DJs and boxers as poker ambassadors?

Author

Vargoso

Published

1/15/2022

Updated

1/15/2022

Yesterday, two poker brands at once - 888poker and WPT - announced their new ambassadors. They are boxers and DJs, not professional poker players. What is it: a coincidence or a new trend?

Boxer-Chris-Eubank-became-888-Poker-Ambassador-and-DJ-Steve-Aoki-became-WPT-Ambassador_1

Teams

The fact that poker rooms invite not only pro players and streamers to their teams has long been known. The most striking examples of such cooperation are football star Neymar and rapper Papo MC (PokerStars), comedian Kevin Hart (partypoker). All of them were signed in the middle of 2020 or later, so such a trend can be called a new one.

Yesterday we received two more confirmations of this trend:

888Poker and WPT have announced that British boxer Chris Eubank and American DJ Steve Aoki, respectively, have become their ambassadors.

It's worth noting that they both took part in the Poker After Dark in 2021 and played at the same table.

Steve confessed to his passion for poker almost 10 years ago. Phil Ivey and Dan Bilzerian, among others, are his good friends. The musician often visits Vegas and participates in private cash games. As an ambassador, he will host a charity poker tournament this summer.

As for Chris, he is not only a world middleweight champion but is also known as a "mod" party-goer. He has long-term acquaintances in the poker world: for example, he played with Tom Dwan.

Is the new audience the main priority?

Tom Dwan and Chris Eubank

Both Eubank and Aoki are famous worldwide, not only in their homeland. The boxer has over a million Twitter and Instagram followers, while the DJ boasts more than 8 million fans on Twitter alone. Both of them should help promote their respective brands among the audience unfamiliar with poker.

We fully agree with the opinion of PokerMatch CEO Ruslan Bangert, which was expressed on his Telegram channel:

"I forgot to add why such an ambassador is good. That's because poker needs a new young audience. Otherwise, everything depends on the older generation, while new stars appear less and less. Hence, young people choose other entertainment for themselves and this is quite expected. So DJ ambassadors are cool!"

We can add that while attracting such personalities to their teams, some poker rooms do not renew contracts with poker professionals. Three days ago, Sofia Lövgren left 888Poker, like Jacobson and Moorman last year. Recently, partypoker said goodbye to Bodyakovsky and Haxton.

It is quite possible that in 2022 we will witness more new collaborations between poker rooms and famous media personalities, which should help the industry maintain its modernity and attractiveness in the long term.