If you’ve watched the World Series of Poker Main Event coverage over the last few years, you’ve no doubt seen Jeff Platt navigating the narrow spaces between the tables conducting interviews and running down the biggest headlines of the day as a sideline reporter.
As a broadcaster and sideline reporter, Platt’s presence at major poker events is almost impossible to avoid at this point – particularly bad news for those superstitious enough to believe in Platt’s apparent superpower as a grim reaper of sorts, swooping in for interviews just before the downfall of his subjects. Jokes aside, Platt has rightfully built a reputation as one of the strongest voices in poker since entering the poker broadcasting space more than five years ago.
But like many who find themselves occupying the broadcast booth, Platt is also a poker player in his own right. He’s made multiple deep runs in the WSOP Main Event, has multiple WSOP bracelet event final tables and a Mid-States Poker Tour title to his credit, accumulating just shy of $800,000 in career lifetime live earnings. Platt’s duties as a sideline reporter have kept him from playing the WSOP Main Event in recent years, but an opportunity to try something new and different came to the forefront, Platt jumped at an opportunity to try something new.
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On Day 1A of the 2024 WSOP Main Event, Platt pulled double duty as both a sideline reporter and a player in the field at the same time.
“It was an amazing experience,” said Platt. “To be honest, I thought it would be because this tournament is so special. I’ve missed playing it over the last couple years. But on the other hand, I’ve enjoyed the work so much. To have the opportunity to both work and play was really special to me. I don’t think I’m exaggerating it. It was incredible, every step of the way – and not just because I did well.”
Platt managed to build his stack from the 60,000 he started with to 96,100 at the end of Day 1A. Simply surviving the day would’ve proved impressive, considering Platt left his table multiple times to conduct interviews and walk around the field.
The PokerGO cameras circled around to Platt’s table regularly to keep tabs on him, and one of the biggest concerns was making sure the other players at his starting table weren’t uncomfortable with the extra attention and the cameras hovering closely around the table.
“It’s an important question, because one thing that we don’t want to do during the Main Event is ruin the player experience in any form,” said Platt. “So right away if people were upset with it, or if they thought it was distracting, then we would have stopped it and figured out some other plan. I would have walked away from the table a little bit more. But in this scenario, everybody seemed to love it. We were talking about it the whole entire time. Fortunately for me, our table was full of PokerGO viewers, so they kind of knew what we were going for. They really enjoyed and appreciated the coverage.
“We’re never going to take a player away from a hand and we’re never going to make him or her do something that he or she doesn’t want to do.”
Platt is back for Day 2ABC Sunday, and plans for more of the same throughout the day as he hopes to continue to pull double duty all the way through to Day 3. As the poker gets to be more serious and the stakes grow as the tournament goes on, it’s natural to wonder when Platt might take a step back from his broadcasting duties and focus on what could eventually become a multi-million dollar opportunity. But from Platt’s perspective, he’s excited at the possibility of carrying this experiment on as long as it could go.
“So my bosses have been telling me like, ‘OK, you know at a certain point we will leave you alone’,” said Platt. “Even our producer Pat McMath, during the last level [of Day 1A], he’s like, ‘I don’t want to bother you. I know you want to bag for Day 2.’ I’m like, ‘I want to work. I genuinely want to do this. Just put me in as much as you possibly can.’ Sure, there’s that dream scenario where you run super deep. Maybe I’d grab the mic a little bit less. But overall, I’ll keep going back to this but it’s just something I’ve really wanted to do.
“Part of this experiment or whatever you want to call it is to is to try to give our viewers an inside look at what playing in the World Series of Poker Main Event is like, because it is the greatest poker tournament in the world. And so I think if we can help the viewer see the tournament through my lens, that’s that’s a huge goal of ours. And I think we’re kind of on that path. This tournament only gets more special as you run deep.”