This interview isn’t about strategy or historic moments at the table. It’s a conversation about identity. About what it means to find your place in the poker world, even if it's not at the tables. Joe reveals himself as someone not defined by titles or bankroll but by the ability to make others laugh while sincerely discussing personal insecurities, pressures, and inner dilemmas. It’s an interview that might make you laugh but will surprise you with its depth.
The Commentator Afraid of Big Pots
Right at the start, Joe admits: “I don’t like playing poker. I love commentating, but playing stresses me out.” It seems paradoxical that someone who watches hundreds of hands daily, knows player tendencies, and understands exactly what the “right” move is... still feels uncomfortable at the table.
It’s not a lack of courage. It’s more about loving the game differently. Not through risk, but through observation, humor, and connecting with the audience. As he says, when he’s at the commentator’s mic, he’s in “God mode.” He doesn’t have to play well or bluff. He just watches and comments. And that’s where he excels.
Laughter as Survival
Joe Stapleton is a comedian – but not one who’ll walk over others for laughs. In the interview, he reflects on years spent finding the line between what’s funny and what might hurt someone. He admits that not every joke from the past would be repeated today. Not just because the world has changed, but because he has.
To be funny but never cruel is his goal. And when someone confides that they fall asleep during his broadcasts regularly, he doesn’t take it as an insult. On the contrary, “In today's chaos, it’s a huge compliment,” he says.
Poker Without Competitiveness?
In one of the most intriguing parts of the podcast, Joe admits something almost taboo in the poker world: he lacks a competitive spirit. He doesn’t care who wins. He doesn’t want to dominate or push hard. And when there’s a woman in the room catching all the men's attention, Joe sits aside. He doesn’t play that game. In poker or life.
His domain is home cash games. €1/€2, beer, friends, and jokes. Not solvers, ICM, or bluff catch analysis. And perhaps that’s the charm, Stapes loves poker when it’s fun. Not when it’s a performance.
What’s Next?
Joe has also ventured outside the poker world, the comic Trapped, featuring a protagonist who... unsurprisingly, is a poker commentator. In essence, it’s a fictionalized version of his story, a man who thought he should be “someone bigger” but realized that what he had was actually quite a lot.
When Olga asks what could reignite interest in poker, his answer isn’t a call to study solvers. Joe talks about a poker series that could do what Queen’s Gambit did for chess. What we’re missing are stories. Heroes. Drama. Fun.
This isn’t a conversation about winning the next high roller. It’s about why we sit at the table in the first place. And it might show you that poker doesn’t have to be only about EV and GTO, but also about people, laughter, and stories that last longer than the hands themselves. Enjoy the full podcast with Joe Stapleton here:
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