Phil Hellmuth, Doug Polk, Michael Mizrachi and a number of other big names in poker have announced the launch of a new social media platform named Alligator Blood, aimed squarely at the poker community.
Billed in a press release as “the Facebook for Poker,” the startup opened its waitlist earlier this week for what it describes as a combined social network and directory, designed to bring poker’s scattered online community together in one place rather than leaving it spread across X, Instagram, YouTube, Discord, Reddit and other platforms.
Branded under the strapline “Poker’s Home,” the platform positions itself as a searchable directory where players, creators, cardrooms, podcasts, tools and operators can be found, claimed and connected from launch.
Huge Poker Names Back New Platform
The company lists an eleven-person steering committee acting as both investors and advisors, aiming to represent a cross-section of the poker world in 2026.
Headlined by Hellmuth, Alan Keating, Polk and Mizrachi, the group also includes players, broadcasters and content creators such as Jared Bleznick, Jeff Gross, Xuan Liu, Ryan Feldman, Benjamin Rolle, Kevin Martin and Corey Eyring.
The company is led by Josh Luber, an entrepreneur based in Austin, Texas, who is a longtime recreational poker player and founder of both StockX and Fanatics Collectibles.
Both those businesses were built around already highly organized, highly engaged communities that existed online first, sneakers and trading cards respectively. The parallel being drawn by the founder is that poker already has a similarly fragmented but passionate player and fanbase, just without a single dedicated hub pulling it together in one place.
Hellmuth said: “I’ve invested in over 50 startups, including three of Josh’s previous ventures. I love helping all of my entrepreneurs, but being on the Alligator Blood Steering Committee is the perfect synthesis of opportunity and passion. It’s poker, baby, and I’m Phil Hellmuth. Josh may not need my help for sneakers or trading cards, but together we’re going to change the future of poker.”
What is Alligator Blood… For Now
At least in the initial stages, the statement suggests Alligator Blood will function more as a directory than a full social network. The company describes the initial version as a poker-specific link hub for anyone in the game, closer to an IMDb-style listing than a social feed, with plans to expand into more networked features over time.
Users will not need to be professionals to sign up. In the statement, Luber said: “Poker is already the one game with no barrier between the amateur and the legend. Alligator Blood gives the industry around it that same openness. Every player will have a profile; every fan will have a way in.”
If it works as intended, the platform could well address a common friction point in poker, where finding information about players, streams, cardrooms or staking groups often requires jumping between multiple platforms.
Whether it becomes a regularly used platform or just another profile to set up and forget will come down to execution. The gap it is targeting, though, is a real one that many in the game will recognize.
$100k PLO Flip Aiming to Drive Signups
Fittingly for a poker product, the waitlist comes with a healthy dose of gambling. Sign-ups are open now at alligatorblood.com, with a free-to-play PLO flip offering up to $100,000 in prizes for users who join and refer others.
No official launch date for the full platform has been announced, but it will be released in due course.
Click here to check out Alligator Blood and sign up on the wait list.
Eliot Thomas
Editor, Poker & Casino