Digital Social Hour
Inside the Rise of Poker Streams: Big Wins & Big Risks | Ryan Feldman DSH #1354
Sat, 26 Apr
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Step into the high-stakes world of poker streams with Sean Kelly on the Digital Social Hour! 🎲✨ Discover the rise of poker live streams, featuring massive wins, jaw-dropping risks, and behind-the-scenes insights from Ryan, the mastermind behind some of the biggest games in the poker world. From Neymar's unforgettable $300K win to record-breaking million-dollar pots, this episode is packed with valuable insights and stories you won’t want to miss! 🤑 Ryan spills the secrets behind organizing games with celebrities like MrBeast, Neymar, Ryan Garcia, and more, while sharing the challenges of high-stakes poker, his toughest opponents, and moments that went viral. Learn what makes poker streams so successful and how they’ve revolutionized the game for players and fans alike. 🎥♠️ Tune in now and join the conversation! 🙌 Watch now and subscribe for more insider secrets. 📺 Hit that subscribe button and stay tuned for more eye-opening stories on the Digital Social Hour with Sean Kelly! 🚀 CHAPTERS: 00:00 - Ryan Feldman 00:30 - Ryan's Poker Downswing 05:00 - Notion Organization Tips 07:50 - Best Player Ryan's Ever Played Against 09:58 - Strategies for Dealing with Aggressive Players 11:26 - The Mystery of Alan Keating in Poker 13:44 - Hustler Casino Live's Rise to Popularity 14:59 - Airest Time Insights 22:10 - Neymar's Impact on Sports 23:58 - 2028 Olympics Predictions 26:39 - Insights from Molly’s Game 29:15 - Handling Non-Payment Issues 33:41 - Experiences of Getting Cheated 39:04 - The Next Big Streaming Event 41:18 - Closing Thoughts and Reflections APPLY TO BE ON THE PODCAST: https://www.digitalsocialhour.com/application BUSINESS INQUIRIES/SPONSORS: [email protected] GUEST: Ryan Feldman https://www.instagram.com/pokerryanfeldman SPONSORS: AIRES TECH: https://airestech.com/ KINSTA: https://kinsta.com/dsh NOTION: https://www.notion.com/ LISTEN ON: Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/digital-social-hour/id1676846015 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5Jn7LXarRlI8Hc0GtTn759 Sean Kelly Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmikekelly/ The views and opinions expressed by guests on Digital Social Hour are solely those of the individuals appearing on the podcast and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of the host, Sean Kelly, or the Digital Social Hour team. While we encourage open and honest conversations, Sean Kelly is not legally responsible for any statements, claims, or opinions made by guests during the show. Listeners are encouraged to form their own opinions and consult professionals for advice where appropriate. Content on this podcast is for entertainment and informational purposes only and should not be considered legal, medical, financial, or professional advice. Digital Social Hour works with participants in sponsored media and stays compliant with Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulations regarding sponsored media. #ad #hustlercasinolive #dougpolk #pokervlog #bradowen #highstakespokerlivestream
Chapter 1: Who is Ryan Feldman and what is his role in poker streams?
All right, guys, we got Ryan here today. How's it going, man? Good, thanks for having me. Yeah, been playing a lot of poker lately? I have been. I've been working a lot, but I've also been playing poker probably too much. I pretty much play...
Chapter 2: What causes Ryan Feldman's poker downswing and how does he analyze it?
either like live or uh online and with like a friend group um almost every night so how's the pnl this year um good question uh not good actually to be honest with you my last like six months have been like the worst ever for me so damn you're on a bad street yeah it's actually been terrible what do you think's causing that um i mean probably a few factors um
One, probably bluffing too much and hero calling too much, which I think is probably number one. If you're a decent player, if you know the fundamentals, if you know how to play, if you're experienced, I think that's the number one factor that can cause big losses or can cause downswings. A lot of variance is...
trying to bluff too much or, or hero call too much, um, like make a big call on the river. So, uh, I think those are probably the biggest things for me. Um, and then after that, it's just like always, so like whenever I have a bad session or a bad run, I'll try to, uh, I'll try to like self-evaluate, right. And say like, what can I do better? Or what am I doing? wrong?
What am I doing poorly now that I've done differently in the past when I've been winning? So sometimes it could be, it could be just playing better preflop also. It could be like, you know, trying to like three bet too much preflop or cold calling preflop, like just playing too many hands in big pots preflop that end up getting me into trouble later in the hand.
So, um, yeah, I think I've always been good at like being self-aware and like being able to evaluate after a session or after a run and, and, and say like, how do I fix this? What can I do different? But, you know, knowing and doing are two different things.
So sometimes in the moment you get into a big spot and, you know, you just can't help yourself and you just like try to run a big bluff and it doesn't work. Do you feel like you do that partially because of content too? Like you want to get a good clip out of it?
On the show, yes. But like in private, if I'm playing like online with friends, like there's no content to be had. So then it's just stupid. But yeah, on the show, yes. You know, I've, it's my own show. I get to pick when I get to play and not play. I don't play a whole lot. But when I do play, it's in some of the bigger games.
And so because I get to pick my own lineups and play when I want, you would think that I would do like pretty well on the show, right? Like if the game's too tough, I just don't have to play.
But yet that has definitely been a thing in my head over the years when I play on my show, whether it's like conscious or subconscious is, you know, some people say that, like, are you just doing that to try to like make highlights or make clips? And I feel like that is in the back of my mind, right? Like, you know, I'm like, man, this would be a sick bluff.
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Chapter 3: How does content creation influence poker playing decisions on live streams?
That's real money. That's why when I see guys like Nick Airball playing on the show, I'm like, does he play like that off camera too? You know what I mean?
Yeah. I mean, I think it happens not for everyone, but for a lot of people where... especially if you play in like bigger games elsewhere or private games elsewhere, like Nick airball does, um, or like I've played in, you know, in plenty of other games elsewhere. Like you, Alan Keating is another example.
Like he does it where he'll make like crazy plays on the show because he plays bigger elsewhere. And it's like, if you're wrong and you lose, um, you know, I guess the, You make a big highlight out of it, and it goes viral, and at least you have that, even though you lost the money.
There was a hand, semi-famous hand that I played on my show a couple years ago against Nick Airball, where I played a five-bet pot against him, And he flopped a straight flush. And I bluffed it off my whole stack into him for like a 400 and something thousand dollar pot. And it was probably to date the dumbest hand I've ever played in my life.
Especially tilting that it went to Nick Airball because then I have to like watch him, you know, celebrate and talk about it a million times after that. And the clip went kind of viral. But, you know, that's pretty tilting when you're like...
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Chapter 4: What was the story behind Ryan's biggest losing hand against Nick Airball?
And, you know, people will come up to me randomly over time and say like, oh, I saw that hand you played against Nick Airball where you had a straight flush. Like, that was dumb. Yeah, I feel that. Was that the biggest hand you've ever played in personally?
No, but it's up there. It's like one of the top 10 biggest pots I've played, I think, or at least on the show. So, yeah, that one hurts. Yeah. are you up or down on the show? I'm down a lot. I'm down like, I'm down like, like close, or yeah, like close to a million. Holy crap. Yeah. That's crazy. Yeah, it's terrible. It's my own show.
I should be winning. I wonder if Doug, Doug Polk's his name, right? If he's up on his show too. He's gotta be up. He had, I remember he had one really big win on his show. I mean, and Doug's also like a world-class player. He doesn't,
play as much now as he did during his prime and um he definitely does some things i'm sure on his show for entertainment value tries to like play extra hands because he understands how to be good for the game but he's a great player and um he knows how to win and and yeah he has a lot of money but i i'm pretty sure he's winning on his show yeah who's the best player you've ever personally played against you couldn't figure them out
Oh man, good question. The best player I've ever played against, I couldn't figure out. I don't know, but the person who I've actually had the toughest time with, I think, is Alan Keating. Really? And Alan Keating's probably nowhere near the best player overall, all things considered, or at least fundamentally, that I've played against. But his style doesn't match up well with my style.
You know, I'm trying to be aggressive, trying to play a lot of hands. I'm three betting, four betting a lot. I'm calling three bets and four bets a lot. I'm trying to play big pots. He does the same thing, but he does it way better. He's more experienced at it. He has way more money. And so... I just constantly level myself.
And even if I'm not losing a big pot to him, um, which I have plenty of times when he's in the game, it just like throws me off my game. And I end up just playing poorly cause I don't know how to navigate. Um, when someone like him is in the game and he, like I played a, uh, we, we played on poker go a few months ago. It just aired recently. And, uh, it was high stakes poker and it was a big game.
but it got even bigger because of the lineup. Alan Keating was in the game, and every single hand, he's straddling, he's making it 10K, 20K, 30K, 40K to go every hand, and I'm on his left, which generally is good, but I end up having to, like...
either just fold a ton, which is painful and can cost some money if you're just not playing any hands, or I have to like put in 20K, 30K, 40K every other hand if I wanna play. Like if I have a marginal hand, let's say I have nine, 10 suited or I have pocket sevens and I wanna play, I have to put that much money in the pot.
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Chapter 5: Who is Alan Keating and why is he a challenging opponent for Ryan?
That's one of the most interesting parts about poker is that there's tons of people out there in the world, especially in LA, that have a lot of money, right? And... They're successful business people. They could be venture capitalists. They could own some big business. Maybe they made money playing private poker. Whatever it is, there's these people that have tons of money that are out there.
L.A. has a lot of money, right? And a lot of these guys play a lot of poker. They've played in private games over the years. Well, now we have our stream that has gotten super popular over the last few years that has put a spotlight on these L.A., and Vegas private poker players that come and play our show. And now people see them on camera and they're like, well, how do they get their money?
Well, these people have existed forever. They just weren't playing. Like Alan Keating has been playing high stakes poker for probably, you know, 15 years. Wow.
Right. And he's been very wealthy for a long time and he's played in private games, organized games, been part of big games. But, you know, Dan Bilzerian back in the day, same thing, you know, but it's like until they're on camera and you get big on social media, you know, people don't know about them. Right.
No one really in the real world knew Alan Keating was before he played on our show and then played on poker go a lot as well. now, you know, everyone wants to know where he got his money from. Same thing with Nick Airball. You know, he's been playing a lot of poker off camera, you know, more than on camera the last few years.
But, you know, because he's this interesting character, people want to know, like, you know, people can't accept the fact that, like, maybe, you know, he's a character on the show, but he's actually, like, doing really well in these private games or he's made money investing or who knows what a lot of these guys are doing. But there's plenty of ways to make money both in poker and out of poker.
And, you know, everybody because of the internet wants to get in their business and know like, where does this money come from? Yeah. You guys really did put a spotlight on those underground games though. You know, you guys get crazy views. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you.
I feel like you kind of pioneered a new, I don't know if you were the first to do this, but you guys kind of have a new lane in poker, right?
Yeah. We weren't the first, but it's become, you know, I guess the most popular show in terms of just daily viewership. We're on five days a week. We stream the most of anyone we've done like eight or 900 episodes since 2021. Um, I used to produce live at the bike. I was an owner there.
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Chapter 6: How has Hustler Casino Live contributed to the rise of poker streaming?
And so if we get to a point sometime in the next 10 years where it comes back, right, it's been almost 15 years now that we haven't had online poker throughout the US. So if we get to a point where that comes back, then I think it'll blow up even more. Yeah. Would you ever do tournaments on your show or no? We could. We've thought about it.
But just from my experience, I think that cash games generally do way better for viewership than tournaments do or sit-and-goes do. If we could ever organize a high roller tournament with big names where we have a feature table and then we stream the final table kind of like Triton does, then I think that would do well. I think that's possible.
It's something I've thought about doing sometime in the next year or two. but in general, cash games just do so much better. Um, people love the idea that like every hand is worth a real amount of money. It's faster paced. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And just anything can happen. People play looser in cash games. Um,
It's just for whatever reason no limit hold him always the most popular cash game is always the most popular Yeah, how was it playing with namar? Was he filthy? I didn't play with him, but he was on our show. Um, but having him on the show was Was awesome. Uh namar's Super cool got to meet him when he came in interact with him a lot.
Um, super nice guy Everybody that asked for an autograph or a picture he did it. Wow um he's a huge deal. So it's, it's really an honor to get Neymar on our show. Like this is a show that we just created based on our vision. And it's at hustler casino in Gardena, California. Like just thinking about that compared to some of the big poker shows out there.
And back in the day, like high stakes poker and the poker ghost stuff, you know, the fact that we've gotten someone big like Neymar on our show is really cool. Um, But yeah, it was awesome. And he won a few hundred thousand dollars. Yeah. He won like three because Alan Keating played a crazy hand against Neymar at the end of the show where they did this unique thing.
And the clips out there in the internet, if you haven't seen it, that really has never been done before on a show where they get it all in. Neymar wins. Then Keating says, wait, wait, wait, wait, let's run it again for another 50. Just the last card. Let's run the river card for another 50,000. Neymar wins that. He says, wait, let's do it again. And every time Keating was 25 or 30%.
So he was an underdog, but just did it anyway for fun to gamble with Neymar. So he puts another 50,000, another 100,000, and he just keeps gambling until he's out of money. And Neymar wins every single time. Keating never won on any of those extra river cards. And Neymar ends up winning something like 300,000 off of Keating in one hand. Wow.
a straight degeneracy yeah it really was it's one of the coolest hands we've ever had on our show that's cool so hopefully uh namar will come back this summer and we'll have another big celebrity show i'm sure i know it's three years away but the olympics is gonna be really cool for you since it's in la i'm sure you could get some i haven't even thought about that but that's that's a good point 2028 yeah you could probably get all the athletes that would be cool um i have a vision for one day having a
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Chapter 7: What factors contributed to the success and popularity of Hustler Casino Live streams?
You'll get there, man. I could see it. You're only a few years in and you're already crushing it. It's impressive. Have you ever played in Molly's game? I haven't. I wasn't, uh, well, I wasn't in LA back then and I wasn't playing high stakes back then, but I know a lot of people that did play in Molly's game. And, uh, so I've heard stories. Obviously I've seen the movie a million times.
How accurate do you think that movie was based off your conversations with people? I think it's pretty accurate. I think there's definitely some things that they altered and changed to make it more exciting for the movie. But I think most of it is roughly accurate. For example, there's a scene in there where a guy... gets it all in with pocket Queens. I think it was on queen seven, seven.
And the guy who, uh, Brad like bad Brad in the, in the, in the movie, in the book from that game, he's a real person. Um, gets it all in with Ace-King on Queen-7-7 against Pocket Queen, so he's basically drawing dead, and it goes either King-King or Ace-Ace, and he wins the hand. The guy who had Queens, I know that guy. I played a lot of poker with him.
I can't say who it is, but, you know, so that part is real, for example. The part where the guy... in the movie, just goes off one night for like a million dollars and then tells Molly afterwards that he can't pay, right? And they play like all night long. That's a real guy. That guy is Houston Curtis. People know him. He's still around. Did he ever pay that?
I think in the movie, I assume this is accurate, but I don't know. I think the Tobey Maguire character, who's the Michael Cera character, ended up like making a deal with him to stake him to pay the money back. But I've heard the story about like who was in the game that night and like what happened and how the game went like overnight till the next day.
And people started waking up and coming to play because they heard Houston Curtis was on tilt. So these are real stories, real things that happened. It's like, it seems hard to believe. Like it's, I mean, it's a great movie, but, Poker was huge in the private game scene back in that era in Hollywood in like 2006 to 2009, whenever that was.
I would have loved to be around it, but unfortunately I wasn't in the scene like that back then. But, you know, it's pretty cool to hear the stories about all these celebrities that were playing so big back then.
I heard those, yeah. New York was big too back then, right? Yeah, exactly. I don't know if it's still big in New York, but has that ever happened to you where someone didn't pay you? Like they just played all night and kind of stiffed you?
more times than I'd like to... So you're fronting players? Well, no, no, not on the show. I'm just saying I've been involved in other games and situations where someone's owed me money and then just ends up being broke and not being able to pay and I've had to deal with that. No, on the show, luckily... I have no financial ties or anything to any, like we deal with a casino.
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Chapter 8: What are Ryan Feldman's insights on the growth of poker and the World Series of Poker main event?
I mean it's sometimes sorry sometimes some spots are unavoidable um and maybe there's a lot of spots I regret that I could have done better over time. And there's a lot of people that I've trusted that looking back, I shouldn't have trusted. Yeah. Um, did you get money to buy yourself? Okay. Or whatever his name is. Okay. No, I did it.
Okay. Yeah. That was a crazy one. Yeah. I know people that he owes money to Nick airball being one of them, but yeah, Bruce K you, that's a situation that's so interesting. And you see that a lot. He was the nicest guy ever. He was so friendly. Um, People did not suspect that he was going to be a scammer. And then all of a sudden, one day, he just skips town and owes people money.
Like a million, right? I don't know how much it ended up being, but it was a lot. And I've seen situations like that so many times. And it's like, you know, I learn as time goes on, like... you have to be more careful and I'll warn people too. Like, Hey, you know, be careful. Don't do that. Don't do that. Like I'll, I'll use my experiences to kind of tell other people. Yeah.
But, um, it's just tough when you're involved in games, you're playing in games, you're organizing games, you're doing, you know, it's just like, you're going to come up with situations once in a while where, you know, someone owes you for whatever the reason is. And, um, you know, most of the time it's, it's no big deal, but sometimes it's just, people aren't honest about their situation.
Like I've had situations where, you know, we're playing in a, you know, we, we, we have like an online game. We'll play sometimes a rake free game, just a bunch of friends. We're all really close. We hang out, like we all trust each other. Right. Totally like just legit cleanest, most fun game that you can imagine. Right. once in a blue moon, we'll have somebody who's super wealthy.
They're maybe not a billionaire, but like, you know, nine figure net worth. And all of a sudden they just go off for like an absurd amount. And then afterwards tell you, shit, I messed up. Um, I'm going to need a lot of time to pay that. Like, I'm just not liquid right now. Why didn't you tell us that before you decided to gamble that big?
Like, be honest about your situation before you screw someone over. So, you know, that just comes up sometimes and people put you in a bad spot because they're just such degenerates. This happens in private games all the time, right? Like, people that run these private underground LA games get screwed all the time because, you know, somebody that's good for the game, somebody that's, you know...
they think is worth a lot and is good for it ends up going off for a ton of money. And then after the fact, they tell them like, Hey, like I can't pay you that right away. And now they're in a bad spot. So it's just, it's the dark part about poker, probably the worst part about poker. Um, but it's something that I've definitely learned how to deal with over time.
Yeah. Yeah. That's why I'm scared of the high stakes. Cause then you run into cheating too, right? Is that common?
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