Greg Merson took to Twitter to bash the WPT500 event, saying that it was "disrespectful" for it to attempt to compete with the WSOP Main Event:

Can’t breath on partypoker/WPT trying to step on the toes of the WSOP Main Event. Of course you can play both but very disrespectful IMO.

The main event is our Super Bowl, save your 5 day re-entry money grab for another date

Just a desperate attempt by a company trying to hold onto a glimmer of the spotlight as they have continued to slid since 2006 #showers
People got confused because the WPT500 did not interfere with the WSOP Main, nor was the buyin similar.

It came out soon after that Merson was a new WSOP.com sponsored player.

Merson then took some heat on 2+2 for possibly multi-accounting on WSOP.com, as he had played on "Toddmcshay", and then was later seen there as "GregMerson".

WSOP manager Bill Rini then cleared things up, stating that he dropped the Toddmcshay account when he started GregMerson, and that this was done as part of the sponsorship deal.