It was early for poker players at the South Point Casino in Las Vegas, but not for the security guards, who looked like they had put in 300 consecutive 40-hour weeks protecting the interests of the guests and their employer. On this morning in May, one after another, the guards in their deep-black uniforms took the escalator up from the casino floor and walked to a room where the latest set of
High Stakes Poker was built. They carried to the table with cameras embedded in its top and on it clear plastic boxes filled with bricks of cash and casino chips that totaled at least $500,000 - each.
Behind this set, Patrik Antonius, David Benyamine, Doyle Brunson, Antonio Esfandiari, Sammy Farha, Jamie Gold, Barry Greenstein,
Cirque du Soleil creator Guy Laliberte, and Daniel Negreanu took their places in front of a makeup artist to be prepped for one of the best poker shows on television.
High Stakes Poker, which began airing its fourth season on Aug. 27 on
GSN, is the only show that tries to bring big-league cash poker games to those of us who get the sweats when facing a $120 reraise.
In a country where the average household income is about $46,000, watching poker players sit down with bricks of their own money and casually bet and raise many times that amount on hands that could crumble into dust with a flip of the dealer's wrist is a bit like watching trapeze artists perform high above a gasping crowd. The tricks these players perform, in their own stratospheres, amaze the recreational players among us and make those who are stretching to make ends meet shake their heads in disbelief.
Over the past three seasons,
High Stakes Poker has concocted a clinic of slick and sick play that has developed a cult following of viewers who tune in every Monday at 9 p.m. EST to watch these tricks.
And when a player plays a hand perfectly, manipulating his opponent's mind into thinking he has the best of it when he most definitely doesn't, when he takes that gray matter and ties it into a Boy Scout knot, it makes fans want to stand and applaud. It's Freddy Deeb calling a $50,000 Daniel Negreanu bluff with second pair and a weak kicker. It's Eli Elezra pushing hard with the 6
2
after pairing his deuce to chase Erick Lindgren off a flush draw. It's Brad Booth putting Phil Ivey all in for $300,000 with only 4 high (your kings were good, Phil). Sometimes it looks like magic, only better, because we know there are no false bottoms, and when someone's chip stack gets sawed in half, it hurts.
Trouble in River City
Exhibit A: Everywhere Daniel Negreanu goes, people want to know how it felt to get one-outed by Gus Hansen on national TV in a pot that cost him $287,000. That hand that took place in the second season showed just how rough poker can be, and also how devastatingly beautiful this game really is. Here's what happened:
Holding pocket fives, Hansen bet $2,100 into a $1,700 pot. Holding pocket sixes, Negreanu popped it for another $2,900. Hansen instantly called. The flop came 9
6
5
, and it looked like Hansen was driving the car that was about to be T-boned by Negreanu. Hansen checked and Negreanu easily tossed out an $8,000 bet. Hansen rubbed his temple, reached for chips, and raised to $26,000. Negreanu waited a few seconds before uncrossing his arms and tossing a bundle of cash into the pot. It landed with a mild thump. There was now $63,700 in the pot.
The turn was the case 5. Negreanu, one of the world's most likable players, had just taken a fist to the face. It made Gabe Kaplan, longtime poker player and play-by-play announcer for
High Stakes Poker, exclaim: "Wow! Gus has made quads. This is trouble, trouble in River City, for Daniel Negreanu."
Hansen bet out $24,000. Negreanu later said that he thought he was good at that point, but he wanted Hansen to think he was holding a big pair, so he squirmed and "Hollywooded" a bit before calling the bet. The pot was now $111,700. With one turn of the card, Negreanu went from a 94 percent favorite to win the hand to a 98 percent underdog.
The 8
on the river only complicated things for Negreanu. The board now read 9
6
5
5
8
, a four-straight that both players loved. Acting first, Hansen gave up control of the pot (for the time being) by checking to the aggressive Negreanu. During the hand, we watched Negreanu go from heroic victor to roadkill in less than a second, and at this point, he didn't know it. Holecard cameras enable viewers to predict the future, and viewers metaphorically watched Negreanu being slowly lowered into a wood chipper.
Sick.
Negreanu slowly reached for cash and chips, took $65,000 worth, and gently placed it in the pot. Hansen placed his head in his hand, and with no emotion, said: "I'm all in," for $167,000 more. Negreanu then stood, and slid his hands into the pockets of his khaki pants. Someone - it might have been Negreanu - swore, but it was loudly bleeped out. It only added to the tension. The only thing missing was a flashing red light.
The pot now stood at $408,700. Negreanu then took his seat, laughed, and said: "I better have something if I'm going to call, right?" The thing is, he did. He smiled (smiled!) as he counted out $167,000 in yellow chips over and over again. Then he stood, stopped smiling, said, "167, right?" and with one motion and two hands, moved his chips into the pot.
"Oh, it's so sick," he said, watching as the dealer shoved $575,700 toward Hansen.
This seven-and-a-half-minute clip is posted on
YouTube no less than 10 times. The clip has been viewed more than 1.6 million times. Thousands of hours are wasted on daily commutes by people slowing down to gawk at a traffic accident, proving over and over that people like to watch. The guy who once took a wicked beat to lose a couple of hundred smackaroos takes solace in Negreanu's misery. He thinks, I'm not the only one. Yes, Daniel, it is sick - deliciously, deliciously sick.
Despite losing all of that cash in a single hand that will most likely be talked about for the rest of Negreanu's poker career, he summed the hand up this way: "It didn't bug me at all." Negreanu hasn't had much luck on
High Stakes Poker, and he points out that he's managed only one winning season out of the four so far.
"If you look at my
High Stakes Poker career so far, it's really kind of a bizarre phenomenon that without question, I've taken the most horrendously sick cold-deck beats in several situations," he said. "Nothing surprises me anymore, let's put it that way."
That hand showed the world why Negreanu thinks
High Stakes Poker displays how beautiful the game can be.
"It's pretty clear that anyone who's a poker player who has any real interest in the game will find
High Stakes Poker to be the number-one poker show on television, period," Negreanu said. "I think it is a good show, and I enjoy watching it. It's actually the show I use when teaching players to play."
As for this hand in particular, it defines why
High Stakes Poker is the show of choice for Negreanu.
"There was so much going on, aside from the fact that it was just a cold deck. There were so many tricky plays that happened during that hand that made it one that I really look back at. It's interesting because Gus maximized his hand by completely misreading mine."
And then he laughed, just a little, as if to say, "That's poker, baby."
Maybe the biggest component of the show's success, even more than the amount of cash the players are risking in each and every hand, are the players themselves. The producers of High Stakes Poker work hard to assemble a group of players who interact, will play hands in an unorthodox way, will laugh and hoot, and are artists of the game. It's an art form unto itself to assemble a good game, and that task has fallen to a veteran professional poker player named Mori Eskandani.
The Matchmaker
The
High Stakes Poker production team is led by three men: Eskandani, Henry Orenstein, and Eric Drache. Orenstein is the man credited with inventing and centering shows around the holecard camera, which has changed poker TV - and consequentially, poker, period - forever. Drache and Eskandani are the two men behind POKER-PRO-ductions, a poker show consulting company that is responsible for the texture of many of the poker shows on TV, including the
Poker Superstars Invitational series, the
NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship, and
Poker After Dark.
Eskandani is a poker insider who loves the game and prides himself in doing a fantastic job at this TV poker production gig, despite coming to the game late in life through his friendship with Orenstein.
High Stakes Poker came about almost by chance. After wrapping up production on a "gimmick" poker show for
GSN a few years ago, Eskandani was having dinner with several
GSN executives at Bellagio when Johnny Chan came by and told them a story about losing a $750,000 pot to Phil Ivey. A few days later, Eskandani got a call from
GSN, asking if he'd be able to make a show featuring pots of that size. He told them that pots like that don't happen every day, but that they'd be able to put together a cash game that would show the best players playing with their own money.
GSN told him to go for it, and ordered one season. The rest, as Eskandani says, is history.
Getting players to take part was easy, said Eskandani, who has slipped into the role of part casting agent and part poker guru with ease.
"Everyone saw the merits of how real poker would look on television," he stated. "It's easy to be a casting agent, because I have played with these players my whole life."
For the most part, the players who are picked to play are players who are capable of playing any two cards, can mix their games up, and don't sit there for hours waiting for the magical pocket aces that appear every 220 hands. They are action players, players who like to gamble. It's these people whom poker fans love to watch.
"Our thought process is to really look for the pros who are capable of that style," Eskandani said.
It also helps when players know each other, which is the case with the core group of players who have been
High Stakes Poker regulars since season one. The formula is simple.
"We try to mix and match people who are familiar with each other, who play action poker, and who have personalities that are good for TV. If you do that, you shouldn't have any problems producing good shows."
Every day, players come up to Eskandani and ask him if they can get on the show; so many, in fact, that the producers are seriously debating whether or not they should raise the minimum buy-in of $100,000.
"There's a good chance that it will go up," Eskandani stated.
The special $500,000 game that will be featured this season wasn't at all hard to get organized, Eskandani said. He simply walked through Bobby's Room, floated the idea to a few pros there, and before he knew it, he had eight seats filled, with four other players pacing around South Point's studio waiting to get in. They never did.
Fans of
High Stakes Poker know that one of the most important components of the show are the players who are not pros but have enough cash to sit and play with the best. These amateurs add a bit of spice to
High Stakes Poker that keeps the show from becoming just a high-stakes poker exhibition. These guys have more money to lose than anyone else. It's like a fantasy camp for them, and it keeps the show and the game interesting.
Eskandani hears about these players all the time. He receives e-mail from them. When he hears about rich amateurs who may be good for the show, he goes and plays with them. It doesn't take him long to learn if they could hang with the big boys beneath all of those hot lights.
"Here's the thing: Pros don't go to play cash games to enhance their skills. People play cash games to win money from recreational players. Recreational players play the cash games to come and knock heads with the top pros," Eskandani said. "The chips in front of them are just toys."
Millions Mean Nothing
Jamie Gold, the 2006
World Series of Poker main-event champion, and Brian Brandon have two things in common. They both are thrilled to be able to play with the best of the best on a show they both know and love. Gold needs no introduction, only a qualifier. Although he's the champion who won the largest live poker tournament in world history, he still believes he's just starting to figure out the game, and is in awe of the players he gets to play against on High Stakes Poker. He is a poker fan living a fan's dream.
"I definitely walked in as a fan. It's been only a year since I played in the
World Series. Before that, I was a huge fan. I watched every episode of
High Stakes Poker. I never dreamed about being on the show; I never thought I would have an opportunity to play at that level."
Running up to the main event, he played $20-$40 no-limit hold'em at Commerce Casino, a game in which players sit with $5,000 to $20,000. Gold used to sit with around $5,000 that he won in tournaments, which is quite different from the $100,000 minimum buy-in on
High Stakes Poker. He said he was a break-even cash-game player at that time.
The $500,000 game was something completely different for Gold. It was, by far, the most money he had ever put into play.
"I will never play in a game if I'm afraid to lose that kind of money. You have to plan on the fact that that money may all go away."
But Gold got lucky on the day before the largest game in
High Stakes Poker history took place. He had a great session and built a bankroll to play in the game, so he did.
"I would not have sat in that game with my own money. If I hadn't been so successful the day before, I wouldn't have been so bold," Gold said.
People will have to tune in to see how Gold did in the $500,000 buy-in game.
Brandon, on the other hand, has won and lost millions of dollars in a single day, but not at the poker table. Since he's spent years on the floor trading curriencies, he's experienced swings that would put most poker players to bed for a week with a bottle of Jack Daniel's. The money does not faze him.
"I'm one of those guys who TiVos every episode and watches it two or three times. It's true poker. The real money changes everything," Brandon said. "For some reason, there's a purity to that, and that's where I wanted to play."
Brandon fits Eskandani's mold of the perfect rich amateur player to a T. He takes the game very seriously, has plenty of money to burn, is as competitive as anyone around, and is an action-sports type of guy, a thrill seeker who is willing to pop guys like Phil Hellmuth in the mouth with a $65,000 reraise.
The 37-year-old Brandon has played in $100-$200 no-limit hold'em games at The Venetian, and also high-stakes games in Miami and Chicago. He's faced most of the guys who have appeared on
High Stakes Poker in tournaments, which he says he doesn't play a lot.
"I'd rather get in there and throw a couple hundred grand on the table and say, 'Hey, let's play,'" he said.
And that's what he did, and apparently that rubbed at least one of the pros the wrong way. What happened between Brandon and Hellmuth, who Brandon said confronted him during a break while a tape change took place, will soon be aired. Brandon said that he took some issues with him, and decided to see if he could take a bite out of Hellmuth's stack.
Brandon hinted at something big, and we'll all know what happened soon enough. Welcome back,
High Stakes Poker. You're the best.
