Kevin Martin: Poker Streamer, GGPoker Ambassador and Big Brother Canada Winner
POKER HALL OF FAME
Inducted 2014
Kevin Martin has built one of poker's more unusual modern careers, combining tournament poker, live streaming, reality television and poker content creation. The Canadian player, widely known as "Kmart," became an early poker streamer on Twitch, won Big Brother Canada Season 5 and later established himself as a GGPoker ambassador and recognizable personality within the online poker community.
Martin's tournament résumé does not revolve around major championship titles or World Series of Poker bracelets. His broader significance comes from the audience he has built around the game, his longevity as a poker broadcaster and his ability to connect poker with reality-competition entertainment.
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Who Is Kevin Martin?
Kevin Martin is a Canadian professional poker player, streamer and content creator. His GGPoker profile lists him as a Content Ambassador and credits him with five Canadian poker event titles.
Martin's poker career began relatively recently compared with many established professionals. According to GGPoker, he played his first poker hand in 2014, immersed himself in strategy and eventually left his work as a radio DJ to pursue poker full time.
He initially played small-stakes cash games in Canadian casinos before shifting more attention toward online tournaments. That transition eventually positioned him at the intersection of poker and live digital broadcasting just as Twitch was becoming an important platform for the game.
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From Radio DJ to Poker Professional
Before poker became his primary career, Martin worked in radio. PokerNews described him in a 2016 feature as a former rock-radio DJ from Lethbridge, Alberta, who moved into small-stakes professional poker.
His development coincided with a major change in the way poker audiences consumed the game. Instead of relying exclusively on televised tournaments and edited poker shows, viewers were increasingly watching players broadcast online sessions live while explaining decisions and interacting with chat.
Martin became one of the early players to build a substantial audience through that format. PokerNews dates his poker streaming career to 2015, making him part of the first generation of recognizable Twitch poker personalities.
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Big Brother Canada and Mainstream Recognition
Martin's public profile extends well beyond poker.
He first competed on Big Brother Canada Season 3 and returned for Season 5 in 2017. On his second appearance, Martin won the season and its C$100,000 top prize.
His reality-television experience became closely connected with his poker identity. The strategic and social elements of Big Brother gave Martin exposure to an audience far larger than the traditional poker community, while his poker background became part of his public persona.
That crossover between poker, streaming and reality competition would remain an important theme throughout his career.
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Kevin Martin's Poker Streaming Career
Martin became particularly influential through poker streaming rather than through a conventional résumé of major live titles.
He joined Team PokerStars Online in 2016 while building his Twitch audience. After leaving PokerStars in 2019, he had a brief association with partypoker Team Online before joining GGPoker's GGSquad in October 2020.
His work as a broadcaster earned formal industry recognition. At the Global Poker Awards honoring the 2022 poker year, Martin won the Best Streamer award.
The award reflected a career built around making poker accessible as live entertainment. Streaming allows viewers to follow extended sessions, observe tournament decisions and experience the swings of online poker alongside the player rather than seeing only selected hands from a finished television production.
Martin has continued to work in that area as both a player and content personality. GGPoker currently identifies him as one of its Content Ambassadors.
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Kevin Martin's Tournament Results and Live Earnings
Martin has also accumulated a substantial live tournament record.
As of October 18, 2026, The Hendon Mob's Kevin Martin record lists $490,534 in total live tournament earnings. These are recorded gross cashes, not profit or net worth; online results are separate. Tournament-database totals can change as new results are added or records are reconciled.
Martin's largest listed live score came at the 2023 WSOP Paradise series in the Bahamas. He finished 25th in the Main Event Championship for $72,200.
That result surpassed several earlier five-figure scores.
In 2018, Martin finished runner-up in the Run It Up Reno VII Main Event for $48,210. He also recorded a second-place finish in a $1,100 no-limit hold'em event at the 2018 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure for $36,590.
One year later, he won the 2019 Great Canadian Freeze Out Main Event in Calgary for C$45,000, worth approximately $35,392 in the tournament database.
Those results show that Martin's poker career extends beyond streaming. Although his public profile is closely connected to content creation, he has produced tournament wins and deep finishes across live and online poker.
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Kevin Martin's WSOP Record
Martin has yet to win a World Series of Poker bracelet or WSOP Circuit ring.
As of October 18, 2026, the WSOP player database lists Martin with:
0 WSOP bracelets
0 WSOP Circuit rings
5 final tables
132 cashes
$653,775 in total earnings recorded on his WSOP player page
That WSOP figure should not be confused with live tournament earnings tracked by databases such as The Hendon Mob. The player page uses an All Brands database filter and includes online results as well as live cashes, so its displayed total has a different scope.
Martin reached a notable milestone during the 2025 WSOP Online series on GGPoker when he reached an online bracelet-event final table. He finished eighth in the $500 WSOP Kick-Off after navigating a 4,047-entry field, earning $29,406 including bounty prizes.
He remained active in WSOP competition in 2026. Martin played the $10,000 WSOP Main Event and advanced to Day 3 before being eliminated.
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Game of Gold and Poker Entertainment
Martin's combination of poker experience and reality-TV background made him a natural participant in GGPoker's Game of Gold.
The 2023 series combined poker competition with team-based reality-show elements. Martin competed on a team with Daniel Negreanu, Jason Koon and Michael Soyza during the opening stage.
Their team lost the first competition, resulting in the four players being eliminated from the show.
Game of Gold reinforced Martin's position as a player whose career sits between competitive poker and entertainment. It also brought together two areas in which he already had extensive experience: poker broadcasting and reality competition.
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Playing Style and Poker Identity
Martin is primarily associated with tournament poker, particularly no-limit hold'em, online play and poker streaming.
His public poker identity is less about being classified under a specific technical playing style and more about broadcasting the process of competing. Viewers have been able to follow both successful tournament runs and difficult sessions in real time, giving his content a different character from traditional edited poker programming.
That visibility has made Martin especially recognizable among online poker audiences and newer players who discovered the game through Twitch, YouTube and other digital platforms.
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Poker Wars and Martin's Current Role in Poker
Martin continued combining poker with reality-style entertainment in 2026 by creating Poker Wars.
The competition was announced in May 2026 as a live-streamed poker and social-strategy show scheduled for May 21–24 on Martin's YouTube and Twitch channels. The format incorporated poker alongside alliances, voting, eliminations and other reality-game elements.
Martin designed the project to combine his previous experiences in Big Brother Canada, poker streaming and Game of Gold in a single production.
As of October 2026, Martin remains publicly listed by GGPoker as a Content Ambassador and continues to participate in poker competition and content projects.
His 2026 activity included the WSOP Main Event as well as the announcement of Poker Wars, demonstrating that his role in the industry now extends beyond simply playing or streaming his own tournament sessions.
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Why Kevin Martin Matters in Poker
Kevin Martin's influence on poker is best understood through media and audience development rather than championship totals alone.
He became involved with Twitch poker near the beginning of the platform's emergence as a major way to watch online play. His streams helped demonstrate that poker could function as long-form interactive entertainment, with viewers following decisions, bankroll swings and tournament runs as they happened.
His success outside poker also expanded that reach. Winning Big Brother Canada gave Martin mainstream visibility, while Game of Gold and Poker Wars allowed him to combine poker with the reality-competition format in increasingly direct ways.
Martin therefore occupies a distinctive place in modern poker. He is a tournament player with hundreds of thousands of dollars in recorded live earnings, but his larger footprint comes from helping turn poker play itself into content.
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Frequently Asked Questions
How much has Kevin Martin won in live poker tournaments?
As of October 18, 2026, The Hendon Mob lists Kevin Martin with $490,534 in recorded live tournament earnings. These are gross cashes, not profit or net worth. Career totals can change as additional tournament results are recorded or databases are updated.
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What is Kevin Martin's biggest live poker cash?
Kevin Martin's largest listed live tournament cash is $72,200. He earned it by finishing 25th in the 2023 WSOP Paradise Main Event Championship in the Bahamas.
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How many WSOP bracelets does Kevin Martin have?
Kevin Martin has not won a WSOP bracelet. As of October 18, 2026, the official WSOP player database lists him with zero bracelets and zero WSOP Circuit rings.
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Did Kevin Martin win Big Brother Canada?
Yes. Kevin Martin won Big Brother Canada Season 5 in 2017 after previously competing on Season 3.
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Is Kevin Martin sponsored by GGPoker?
Yes. As of October 2026, GGPoker's official team page lists Kevin Martin as a Content Ambassador.
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What award did Kevin Martin win for poker streaming?
Kevin Martin won Best Streamer at the Global Poker Awards honoring the 2022 poker year. The award recognized his work as one of poker's prominent live content creators.
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What is Poker Wars?
Poker Wars is a poker and reality-competition project created by Kevin Martin. Announced in May 2026, the live-streamed format combined poker with social-strategy elements including alliances, voting and eliminations.