Dan Bilzerian is one of the most polarizing figures among poker celebrities. Many men, especially younger ones, admire his lifestyle. He is rich and fit, surrounds himself with top models, and spends enormous amounts of cash on a lavish lifestyle. Of course, for the same reasons, many treat him as a spoiled brat who is just faking a young man’s dream so he can gain attention on social media.
What’s really interesting is that Dan claims he made all of his money playing poker, mostly in various cash games. That would technically make him a professional poker player. Is this possible?
The modern story of the Bilzerian family starts with Dan’s father – Paul
Let’s start with a bit of family background. Paul Bilzerian was quite a character with a very unclear and convoluted past. What’s most important in the context of Dan’s story is that Paul amassed wealth worth millions of dollars in the real estate business and, later on, due to a few questionable takeovers of other companies.
Paul’s methods and actions were contested by many and ultimately legally pursued by the US government. The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has accused Paul of fraud and has been trying to recover embezzled money for years with variable luck.
Paul has been moving and hiding his riches very well, using his knowledge to funnel the money through various shell companies and trust funds. He even has filed for bankruptcy twice. Among many potential money hideouts, one consisted of his sons’ trust funds. Eventually, Paul paid back almost $4 million out of the $62 million he defrauded. How much of that money Dan has received is unclear.
There is no doubt that Dan eventually got hold of some of the money his father had gathered for him over the years, which probably makes up a lot of his current net worth. Despite that, Dan claims he made his money solely by playing poker, infuriating many poker players.
Could Dan Bilzerian really make millions playing poker?
That is the question that provokes a heated discussion. Firstly, let’s take a closer look at what is publicly known about Dan’s poker results. A quick search on the most popular site collecting live poker tournaments’ results, Hendon Mob, shows that Dan has only one recorded tournament cash win. He won a little over $36k in the WSOP Main Event in 2009. That’s a lot of money, but pretty far from the millions, he owns currently.
How about online poker, then? There is hardly any evidence of Dan playing online poker. In fact, the only video on YouTube starring Dan is him playing on Bill Perkins’ account. The recording from the Twitch stream shows him playing a $10/20 heads-up match without much success:
As a poker player who allegedly won millions of dollars, Dan doesn’t seem to have a great idea about what he is doing, constantly asking for help and showing a reckless style of betting until the opponent folds. Arguably, in this recording, he does not look like a winning player who knows the ins and outs of a solid poker strategy.
Not long ago, Dan announced a huge online poker venture – he has become an ambassador for GGPoker. At first, there was quite a lot of buzz about this sponsorship and its potential consequences. Unfortunately, we can’t shed much more light on this, as the cooperation didn’t work out and ended quietly.
The poker world of private games
That brings us to the most mysterious aspect of Bilzerian’s career, private high-stakes poker cash games. According to Dan himself, he has made millions playing poker with wealthy businesspeople who are more than willing to gamble out of pure boredom.
Such games, without poker pros around, might be very juicy. The thing about private cash games is that it is impossible to verify their results for obvious reasons. Therefore they are a great way to legitimate almost any amount of money. Dan claims he has made over $50 million playing poker in these cash games. That’s as bold a claim as one can make, given that his supposed journey to riches started with a few hundred dollars, which he allegedly took to Las Vegas and turned into $10k, kickstarting his further poker career.
Obviously, all of the above are just stories we can’t disprove. What can give us a valuable view of Dan’s poker game is a recent video from the PokerGo channel. Dan was recorded playing poker in televised cash games from Las Vegas, as he was part of the 2021 lineup of Poker After Dark.
It’s hardly enough data to assess Bilzerian’s poker skills. Nevertheless, anyone can have some insight into how Dan acts at the poker table and how he plays.
You probably won’t be too amazed by Bilzerian’s plays if you have about average knowledge of the poker cash games. The question remains: is it his true potential, or just an act for TV? We’ll never know for sure.
It’s technically possible to win this much money, though
Let’s be the devil’s advocate for a while and try to do Dan some justice. In a recent interview, Daniel Negreanu shared his take on a world of high-stakes poker cash games. According to Daniel, Dan’s stories of how he got the money to start his poker career might be sketchy. However, winning millions of dollars playing private high-stakes cash games is entirely possible.
Ultimately, the thing with Dan’s case is that probably no one will be able to verify his poker winnings. Whichever way you look at his performance, it doesn’t make sense to put him in the same group as other professional poker players. Many of them devoted their lives to studying strategies, getting better at poker, and often playing other seasoned poker pros on their way to the top.
It’s also worth remembering that the flashy lifestyle that he sells on his social media has its toll. Bilzerian has already suffered a double heart attack at 25, which should be a red flag for all of his wannabes.
In the end, we doubt Dan could play poker for a living starting from scratch
We treat Dan’s case as some curiosity, a pretty implausible story to reproduce, and we would suggest you take it with a grain of salt. What we know for sure is that playing poker for a living is possible. We’ve proven that along with a few hundred of our players and constantly do so.
If playing poker professionally sounds appealing to you, check out our offer. We’ve helped many online players to take their careers to the next level with the support of our experienced coaches, training materials, and community.
We probably won’t make you as rich as Dan is, but your hard work and our help combined can yield some great results.