God I hope not.

He’s a bad example of how to treat others with respect.

Still writing their magnum opus

https://y.yarn.co/1d432c6c-d459-4bb9...8f6f5_text.gif

Airball is definitely one of the biggest draws currently, along with Keating. If these 2 guys were in the pokergo game instead of Gonsalves and Gonzalez it would've been the best TV lineup of the last 10 years.

no, he's insufferable

Personally i don't think its fair to compare Airball and tony g. the latter was clearly a character and the former seems genuinely mean spirited

Tony G was not a Trust Fun powered Trust Fun Baby. He had to wash cars and fix sewing machines.

It’s amusing how many people have been duped by Airball. I guess it doesn’t take much to fool people.

well airball being a trust fun baby explains a lot about his personality

Imagine being a grown adult and referring to someone as niK aiRBaLL.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0dn...okerAtTheLodge

Nik called Jungle his bitch

Does the nit shortstacker treat his customers with respect if he never gives action to them and is just there to be quiet and take their money? Does Jungle tanking for 3 min each decision for live reads and berating and asking his opponents questions treat them with respect? Yet to see a clip of Airball not getting the action game cultures rocking and he doesn’t really disrespect people he can be very respectful at times. I love how he does his own thing with gambling and has fun win or lose unlike all the other personalities that just imitate each other

Trust Fun Powered carefreeness and money apathy. LOL

He's great for poker.

Jungleman pushing over Nik's stack twice was hilarious.

I have yet to see Nik Goofball actually outplay anyone. He’s just another donk on a heater.

i can't stand jungles tanking but that doesn't mean Nick isn't an absolute dbag.

the hand he got jungle to fold the aq trip aces is the first one i've seen. other than that it's basically been him coolering people and bragging about how well he played.

Owning Mariano TT versus KK comes to mind for me not reraising pre knowing exactly where he’s at with a premium then value town trapping him for 100k on the river. Or how he seems to get the best of amateurs like Pepe and Bill and keep them happy over and over

I stopped watching HCL since November 2022, since Nik Arcot (Nik Airball) started appearing regularly on the stream. Since then, he has appeared on almost every Friday show (the high stakes show), and has basically ruined every stream and made them unwatchable, particularly not for 6 hours. I stopped watching HCL entirely until last Friday, when I noticed Nik Airball was not in that game's lineup and found myself really enjoying the stream.

From comments on YouTube and the stream's live chats, I can see that the overwhelming majority share strong negative sentiments about Nik. It is also quite obvious that many players don't enjoy playing with Nik. So why does one player get to ruin the experience of everyone else (the audience and other players)?


His brand of behavior is quite clearly rooted in deep seated insecurity and inherent meanness The result is
- constant need to talk, to get attention
- constant wild, nervous laughter at his own jokes. He creates his own laugh track, worried that others won't laugh
- constant need to bully, attack, and insult others.
- speaking in Mandarin Chinese at random moments at the table, to show off his multilingual skills and to get Chinese players to like him. Even the Chinese players find it awkward/cringy because they can speak English and wonder why Nik is speaking Chinese to them. It all feels disingenuous and fake.
- his jokes and behaviors are unsophisticated and immature. There is no finesse. Only his mean spirit and insecurity shows


He acts like a baller but it all seems fake.
- he claims to be an investment banker. that is fine, but the truth is that he works for bottom tier investment banking firms. If he comes from money, he would more likely be at a bulge bracket bank, elite boutique, or in private equity on the buy-side.
- at 26-27 years old, he would be at the Associate 1 or 2 level in an investment bank. At his type of firm, he would at best be pulling in around $200k a year, all-in including bonuses.
- so his day job definitely cannot support his poker at the stakes he is playing at
- why would he still work in investment banking if he has such a big bankroll already? 95% of bankers toil 90+ hour work weeks purely for the money.
- and if he is really still working in ibanking, where does he find the time to appear on a poker stream so early EVERY Friday.and EVEN sometimes on weekdays, AND go without his phone for 6-7 hours? As an Associate level banker, he'd still be in the office until late on Fridays AND he'd have to have constant access to his phone in case his MD or VP needs to contact him about a live deal.
- if his bankroll came from a rich family, why would he still be toiling for 200k a YEAR at a bottom tier firm? remember, this is a guy buying in for 500k every WEEK for a poker game. If his family was willing to fund his poker playing, wouldn't they be more than willing to give him seed money to start his own investment vehicle?

Normally it doesn't/shouldn't matter what a poker player's background is or where his bankroll comes from. We are just here to play and watch poker. But when a player starts acting like the way Nik does, it does make him open to scrutiny.

To Nick, Ryan of HCL if you read this: Get Nik Airball off your televised lineups. He is ruining our experience as the audience, the experiences of your players, and ultimately your stream/franchise.

Nik owned Jungleman's soul, putting on a clinic that exposed that some online beasts crumble when put under some live game skillz pressure.

that's not really outplaying mariano though. it's flopping a set vs an overpair. outplaying him would have been no ten on the board and he gets mariano to fold.

i mean he flops the nut straight vs button clickers top set in a 3 bet bot and still runs his mouth about it weeks later. it reminds me of the people who think they outplayed someone when " i got him to put his money in with kings and against my aces preflop".

Nik's great at knowing where he is in a hand, a skill which is under rated by online players who are used to playing much higher volume at not as high stakes. Playing low volume at much higher stakes makes knowing where you are in a hand extremely important.

I noticed that Doug Polk going back a little bit in time on live streams, played 100% GTO in cash, now he combines some exploitative play and his results are much better. Doug's also learned the live player pool and their tendencies, something that Nik is great at too.
He's making a lot of opponents look quite ordinary. Nik v Andy Stacks and Nik v Garrett Adelstein will be very interesting battles as and when they happen, because both of those players have very good live skills and are way harder to put on tilt than people like Jungleman and Ben Lamb are.

Trust funds are fun though so I can kinda see his point

he was quite sharp to know his set was good

PPD, is that you?