The Hustler Casino Live Million Dollar Game has been pulled from its planned May 20-22 dates in Los Angeles. The $1,000,000 minimum buy-in cash game will now take place on June 12 at Horseshoe Las Vegas as part of a new joint venture called WSOP High Stakes Live.
The collaboration brings together NSUS Group, the parent company of GGPoker, the world’s largest poker room, and the World Series of Poker, with High Stakes Poker Productions (HSPP), the company behind Hustler Casino Live. GGPoker is sponsoring the headline $1 million event.
Six livestreamed cash games will run across three consecutive June weekends at the Horseshoe. Producer Ryan Feldman described the series as a “test run” for turning HCL into a multi-venue streaming network.
What Is WSOP High Stakes Live
WSOP High Stakes Live is a co-branded production that will install a dedicated livestream cash game table at Horseshoe Las Vegas, placed alongside the WSOP feature tables during the 2026 World Series. It is not being marketed under the Hustler Casino Live name.
“It’s not Hustler Casino Live,” Feldman told reporters when the news broke on April 24. “We’re going to call it WSOP High Stakes Live.”
- Joint venture: NSUS Group (GGPoker/WSOP parent) and High Stakes Poker Productions (Hustler Casino Live).
- Venue: Horseshoe Las Vegas, alongside the WSOP feature tables.
- Schedule: six livestreamed cash games across three consecutive weekends in June 2026.
- Headline event: Million Dollar Game IV on June 12 with a $1,000,000 minimum buy-in, sponsored by GGPoker.
- Branding: the Vegas streams will run under the WSOP High Stakes Live name, not the Hustler Casino Live brand.
The separate branding is a strategic choice. By spinning the Vegas show out under a different name, Feldman keeps the door open to add new venues, tour stops, or partner casinos under additional banners without diluting the LA-based flagship.
Full Schedule and Buy-in Levels
The series spans three consecutive weekends for a total of six stream days. Five of those days will host games Feldman expects to fall in the $50,000 to $100,000 buy-in range. The centrepiece is the Million Dollar Game on June 12.
| Date | Event | Buy-in | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fri, June 5 | WSOP High Stakes Live #1 | TBA ($50K-$100K) | Lineup pending |
| Sat, June 6 | WSOP High Stakes Live #2 | TBA ($50K-$100K) | Lineup pending |
| Fri, June 12 | Million Dollar Game IV | $1,000,000 minimum | GGPoker-sponsored |
| Sat, June 13 | WSOP High Stakes Live #4 | TBA ($50K-$100K) | Lineup pending |
| Fri, June 19 | WSOP High Stakes Live #5 | TBA ($50K-$100K) | Lineup pending |
| Sat, June 20 | WSOP High Stakes Live #6 | TBA ($50K-$100K) | Lineup pending |
The MDG IV format stays the same as previous editions: $500/$1,000 No-Limit Hold’em with a $2,000 big-blind ante. Specific buy-in levels for the five non-MDG streams have not been finalised.
“One of the games, on June 12, will be a Million Dollar Game,” Feldman said. “So, instead of running the Million Dollar Game in May, we’re going to do it in Las Vegas at the WSOP.”
Confirmed Players and Lineup Status
Three players have been publicly confirmed for the June 12 Million Dollar Game. No names have been announced for the five non-MDG stream days.
- Alan Keating: confirmed for the June 12 Million Dollar Game. The most consistent MDG participant across all three previous editions.
- Santhosh Suvarna: confirmed for MDG IV. A regular on both Hustler Casino Live and High Stakes Poker.
- Phong 'Turbo' Nguyen: confirmed for MDG IV. Known for aggressive play on HCL high-stakes streams.
- Daniel Negreanu: pledged in March 2025 to return to high-stakes streaming under the NSUS partnership. No specific June date confirmed yet.
Feldman acknowledged the lineup is still in flux. “We don’t have a full lineup yet, but I’ve talked to a bunch of people and I’m pretty confident,” he said.
No on-record social media reaction has surfaced from Tom Dwan, Phil Ivey, Eric Persson, Wesley Fei, Doug Polk, Patrik Antonius, Garrett Adelstein, or Nik Airball about the Vegas move.
The high-stakes player pool will already be in Las Vegas for the WSOP, which was the key motivation behind the relocation.
Why the move matters for lineups: MDG III in April 2025 struggled to assemble a full table and had to drop its Day 2 buy-in to $500,000. Staging the event during WSOP, when every relevant player is already on the ground in Las Vegas, is Feldman’s direct solution to that problem.
The NSUS Deal That Made This Possible
The June series cannot be understood without the corporate plumbing that went in fourteen months earlier. On March 5, 2025, NSUS Group announced a strategic partnership with HSPP that was, in substance, an equity purchase.
NSUS bought out the stake formerly held by HSPP co-founder Nick Vertucci, who had stepped away from the company in October 2024.
NSUS is the parent company of GGPoker that completed a major investment in Hustler Casino Live and a $500 million acquisition of the WSOP brand from Caesars in late 2024.
- Date: March 5, 2025.
- Structure: NSUS Group acquired the equity stake previously held by HSPP co-founder Nick Vertucci, who left the company in October 2024.
- Financial terms: not publicly disclosed. Neither NSUS nor HSPP has confirmed the ownership percentage or purchase price.
- Operational control: Ryan Feldman retained day-to-day management of HCL and HSPP. NSUS positioned itself as a strategic investor.
When that 2025 deal was announced, Feldman framed it as a growth play. “This partnership with NSUS marks an exciting new chapter for High Stakes Poker Productions,” he said at the time. WSOP High Stakes Live is the first concrete operational result of that chapter.
Feldman’s Network Vision for HCL
The strategic logic Feldman has outlined goes well beyond a single relocated cash game. He is pitching WSOP High Stakes Live as the first step toward turning HSPP into a multi-venue streaming operation.
“It’s like our test run,” Feldman said. “This is the first time that we can transition our overall product from just being this show Hustler Casino Live to a network concept.”
Feldman elaborated on the broader vision.
“For a while now, we’ve been thinking about how to expand and do things beyond Hustler Casino Live. And what we landed on was the idea of streaming cash games at different events. So, the first step in doing that is WSOP this summer.”
The ambition traces back to comments he made when the NSUS deal closed in March 2025. At the time, he said the partnership would give HSPP the ability to be “more of a global company” and to do “more things in the live streaming space.”
He has previously described the long-term goal as building something resembling “the ESPN of poker”: 24/7 cash game content from multiple venues worldwide.
The branding decision supports that trajectory. By not calling the Vegas streams “HCL: Las Vegas,” Feldman can plug a new partner casino or tour stop under a third or fourth banner without any brand confusion.
Mega Cash Mania Fills the May Gap
To keep the LA studio active during the original MDG window, HSPP announced a replacement event four days before the WSOP partnership news broke. Mega Cash Mania runs May 14-15, 2026 at Hustler Casino in Gardena, California.
The format is a $100,000 minimum buy-in game at $500/$1,000 No-Limit Hold’em plus side games, essentially HCL’s standard High Stakes Friday stretched over two consecutive days. The confirmed lineup reads as a who’s who of recent HCL regulars:
- Alan Keating
- Yijing 'Britney' Wang
- Phong 'Turbo' Nguyen
- Jibrael Hindi
- Jake Brander
- Sam 'Senor Tilt' Kiki
- ICTMoxie
- Stanley Tang (DoorDash co-founder)
Additional names are expected. HCL will stream Mega Cash Mania on its YouTube channel under its standard schedule.
In a notable break from past practice, Hustler Casino Live will not go on summer hiatus this year. HCL will continue regular Monday-through-Thursday programming out of Hustler Casino while the WSOP High Stakes Live weekends absorb Friday-Saturday production at the Horseshoe.
HSPP has not disclosed how the production team will be split between the two venues.
How June Fits the WSOP 2026 Calendar
The 57th Annual World Series of Poker runs May 26 to July 15, 2026 at Horseshoe Las Vegas and Paris Las Vegas, per the official WSOP schedule, with 100 live bracelet events ranging from $300 to $250,000. You can see the full WSOP 2026 bracelet schedule in our earlier coverage.
Feldman’s June 5-20 window slots cleanly into the meat of the bracelet schedule. But one calendar collision stands out: the $250,000 Super High Roller begins on June 13, the day after Million Dollar Game IV and on the same day as a WSOP High Stakes Live stream.
Top high-stakes pros will face a real choice between chasing a $250K bracelet and sitting in a $1 million cash game. That conflict may shape how Feldman’s still-incomplete Vegas lineup fills out.
The Main Event itself begins July 2. Under a new ESPN broadcast deal for the Main Event, the final table is delayed until August 3-5 for prime-time television. That delay is the first of its kind since the “November Nine” era ended in 2016.
WSOP 2026 key dates: The series runs May 26 to July 15. WSOP High Stakes Live occupies the June 5-20 window. The Main Event starts July 2, with the final table delayed to August 3-5 for ESPN prime-time broadcast.
Million Dollar Game History
The $1 million minimum buy-in livestream was a Feldman invention, launched in May 2023 as the first of its kind anywhere in the world. The event has produced some of the most-watched moments in poker streaming history, but has also faced persistent challenges assembling a full table.
- MDG I (May 2023): the inaugural edition. Million Dollar Game veteran Tom Dwan won a $3,081,000 pot against Wesley Fei, still the largest in televised poker history.
- MDG II (May 2024): featured Dwan, Doug Polk, Dan Cates, Suvarna, Rampage, and Keating. Peter Wang netted roughly $5 million across the event.
- MDG III (April 2025): struggled to fill a complete table. The Day 2 buy-in was dropped from $1 million to $500,000. Keating won approximately $1.92 million.
The pattern is clear. Each edition has delivered headline-grabbing moments, but the pool of players willing to put up $1 million for a cash game remains thin.
Moving MDG IV to Las Vegas during WSOP, when every relevant high-stakes player is already in the same city, is Feldman’s most direct attempt to solve that problem.
What to Watch as June Approaches
The Million Dollar Game’s relocation is being marketed as a one-event move. But it is more accurately read as the operational debut of HSPP as a touring production company, bankrolled by the WSOP’s owners and supported by their ability to deliver players, venue access, and sponsorship.
- GGPoker ambassador attendance: whether Negreanu and other NSUS-backed players actually sit down at the table is the implicit return on investment for the partnership.
- Non-MDG stream lineups: if Feldman cannot publish specific buy-ins and confirmed names for the five secondary stream days by mid-May, it would echo the lineup-assembly struggles of MDG III.
- Second venue announcement: Feldman has framed WSOP High Stakes Live as a test run. A second location before the end of 2026 would convert the network concept from rhetoric into reality.
If WSOP High Stakes Live delivers its six streams cleanly, the Hustler Casino studio in Gardena will, for the first time, no longer be the ceiling on what HCL can be.
