You have to watch this show, "High
Stakes Poker," on the Game Show network on cable.
It starts at 1 AM Central, and damn, this is poker that rocks.
Last night, all at one table:
Doyle Brunson, (The Godfather)
Freddie Deeb, (Todd Brunson calls him "The Terrorist")
Barry Greenstein, (Symantec, all $ to charity)
Phil Hellmuth, (Poker Brat, "Johm McEnroe")
Antonio Esfandiari (The Magician) and
Daniel Negreanu, who they call "Kid Poker."
This isn't like any other poker game I've seen.
Besides hard language, the camera records everything.
All the snide comments, all the snarky mutterings under the breath.
They accuse each other of stuff, they argue (and they're
not kidding) but the biggest difference is
they're playing for real money, not chips or trophies, and money is
flying like it was in a tornadoe*.
Daniel Negreanu sat down with a million dollars in cash and had
a run of bad luck.
He'd have a set, the other guy had a straight.
He gets a straight, the other guy (usually Deeb) had a flush.
He gets a flush, the other guy's got a higher flush.
He finally gets the nut flush, Deeb has a full house.
ha ha
Dude, we've all been there, but for less money
When last night's hour ended, Kid Poker was down over $700K
in cash.
He's been losing over $200K
an hour - ha ha - and you thought
YOU sucked at poker.
Then something happened that put The Kid in a good mood - Hellmuth
walks in, bragging
how he's the best in the world and how the others weren't even worth
to sit at his table, and how
he hasn't lost at a cash game but once in the last two years, yaklkity,
yakkity from Hellmuth...
While bragging how great he is, he lost his first three hands to the
tune of $100K
- ha ha - in cash!
If you've ever heard Phil bitch, he's a master, but you haven't heard
his best bitch yet.
Barry Greenstein took his last dollar with four eights, which
had Phil talking to himself!
The best part of the show is that they're DAMN serious about the poker.
This ain't "Poker with the Playmates." This is individual
pots of up to $360K,
so it's damn serious.
The guys are kidding each other, messing around, but it seems more
real because it's so much more intense
because when you have pots of up to $360K
these great players are focused like lasers - and lying about it
I haven't seen a table boss or tournament director, so maybe it's just mob rules.
Several twists to the game:
They do this "straddle" thing, which I only semi-understand.
It's like a third, bigger blind, whichs gives that player the advantage
before the flop.
They also sometimes double up the Turn and the River - two
chances at each card, if
both players agree.
Negreanu was behind Deeb in one of those BIG pots.
Daniel asked Freddie if he wanted to "play
double," and Freddie said, "Sure."
So after Negreanu lost the hand (and about $200K) they removed the
turn and river cards
and dealt a new turn and new river card - which gave
Negreanu a straight ...and half the pot!
Plus, tempers flared - twice.
Someone accused Deeb of "going south" with his chips, which apparently
means they thought
they saw him pull some of his chips off the table, perhaps to minimize
a risk while going, "all in?"
Freddie stopped play, refusing to let play proceed until they cleared
tthings up.
Minutes later, someone told "Skeikan" to move his cards and he got all
huffy and said,
"Don't you tell me what to do, you watch your
ass," kind of talk.
It was the most "honest" game I've ever seen - so I thought I'd spread
the word. You've got the top
15 players - Lederer was there, so was Sammy Farha, the guy who chews
on unlit cigarettes,
and others you'd know, and when they bet, they bet with loaves
of bundled hundred dollar bills.
I don't know about you, but it's a lot easier for me to push a stack
of chips into a pot,
because you lost your money when you bought the cips, right?
Even if I had the nuts, it'd be tough to throw actual cash money
into the pot
and these guys are sometimes betting luxury cars and houses when they
go to place a bet.
Damn, Negreanu just lost another $185Kcash pot to Doyle Brunson's Aces over Fives. Wow!
So if you get the Game Show network, set your TIVO or VCR to "High Stakes
Poker."
It's better than the World Poker Tour and I didn't think
they could be beat.
Bartcop Poker Club
Update:
We
have a nibble at Absolutepoker.com
but I don't want to send
anyone there until I'm sure they'll have a game for us before we make
a deposit.
If you've had a good or bad experience with Absolutepoker.com
let us know right away, OK?