Some of the worst behavior at the poker tables to make it onto a live-streamed broadcast in quite some time has resulted in a ban for two players on Wednesday's episode of the new Bally's Big Bet Poker LIVE show, which airs from the Tropicana Casino in Las Vegas. Show participants Austin Yoo and Jason Liu were banned after a confrontation that began with violent threats on-stream and, after the stream had been paused, some form of limited contact between the two before they were separated.
The bizarre episode unfolded when Liu (at left, above), began talking loudly about random subjects during a major pot between Sullivan (center) and Yoo (at right). Sullivan used up his four time-bank chips while facing a $20,000 river bet from Yoo, and can be seen in the hand shaking his head to try to clear his mind of Liu's prattle, which included Liu's declaration that he had every mental disorder before jumping to such topics as patronizing prostitutes in German brothels, drug use, and more.
Whether Liu's conversation affected Sullivan's decision to fold is unknown, as Sullivan allowed his last time extension to expire without calling Yoo's rivered flush. The next hand began, and the talk between Liu and Yoo quickly escalated. At one point, Yoo asked Liu, "Do you do drugs?"
Liu responded, "I do mushrooms and molly every day," before returning to his explanation to another player about how he was schizophrenic and bi-polar and had been beaten regularly as a child. Moments later, when the table talk returned to the drug use, Liu told Yoo, "I don't need your drugs. I make them."
From there, the situation quickly slid further downhill. Liu appeared to make the first challenge to fight, though some of the conversation was masked by the stream's commentator discussing the situation. Yoo agreed to fight, though wanted to do so after the stream ended. As the show's producer and security tried to rein in the two players' behavior, Yoo exploded with several more physical threats against Liu and his mother.
At that point, reportedly at the request of the show's dealers, who were concerned about their safety, the stream was cut off. Though not captured on air, Liu and Yoo reportedly then engaged in a brief scuffle before being separated.
Prominent podcaster Matt Berkey posted a three-minute-plus video of the height of the confrontation on X (Twitter):
A longer video capture of the stream has been posted by @HighrollPoker, where the nearly 11 minutes of video also shows the Sullivan/Yoo hand where the confrontation between Yoo and Liu began to simmer:
In a Reddit thread tracking the situation, an account posting as @BigBetPokerLive verified that the show's dealers asked for the stream to be halted. The BBP account also indicated that the "final confrontation" might be published at some point, though that promise was later retracted; Liu, in comments made on multiple social-media platforms, has asserted that Yoo's specific threats of violence were illegal and should be investigated by law enforcement.
Asked by a commenter who Yoo was, Liu described him as "a criminal hiding in plain site":
Despite Yoo's threats, Liu's nonstop chatter and his own threat toward Yoo appear to have triggered the situation. Sullivan, who was caught between Liu and Yoo in the earlier hand, posted in the Reddit thread, posted this about Liu:
Doctor_Sullivan
I wuz literally dying w that moron on my right.
If creating the controversy was intentional on Liu's part, it may backfire. Liu promotes himself on Twitter as "Professional Poker player, Tech Recruiter, Life Coach," but the erratic behavior he displayed will likely make it more difficult to find customers.
Meanwhile, Big Bet Poker, an offshoot of Live at the Bike, entered spin-control mode. After first hoping to defuse and perhaps publicize the incident further as a marketing tool, the BBP Reddit account announced that both players had been suspended "indefinitiely". The later developments raise the possibility that the entire streamed game will never be added to Big Bet Poker's YouTube library and might instead become something of a "lost" episode.
Big Bet Poker also issued a more generic statement where it confirmed Liu's and Yoo's bans while affirming that the show's goal is to create a safe, fun atmosphere for everyone involved, a goal which Wednesday's cash game and unanticipated confrontation clearly missed.
Featured image source: Twitter / @HighrollPoker
