HOI AN, VIETNAM — Jeff Sluzinski sits still in silence, two cameras trained on his face.
More than 24 hours 💶 through multiple airports, security lines, and customs officials
have taken him from his home in Las Vegas, where he resides 💶 as a professional poker
player, to a Korean barbeque restaurant in Hoi An, Vietnam.
One of the cameraman calls
for action. 💶 Sluzinski, or Jeff Boski as he’s better known on his many social media
channels, launches quickly into a freestyle stream 💶 of consciousness that lasts
throughout his 30-minute meal of wagyu steak.
Boski seamlessly transitions from
multiple topics: the benefits of marbling 💶 in steak, the Maillard reaction’s role in
creating sear, the dangers of consuming ice for tourists in Vietnam, and his 💶 recent
exploits in spendingR$125,000 in entry fees for poker tournaments over the past
week.
He’s competing for prizes well north of 💶 a million dollars as part of the Triton
Super High Roller poker series, comprising 15 tournaments staged in the casino
💶 downstairs over the next two weeks.
MORE: Results, schedule for Triton Poker Super High
Roller Series
Boski’s not a regular on the 💶 high stakes poker scene, or a food critic
for that matter. But he takes whatever life throws at him, filming 💶 what his life is
like along the way. The fact that he struggles to even order a bottle of water 💶 in
Vietnamese hasn’t stopped him from throwing himself into these recent challenges. He’s
come too far to quit now.
The beginnings 💶 of Boski’s poker journey are fairly common
among his peers. Growing to love the game after watching Chris Moneymaker take 💶 down the
World Series of Poker on ESPN back in 2003, Boski quickly grew his skill level playing
in home 💶 games with friends and online tournaments. He eventually got good enough to
quit his job as a manager at a 💶 call center and drop out of college.
In 2008, Boski
moved out to Las Vegas to see if he could cut 💶 it as a professional poker player.
“I had
barely any money, but I said f– it,” Boski said.
Anyone who has been 💶 in poker as long
as Boski knows that the journey never goes smoothly. There were some big successes
along the 💶 way. He started off on a high note, winning overR$100,000 in a week of online
tournaments in August of that 💶 first year.
Downswings as big as 20 or 30 thousand
dollars eventually led him back down to his lastR$1000. He went 💶 back to grinding outR$6
tournaments online, earning aboutR$10 an hour and trying to get ahead of his bills
until his 💶 next big score. The ebbs and flows of a career as a poker player continued
for years.
There’s a saying in 💶 poker that players don’t get into the profession because
it’s easy. Rather, they do it because they thought it would 💶 be easy.
The grind of
playing 4000 poker tournaments online per year was starting to catch up to Boski. At
times, 💶 he considered transitioning to something else.
That's when Boski first saw
fellow Las Vegas poker player Andrew Neeme documenting his day-to-day 💶 life on YouTube,
around the end of 2024. Neeme is widely credited with helping to launch an industry of
poker 💶 vlogs that have spread like wildfire among the community. Boski would not be far
behind. When he started his poker 💶 vlog in 2024, he was one of handful. Now, there are
hundreds following in those footsteps.
Boski never expected for his 💶 channel to gain
interest in the way that it did.
“I made it to show my mom, this is what it’s 💶 like to
play a poker tournament. She’d always wonder how I’m doing. Like, how I’m really
doing.”
Poker vlogs from Neeme, 💶 Boski, and others exploded in popularity over the next
few years. Today, Brad Owen leads the poker community with over 💶 600,000 subscribers on
his channel. Boski still maintains one of the more popular ones, with 50,000
subscribers.
After he passed the 💶 1,000 subscriber mark, his channel started to become
monetized, allowing him to take some of the pressure off having to 💶 earn a living solely
on the felt. It wasn't much, but it was a start to something bigger.
“Everyone has
different 💶 revenue based on their audience,” Boski explains. “A general guideline [for
poker vloggers] would be aroundR$2,000 per million views in 💶 a given month.”
Boski
eventually added a popular Twitch stream alongside his YouTube channel, where viewers
could follow alongside him while 💶 he played in poker tournaments online.
“If you want to
see what it’s like to play online poker for a living, 💶 or see how I turnR$10 intoR$1,000
some nights, I’m still streaming at 5 or 6 Pacific Time almost every night.”
For 💶 hours
on most nights, Boski loads up multiple tournaments on his computer screen and narrates
his thought processes to his 💶 viewers or answers questions that they pose to him in
chat. For some, it's unnerving to open themselves up to 💶 criticism. Boski thrives off
it.
"It keeps me focused, in the zone. I think it makes me play better now. If 💶 I f– up,
everybody’s watching and they’ll let me know I f–ed up."
Like his poker vlogs on
YouTube, Boski had 💶 an early mover advantage in building up his poker Twitch streaming
channel. Even with his 24,000 subscribers, he doesn't make 💶 much money from the
company.
“If you stream a hundred hours a month with a hundred viewers, you’d be lucky
to 💶 make a thousand bucks a month,” Boski says.
But there are other benefits if you’re
willing to hustle. And like poker, 💶 YouTube, and Twitch, Boski knows how to play that
game too.
Boski’s Twitch and YouTube audiences have allowed him to parlay 💶 his influence
into a sponsorship deal with poker site America’s Cardroom. He was a first-mover there
too.
“I took the initiative,” 💶 Boski said of the arrangement. He asked if the site
sponsored any pros. When they revealed that they did not, 💶 Boski suggested that he’d
make an excellent addition to help promote them. He’s now been there for five years,
and 💶 they’ve expanded their sponsored player list to 12 members.
“It’s about getting
your hands in a lot of pies,” Boski explains. 💶 Along with his revenue from YouTube,
Twitch, and America’s Cardroom ("use promo code 'BOSKI' to sign up," he urges), he 💶 also
promotes a poker training site called Raise Your Edge, CBD company Viva Oils, clothing
line Kounterfeit, and a strip 💶 club in Vegas called Peppermint Hippo.
When Boski first
started learning the game back in Michigan 20 years ago, he couldn’t 💶 imagine where he
would be today. Moneymaker, the man he watched on TV to bring his interest into the
game, 💶 is now one of his peers as a fellow sponsored professional player at America’s
Cardroom. And Boski’s gone fromR$6 buyins 💶 on his home computer up toR$50,000 buy-in
tournaments in Vietnam without batting an eyelash.
Boski had won his tournament entry
fees 💶 on America's Cardroom prior to arrriving in Vietnam. He blew through the
firstR$100,000 of those fees without a single dollar 💶 to show for his efforts during the
first week of the tournament series.
On the last tournament that he planned to 💶 play,
Boski went back to the cashier, his finalR$25,000 that he brought for his trip in tow.
He sat still 💶 for a moment in silence. And then he dove headfirst against 104 of the
best minds in poker.
Ten hours later, 💶 he was eliminated from the tournament in seventh
place, earning himR$121,000. It was the biggest score of his life and 💶 took him overR$1
million in career live tournament cashes. For Boski, it was another day in the office,
and one 💶 that his viewers will live alongside him when he puts the journey on YouTube
when he returns home.
The life of 💶 a professional poker player may seem full of intrigue
to those out of the know. But get to watch Boski's 💶 videos, and you realize that he's a
regular guy who has made it to extraordinary places in life by being 💶 willing to go a
little bit outside of his comfort zone.
“It’s humbling to have that much reach. What
makes me 💶 so special that people want to watch this? It’s amazing to me. That’s the
coolest thing.”
