilt on his Imper1um account since October 2007, when he took over the account belonging to Chris Vaughan when he was making a deep run in a $1 million guaranteed tournament. With 26 players left, Mizzi bought the account BluffMagCV from Vaughan and went on to win the tournament. However, Full Tilt discovered the arrangement and disqualified the victory, giving first-place money to the second-place finisher. Mizzi was then banned from the site, until last week.