A poker game in a Texas card club recently led to a fistfight involving former NFL running back and Oklahoma Sooners star Adrian Peterson.
The fisticuffs occurred at JokerStars poker club in Houston on May 27, and video of the incident was released Thursday by TMZ Sports. The video shows Peterson and another player squaring off as another man attempts to intervene.
However, the two continue throwing punches as the fight spills out across the poker room, knocking over several chairs in the process. Both men appear to land punches. Peterson, 40, told TMZ that he and a poker buddy had a disagreement and that “one thing led to another.”
The hand-to-hand action reportedly left both combatants bloody. Peterson said that alcohol played a role in the fracas, but both men now seemed to have resolved their differences.
“Me and the guy, we’re cool,” Peterson said. “We’ve known each other. It was literally like a brother situation. We agreed to disagree, we had our words, and we threw blows – and that was it.
“I felt really bad. It’s a situation where I kind of regret it.”
According to TMZ, the police weren’t called and neither player received a punishment from the poker club. Watch the fight below.
Former #NFL superstar #AdrianPeterson got into a fistfight with a poker player following a dispute over a hand … and #TMZSports has obtained video of the tussle. pic.twitter.com/WdhcZFHwBt
— TMZ Sports (@TMZ_Sports) June 19, 2025
Peterson Spending A Lot Of Time On The Felt
Peterson was last in the NFL in 2021 for the Seahawks, but only played in a single game. After 10 seasons with the Minnesota Vikings, he then played for the Saints, Cardinals, Commanders, Lions, and Titans.
A longtime poker player, Peterson seems to have taken up the game more after retirement. In 2010, Phil Hellmuth co-hosted a charity event with Peterson at the Aria in Las Vegas . He also hosted another charity event in Dallas in 2011.
In January, Peterson has also played in the PokerGO Studio as part of the Celebrity Poker Tour. He finished ninth in a CPT event in 2024 and then took sixth for $3,500 in another one last November.
“I started out playing hold’em in high school and then played for 10, 15 years,” he told PokerGO. “Then I learned about PLO … so I’ve been playing that a lot more, but I always go back and forth and (also still) play hold’em.”
The fight comes after Peterson was ordered by a Houston judge in September to turn over assets to settle a $12 million debt. The issue stems from a $5.2 million loan that the former NFL MVP took out in 2016. Penalties, interest, and attorney’s fees have accumulated since then to make the debt much larger, according to reports.
