Phil 'Polarizing' Ivey Down Almost $5 Million On Full Tilt

Last month, I wrote how Full Tilt Poker’s two biggest pros don’t seem to be able to gain any traction with Gus Hansen currently down a massive -$19,758,983 since 2007, and Viktor Blom in the hole by -$3,385,766 since 2009.
However, such poor results are not just reserved for some of the swingiest players in the game and the usually steady Phil Ivey, too, has taken a bit of a battering since returning to Full Tilt’s virtual baize in December 2012. In the ensuing time, Phil Ivey has proceeded to drop -$4,739,732 under his latest screen name ‘Polarizing’, making his the fifth worst account in Full Tilt Poker’s history.
In the past, Phil Ivey has focused on employing a strict stop-loss system to help limit the amount of variance in his results, even if his approach isn’t always to his opponents’ taste. Last year, for instance, Ivey had an online exchange of words with cash game specialist “SallyWoo”, with an extract of their conversation going as follows:
SallyWoo: nah, u too nitty
Polarizing: i have no idea what your talking about
Polarizing: u have issues
SallyWoo: issues?
Polarizing: i will play i just quit when i want
Polarizing: simple as that
SallyWoo: u lose 2bb and quit 9 out of 10 times and i have issues gotcha
Polarizing: ha
However, even Phil Ivey’s famous stop-loss approach doesn’t seem to be able to stem the tide this time around, and the 38 year-old pro has continued to hemorrhage money, dropping a further  $600,000 over 1,600 hands played since last Friday.
Despite his more recent losses, however, Phil Ivey does show $19,242,744 in online cash winnings under his own name, and a further $21,457,073 winnings from live tournaments. The 10-times WSOP bracelet winner is also busy running his Ivey Poker training site, and his students can benefit from his message that enduring and coming through horrific downswings is a necessary requirement when playing poker :
“Poker is a long-term game and you have to keep that vision or you’ll lose heart. In the long run, the better players who put the time in and work on their games will come out ahead,” explained Ivey.