Poker News

Cake Network Explodes with Unabomber Poker

With his trademark sweatshirt and sunglasses Laak is one of the most recognizable poker players in the world but has rarely had a major poker room sponsorship deal.

He mentioned he was thrilled to start Unabomber Poker.

“We knew we wanted to launch the sickest poker site possible," stated Laak.

"By joining a network that focuses on player rewards and accepts players world-wide we knew we would be starting out on the right track. I love getting involved from the ground up.”

Laak burst onto the poker scene by winning the WPT Celebrity Invitational in 2004 and has since made big scores at the WSOP, WPT and Poker After Dark.

The Irish-American most recently outlasted Luke “Full Flush” Schwartz, Mike Sexton and Andy Black to win the PartyPoker.com World Open V for $250,000.

Laak will blog regularly on the Unabomber Poker website.

“The addition for of Unabomber Poker to the Cake Network is cause for great excitement,” said a Cake Network spokesperson. “Phil’s enthusiasm for the game is infectious and brings great energy to the network.”

Cake Poker also launched seven other partner sites including 7Win Poker, Redback Poker, Amsterdams Poker, Safari Poker, Dime Line Sports, Rags2Riches and Burro Poker.

Phil Laak Wins Poker After Dark Nicknames Week

The final episode of Nicknames week on the NBC poker franchise “Poker After Dark” featured Phil “The Unabomber” Laak defeating close friend Antonio “The Magician” Esfandiari heads-up to win $120,000.

UB.com pro Phil “The Poker Brat” Hellmuth was also part of Friday’s three-handed finale of Nicknames week. Holding four big blinds, Hellmuth called pre-flop with K-4 and Esfandiari checked his option with a lowly 8-3. The flop came 9-A-5 and the action went check-check to a deuce on the turn. Once again, both players checked, and the river was an eight, pairing Esfandiari. “The Magician” led out for 1,200 and laughed, exposing the three of diamonds and saying that he had 3-6. Hellmuth came along and promptly dropped to less than one big blind.

Amid Laak and Esfandiari celebrating that Hellmuth had less than one big blind remaining, the UB front man committed his chips and received calls from Esfandiari, who held 10-6 of diamonds, and Laak, who had K-6 of hearts. Both checked the action down to the river, with the board running out 9-4-Q-2-8. Hellmuth needed to beat king-high to stay alive, but instead turned over 5-7 and was sent packing in third place. He told “Poker After Dark” hostess Leeann Tweeden that Laak and Esfandiari were out of line: “When they’re out of line to me, it’s okay because god knows I need some sympathy the way I act.”

Esfandiari was a 7:5 chip leader entering heads-up play against Laak, who put the pedal to the metal throughout the match. “The Unabomber” took the chip lead after calling pre-flop with 8-9 of hearts and watching Esfandiari raise to 3,800 with A-5 of clubs. Laak called to see the flop come Q-9-4 with one club. The action went check-check to an eight of clubs on the turn, giving Laak two pair. He led out for 4,100 and Esfandiari, holding a flush draw, called. The river was the six of diamonds, missing Esfandiari. He checked, Laak bet 10,425, and Esfandiari folded.

Laak never relinquished the lead in the heads-up match on “Poker After Dark.” He flopped top pair and a straight draw with 9-8 on a 5-9-7 board. Esfandiari bet out 5,100 with 4-3 and Laak raised it to 30,000, including two stacks of $100 bills. Esfandiari mucked and Laak raked in yet another pot.

Esfandiari, whose boisterous laughter when Hellmuth was on the short stack changed to raw frustration heads-up against Laak, checked his option with 4-3 after Laak called pre-flop with K-5 of hearts. The flop came down 6-4-2 and Esfandiari fired out 1,800 chips. Laak called and the turn was a three, completing his straight and giving Esfandiari two pair. “The Magician” bet 5,100 and Laak called to see an ace on the river. Esfandiari bet 11,200, Laak insta-raised all-in, and Esfandiari mucked, lamenting, “It’s amazing how lucky you are.” At that point, Laak held a 5:2 advantage in chips.

On the final hand of Nicknames week on “Poker After Dark,” Esfandiari called pre-flop with the Doyle Brunson hand, 10-2, and Laak coyly checked his option with A-J. Laak flopped top pair on an A-5-4 board, but checked to Esfandiari, who also rapped the table. The turn was a seven. Laak once again just checked, Esfandiari bet 2,525, and Laak called to bring a queen on the river. Laak checked top pair one last time, Esfandiari tanked before moving all-in, and Laak called. Just like that, Nicknames week was over, as Esfandiari’s stone cold bluff failed miserably.

Esfandiari told viewers following the match, “I’m going to jump.” No new episodes of “Poker After Dark” are scheduled until the week of March 15th, when part one of a $50,000 cash game will feature Chris Ferguson, Hellmuth, Esfandiari, Brandon Adams, Todd Brunson, and Mike Matusow. In the meantime, fans of the show can catch encore presentations of “Poker After Dark” nightly at 2:05am ET on NBC.

Vanessa Rousso Bests Tough Field in 2010 PCA $1,000 Ladies Event

Harrison "gibler123" Gimbel may have garnered the headlines at the 2010 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure (PCA) by winning the Main Event and a $2.2 million paycheck, but he wasn't the only one having a good time at the Atlantis Resort and Casino in the Bahamas.  One of the biggest hits of the Caribbean poker festival was the $1,000 + $100 Ladies No Limit Hold'em tournament.

A total of 91 women competed in the event, 33 of whom won their seats online at PokerStars via satellites with buy-ins starting as low as $2.20.  They won more than just their entry and spending money; the online qualifiers were also pampered at the resort's Mandara Spa and received instruction at a High Heels Poker Tour Ladies Boot Camp session from Team PokerStars Pro Vanessa Rousso.

As it turned out, the Boot Camp attendees probably should have listened to their instructor more closely, as Rousso went on to win the event, scoring a $24,725 cash.  Rousso burst onto the poker scene in 2006 when she placed 7th in the $25,000 World Poker Tour (WPT) Championship and then won a $5,000 No Limit Hold'em event at the WPT Borgata Poker Open a few months later.  In 2007, she finished second in PokerStars World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP), winning over $700,000, and became known to a broad television audience when she was the runner-up in the 2009 National Heads-Up Poker Championship.  The GoDaddy.com girl has also won two tournaments on NBC's "Poker After Dark."

Other members of Team PokerStars Pro in the tournament who were not as fortunate were Katja Thater, Veronica Dabul, Sandra Naujoks, and Maria "Maridu" Mayrinck.  Other known pros in attendance included J.J. Liu, 2007 World Series of Poker (WSOP) Europe Main Event champ Annette Obrestad, European Poker Tour (EPT) London Ladies champ Dagmara Aleksandrowicz, and Shirley Rosario, who placed fourth.

Another player of note was Elizabeth Bennett-Martin, who qualified for the Main Event via a PokerStars satellite for the second year in a row.  A portion of her winnings was earmarked for the charitable organization Cambodian Legal Education for Women (CLEW).  Created by her Toronto law firm, Bennett Gastle P.C., CLEW raises money to help impoverished women in Cambodia attend law school.  The goal of these women is to provide legal help to those who would not normally be able to access any in Cambodia, where the population of more than 14 million has only 538 lawyers.  Unfortunately, Bennett-Martin did not make the money in any event this year.

Sixteen women did cash, though, each getting a piece of the $88,270 prize pool.  Runner-up Halli Pinson was impressed with the field, telling PokerStars, "This event was a lot more serious than most ladies tournaments. I didn't recognize that many faces, but the field seemed a lot more experienced than usual. These women had come to play, and they had come to win! Vanessa Rousso dominated the event though – she had good cards and she's an experienced player: the combination was lethal."

Those who did not want to pony up $1,100, but still wanted to compete in a women-only tournament, or those who just wanted another shot at a title, had the chance to play in another Ladies Event the next day for just $300.  The field of 73 produced a prize pool of $19,119 and Diana Linke took home the top cash of $6,504.

PokerStars Caribbean Adventure $1,000 + $100 Ladies Event Final Standings

1. Vanessa Rousso - $24,275
2. Halli Pinson - $13,815
3. Ann-Margaret Johnston - $9,335
4. Shirley Rosario - $6,620
5. Jamie Kerstetter - $5,740
6. Pastora Sorenson - $4,635
7. Lisa Adams - $3,750
8. Vanessa Caldeira - $2,870
9. Irene Baroni - $2,425
10. Sarah Wasch - $2,425
11. Violetta Szczerba - $2,205
12. Nesrine Kourdourli - $2,205
13. Muriel Allard - $1,985
14. Anna Yamshchikova - $1,985
15. Alina Salnikova - $1,765
16. Hai Nguyen - $1,765

Annette Obrestad (Annette_15) Debuts on Poker After Dark

This week’s brand new installment of the NBC franchise “Poker After Dark” is dubbed “Nicknames.” Making her debut on the show is 21 year-old Betfair pro Annette “Annette_15” Obrestad, who went by the moniker “The Huntress.”

On her departure from the familiar screen name “Annette_15,” Obrestad told her tablemates, “Basically, I needed a nickname for the show,” and called her traditional handle “boring.” In the first hand, Obrestad, the winner of the 2007 World Series of Poker (WSOP) Europe Main Event, raised to 600 and the table folded around. Then, Phil “The Poker Brat” Hellmuth, a sponsored pro of UB.com, began Twittering at the table, truly a sign of the times.

Phil “The Unabomber” Laak raised to 550 pre-flop with 10-7 and Obrestad came along from the big blind holding A-2 of hearts. The flop came 5-9-9 with two hearts and the action went check-check to a three on the turn. Obrestad check-called a bet of 850 from Laak to another nine on the river. The action went check-check and Obrestad raked in the 2,900-chip pot with an ace.

Erick “E-Dog” Lindgren’s stay at the “Poker After Dark” feature table was brief. His “go big or go home” strategy resulted in four-way action to a flop of J-5-4 with two spades. Holding pocket queens, Antonio “The Magician” Esfandiari led out for 2,100 and Lindgren made it 5,400. The other two players got out of the way, Esfandiari pushed the price of poker to 15,400, Lindgren moved all-in, and Esfandiari made the call. Needing a spade or king to hit, the turn and river fell the jack of hearts and three of diamonds, respectively, sending Lindgren out in sixth place. Obrestad announced that she folded J-9 of spades after the flop.

Obrestad, who largely played tight throughout the first episode of “Nicknames” week, mixed it up and made it 600 to go with 8-5 pre-flop and received a call from Laak, who peeked down at K-4 of hearts. The flop came A-9-6 with two hearts and Laak check-called a bet of 750 from the young internet huntress. The nine on the turn resulted in a pair of checks, as did a king on the river. Laak scooped the pot with second pair, inching him further up the “Poker After Dark” leaderboard.

Esfandiari, while eating ground sirloin and brown rice throughout much of Monday’s kickoff episode, led out for 850 on a board of 8-8-4-10 with two hearts holding 10-4 of diamonds. Obrestad made the call with A-9 to see a five on the river. Esfandiari bet 2,400 and Obrestad called, shipping the pot of 7,900 to “The Magician.” Mike “The Mouth” Matusow, who was also part of “Nicknames” week, triumphantly identified what Esfandiari had: “He flopped two pair and turned three pair. Do you know how hard that is to do?”

Matusow hawked copies of his book, “Check-Raising the Devil,” which includes a foreword penned by Hellmuth. Not to be outdone, “The Poker Brat” declared that he enjoys partying with 2009 WSOP Main Event November Nine member Phil Ivey and discussed his then-upcoming appearance on a VH1 weight loss show, “First to 100.” Hellmuth was set to team with fellow UB.com pro Mark “P0ker H0” Kroon for the series, which ultimately never panned out.

In the final hand shown on the kickoff episode, Esfandiari raised to 850 with 8-7 and Laak called from the small blind with K-10 of spades. The flop of 8-5-K with two spades offered a little sniff for everyone, but the action went check-check. An offsuit four hit on the turn, leading to a bet of 1,125 from Laak. Esfandiari made the call and the turn was an offsuit queen. Laak bet 1,850 and Esfandiari mucked, giving “The Unabomber” a 6,100-chip pot.

You can catch episodes of “Nicknames” week through Friday on NBC nightly at 2:05am ET. After this week, no new episodes of “Poker After Dark” will air until March, although re-runs will still be shown each night.

The Nightly Turbo: Poker After Dark, Sky Poker Tour, and More

Poker After Dark Season 6 Kicks Off with Commentators III

Season 6 of the popular NBC poker program “Poker After Dark” kicked off this week with “Commentators III.” In a somewhat surreal scene, announcers from popular poker programs took to the felts at the Golden Nugget in Las Vegas.

Each player started with 20,000 in chips and blinds at 100-200. Dan Gati replaced Full Tilt Poker’s Ali Nejad in the booth, as Nejad took to the felts as part of the kickoff week. He raised with A-J in the first hand shown and received no action, turning over his two cards to prove that he always has a hand. Also appearing as part of “Commentators III” this week are Howard Lederer, “High Stakes Poker” hosts Gabe Kaplan and Kara Scott, “Poker2Nite” anchor and UB.com pro Joe Sebok, and Mark Gregorich.

In one hand, Nejad raised to 650 pre-flop with K-J and Lederer made the call with 10-J. The flop came 8-9-6, giving Lederer an open-ended straight draw, and the action went check-check to a four on the turn. Lederer led out for 875 and Nejad quickly mucked, prompting a flurry of references to a set of fours. During the last “Commentators” week, Nejad busted with a set of fours against Kaplan’s set of tens.

Nejad then ramped up his charm, telling the assembled panel of announcers, “I had something special to do today in honor of Joe [Sebok] finally making a TV table.” He produced a tray of champagne classes and gave one to each competitor. Sebok has a bevy of televised final table bubbles in his career, including a ninth place finish in the 2008 World Poker Tour (WPT) Festa al Lago, a seventh place finish at the 2007 Legends of Poker, and a seventh place finish at the 2007 Bay 101 Shooting Star; WPT final tables are played six-handed. He finished fifth in the 2006 Ultimate Bet Aruba Poker Classic for $99,000.

On his tendency to bubble, Sebok told “Poker After Dark” host Leeann Tweeden, “Unfortunately in poker, I became more famous for missteps than good steps.” It was later revealed that Sebok and Nejad attended the University of California, Berkley at the same time, leading to a discussion as to whether the two had ever met. Kaplan then flopped the nuts with K-J on a board of 10-Q-A. Nejad, who held Q-J for middle pair and a gutshot straight draw, bet 850 after Kaplan checked. Kaplan raised to 2,100 and Nejad folded.

Twenty-five minutes into the kickoff episode of “Poker After Dark” Season 6, the first river card was dealt. Sebok led out for 550 with Q-3 on a board of 4-8-Q with two spades. Kaplan put in a raise to 2,150 with 3-4 of spades and Sebok called. The turn was another queen, giving Sebok trips, and the action went check-check. The river was a four, giving both players full houses. Sebok bet 2,700 and Kaplan wisely folded. Sebok became the new chip leader after scooping the pot of 7,900.

Scott, who was largely quiet throughout the episode, donned a CardRunners logo for her first “Poker After Dark” appearance. She exclaimed, “I’m playing with Gabe Kaplan! It’s really exciting!” Amid discussion of the upcoming Heath Ledger movie, “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus,” Sebok raised to 1,100 with A-K and Gregorich called with pocket nines. The flop fell 7-3-10 and Sebok made a continuation bet of 1,600. Gregorich called and a six came on the turn. The action went check-check as Sebok let his foot off the gas and a four came on the river. Both players again checked and Gregorich scooped the 6,000-chip pot.

In one of the final hands shown on Monday night’s episode, Gregorich held pocket rockets and raised to 1,200 pre-flop. Sebok came along with 5-6 of clubs from the big blind and the flop came Q-6-8. Sebok checked, Gregorich fired out a bet of 3,000, and Sebok folded.

“Commentators III” continues all week on “Poker After Dark.” The franchise airs late nights at 2:05am ET on NBC and is sponsored by Full Tilt Poker, whose logo appears in the center of the felt.

2009 WSOP Europe Air Dates Announced

Fans of the World Series of Poker (WSOP) Europe won’t have to wait long for the tournament series to air on ESPN. The first episode kicks off on Sunday, January 31st at 11:00pm ET and a total of 10 hours will air.

The opening episode will be one of two recapping the Caesars Cup, a made-for-television tournament that featured Team Europe taking on Team Americas. The former ultimately crushed the Americas squad four matches to one, with the stars of poker turning out to compete on behalf of their continents. Team PokerStars Pro member Daniel Negreanu captained the Americas squad, which also featured DoylesRoom namesake Doyle Brunson, 2009 WSOP Main Event November Nine member Phil Ivey, 11-time WSOP bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth, reigning National Heads-Up Poker Championship winner Huck Seed, 2008 WSOP Europe Main Event winner John Juanda, Big Game player Jennifer Harman, and Barry Greenstein, who was a last-minute replacement for Chris Ferguson.

The American squad held a total of 45 gold bracelets and more than $50 million in career earnings. Their foes: Team Europe, led by 2007 WSOP Europe Main Event Champion and Betfair pro Annette “Annette_15” Obrestad. Her group of young guns included 2008 WSOP Main Event winner Peter Eastgate, Italian poker sensation Dario Minieri, 2008 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure victor Bertrand “Elky” Grospellier, Power Poker front man Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies, Durrrr Challenge participant Patrik Antonius, Gus Hansen, and Betfair qualifier John Harvey, a 47 year-old pipe inspector from Scotland.

On March 1st, the second of two hours dedicated to the Caesars Cup will air on ESPN. The festivities kick off at Midnight ET and serve as the run-up to the WSOP Europe Main Event, which will begin on February 7th. The £10,000 buy-in tournament drew a crowd of 334 runners and featured one of the toughest final tables ever assembled in WSOP Europe history. Two members of the November Nine – James Akenhead and Antoine Saout – reached the feature table in London, a feat accomplished in 2008 by Ivan Demidov.

Also at the WSOP Europe Main Event final table was Negreanu, the face of the “PokerStars.net Million Dollar Challenge,” who took fifth in the same event in 2008. Joining Negreanu was Barry Shulman, whose son, Jeff Shulman, reached the final table of the Main Event in Las Vegas. The duo was seeking to make poker history as the first father/son team to win poker’s most coveted bracelets in the same year. The final table lasted 16 and a half hours and the entire WSOP Europe schedule panned out at the Casino at the Empire in London.

Here is the schedule for the 2009 WSOP Europe Caesars Cup and Main Event on ESPN. All times are Eastern and each episode runs for one hour:

Sunday, January 31st: 11:00pm (Caesars Cup)
Monday, February 1st: 12:00am (Caesars Cup)
Sunday, February 7th: 10:00pm (WSOP Europe Main Event)
Sunday, February 7th: 11:00pm (WSOP Europe Main Event)
Monday, February 8th: 12:00am (WSOP Europe Main Event)
Sunday, February 14th: 11:00pm (WSOP Europe Main Event)
Monday, February 15th: 12:00am (WSOP Europe Main Event)
Monday, February 15th: 1:00am (WSOP Europe Main Event)
Sunday, February 28th: 9:00pm (WSOP Europe Main Event)
Sunday, February 28th: 10:00pm (WSOP Europe Main Event)

Poker PROductions filmed WSOP Europe for ESPN. The same company also brings poker television staples like NBC’s “Poker After Dark” and GSN’s “High Stakes Poker” to life. Last August, ESPN and the WSOP reached an agreement to keep the tournament series on the cable station until April 2018. The WSOP attracts a total viewing audience of more than 80 million people each year and at least 32 hours of coverage will air annually.

WSOP Europe air dates outside of the United States will likely be announced soon.

Sixth season of Poker After Dark is here!

NBC’s popular Poker After Dark is back. The first episode was aired yesterday and can be watched at the NBC’s website.

The first week is called “Commentators III” and you can find familiar faces sitting at the table. There’s Howard Lederer, Gabe Kaplan, Joe Sebok, Ali Nejad, Mark Gregorich and Kara Scott playing a 6-max $20k sit and go. Winner takes the whole $120.000 pot.

You can watch the first episode here.

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Sixth season of Poker After Dark is here!

NBC’s Poker After Dark is Set for Season Six

Poker After Dark Season 6 Kicks off January 4th

Fans of the popular NBC poker franchise “Poker After Dark” won’t have to wait long after the clock strikes Midnight this evening to catch the show’s sixth season, which debuts on Monday night, January 4th, at 2:05am ET.

Ali Nejad and Leeann Tweeden will reprise their “Poker After Dark” announcing and hosting roles, respectively, as the show enters season number six. The first week is entitled “Commentators III” and, while the name isn’t very catchy, the action on the felt should be nail biting. Howard Lederer, Gabe Kaplan, Joe Sebok, Nejad, Mark Gregorich, and Kara Scott will all play in “Poker After Dark’s” Season 6 premiere. Sebok, who hosts UB.com’s “Poker2Nite,” and Scott, the new floor reporter for GSN’s “High Stakes Poker,” are making their “Poker After Dark” debuts. You can catch “Commentators III” beginning on January 4th.

A total of 13 shows were filmed for Season 6 of “Poker After Dark,” including six-handed freezeouts and three different buy-in cash games. Followers of 2007 World Series of Poker (WSOP) Europe Main Event champion Annette “Annette_15” Obrestad will be able to catch the youngster on a special “Nicknames” episode that also features Mike “The Mouth” Matusow, Antonio “The Magician” Esfandiari, Erick “E-Dog” Lindgren, Phil “The Unabomber” Laak, and Phil “The Poker Brat” Hellmuth. Obrestad, a Betfair pro, turned 21 in September and is finally old enough to gamble legally on U.S. soil.

A $50,000 buy-in cash game features a star-studded lineup of Brandon Adams, Todd Brunson, Chris Ferguson, Matusow, Esfandiari, and Hellmuth. A press release distributed by Poker PROductions notes, “Any time Matusow and Hellmuth play against each other in a cash game, the insults alone make for must-see-television.” A high-stakes $150,000 buy-in cash game will see Tom “durrrr” Dwan, Patrik Antonius, David “Viffer” Peat, Eli Elezra, Kaplan, and Alan Meltzer take to the felts. The six are staples of “High Stakes Poker” and one mounts the comeback of the century.

One of the more notable freezeout themes is “Lonesome Shark,” which features Lindgren, James Akenhead, Esfandiari, Matusow, David Williams, and Brad Booth. What do they all have in common, you ask? All six are poker’s most eligible bachelors and the heads-up battle in this episode is one of the longest of the season. Mixed Martial Arts will take center stage shortly thereafter in a show featuring UFC announcer Bruce Buffer, Antonius, Strikeforce fighter Dan Henderson, former UFC champion Randy Couture, Lederer, and Lindgren.

Here is the schedule through April for new episodes of Season 6 of “Poker After Dark” according to NBC.com:

Week of January 4th - Commentators III
Howard Lederer, Gabe Kaplan, Joe Sebok, Ali Nejad, Mark Gregorich, Kara Scott

Week of January 11th – Nicknames
Annette Obrestad, Mike Matusow, Antonio Esfandiari, Erick Lindgren, Phil Laak, Phil Hellmuth

Week of March 15th - Cash Game $50,000 buy-in, Part 1
Chris Ferguson, Phil Hellmuth, Antonio Esfandiari, Brandon Adams, Todd Brunson, Mike Matusow

Week of March 22nd – Cash Game $50,000 buy-in, Part 2
Todd Brunson, Mike Matusow, Phil Hellmuth, Brandon Adams, Antonio Esfandiari, Chris Ferguson

Week of April 19th - My Favorite Pro
Craig Ivey, James Ashby, Steve Bartlett, Phil Hellmuth, Jens Voertmann, Chris Ferguson

Week of April 26th - He Said, She Said
Erica Schoenberg, Jean-Robert Bellande, David Grey, Karina Jett, Mike Matusow, Annie Duke

Additional dates for new episodes will be announced in the future and re-runs of popular shows will also air over the first four months of 2009. “Poker After Dark” will take a hiatus during the weeks of February 15th and 22nd due to the Winter Olympics, which NBC owns the rights to.

“Poker After Dark” and “High Stakes Poker,” both products of Poker PROductions, were filmed in October at the Golden Nugget in Downtown Las Vegas. The latter begins airing on GSN on Sunday, February 14th.

Poker2Nite Welcomes Gavin Smith

The final UB.com sponsored “Poker2Nite” of 2009 aired on Wednesday night and featured Gavin Smith along with a recap of the outgoing calendar year. In addition, Justin “ZeeJustin” Bonomo broke down a hand from the 2008 World Series of Poker (WSOP) on the Fox Sports Net poker news franchise.

“Poker2Nite” hosts Joe Sebok and Scott Huff ticked off their top three poker stories of 2009. For Sebok, the WSOP Main Event final table came in at number three, as he told viewers, “It had more suckouts than a Blow Pop factory.” Huff added, “It finally proved that the November Nine format can work.” Number two on Sebok’s best of 2009 list was the arrival of Isildur1, who stormed onto the high-stakes online poker scene late in the year. Sebok noted, “For somebody to come out of the mystery and take over is pretty unbelievable.” Sebok’s top story of 2009 was Phil Ivey, who won two WSOP bracelets and reached the final table of the Main Event. He also appeared on the cover of “ESPN: The Magazine.”

Huff then shared his top three poker news stories of the year. First up for the “Poker2Nite” host was Lada Gaga introducing her hit song “Poker Face” to the world. Huff explained, “You have the biggest pop star in the world making a song about her poker face.” Number two was the WSOP Main Event Day 1D lockout, which saw 500 players shut out of poker’s most prestigious tournament when it reached capacity. Huff questioned, “How do you shut people out of the Main Event of the WSOP?” Number one for Huff was the compliance delay of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA). As it stands, the financial services industry in the United States has until June 1st to comply with the 2006 law.

“Poker2Nite” correspondent Lacey Jones interviewed players at the Doyle Brunson Five Diamond World Poker Classic asking what their New Year’s resolutions are for 2010. Shawn Buchanan stated that he wanted to win a WSOP bracelet, while Shaun Deeb explained that he’d rent a house in Europe. Vivek “Psyduck” Rajkumar vowed to study the game more, while Steve “MrTimCaum” O’Dwyer desired to be more organized. Finally, UB.com pro Adam “Roothlus” Levy told Jones that he would lose weight in 2010.

Smith, a Full Tilt Poker pro, then joined the show. He described 2009 as, “Awful. Atrocious. Terrible. It’s my very first ever losing year in tournament poker.” He added, “I don’t think I ever tried to win.” Smith took home $120,000 from an episode of NBC’s “Poker After Dark” and earned $30,000 at the 2009 WSOP. A man known for prop betting, Smith explained the origin of a tattoo featuring the initials “J.S.” on his shoulder: “At the L.A. Poker Classic a few years ago, [Sebok and I] had a last longer bet and the loser was supposed to get the other man’s initials on his butt.” Smith, upon hearing how painful a tattoo on his rear would be, instead immortalized Sebok’s initials on his shoulder.

Bonomo appeared in a segment entitled “In the Tank,” breaking down a hand from the 2008 WSOP against David “Chino” Rheem and Roland de Wolfe. The Bodog pro described his thought process on every street, although Bonomo ultimately dropped the pot to de Wolfe, who picked off Bonomo’s bluff. Bonomo bet after the river brought three clubs to the board, explaining, “Roland has to be afraid of that card,” but de Wolfe called with an underpair to the board.

Dana Workman doled out the “Weekly Misdeal,” a satirical look at recent poker headlines. Workman chose to recap the top offbeat stories of 2009, including Ivey’s numerous side bets involving bracelet wins at the 2009 WSOP, the Poker Hall of Fame nomination of Tom “durrrr” Dwan, and UB.com pro Annie Duke’s feud with comedian Joan Rivers.

“Poker2Nite” airs on Wednesdays at 11:00pm ET on Fox Sports Net. Check your local listings for more information, as the show is often pre-empted due to local sports programming.

Returns

Filming of 13 different shows concluded in October at the Golden Nugget Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas featuring a mixture of well-known regulars from previous seasons and thirteen players making their Poker After Dark debut.

Ali Nejad, returns to provide commentary and Leeann Tweeden is back for her third season as the show’s host.

Seven of the new shows will follow the traditional Poker After Dark week-long six-handed winner-take-all freezeout format while the remaining six will feature cash games of varying buy-ins that will each air over a two-week period.

Producers say there are first-time winners, matches that end in dramatic fashion, huge swings, plenty of laughs and many other memorable moments.

The season will kick-off Jan. 4 with a Poker After Dark staple: The “Commentators” episode, featuring Nejad and High Stakes Poker host Gabe Kaplan along with newcomer Joe Sebok from Poker2Nite and Kaplan’s new co-host Kara Scott.

A “Nicknames” episode will follow that includes Annette “The Huntress” Obrestad’s Poker After Dark debut and great names like Mike “The Mouth” Matusow, Antonio “The Magician” Esfandiari, Erick “E-Dog” Lindgren, Phil “The Unabomber” Laak, and Phil “The Poker Brat” Hellmuth.

The first cash game episodes to air will feature a $50,000 minimum buy-in and players including, Todd Brunson, Chris Ferguson, Matusow, Esfandiari, and Hellmuth.

In what could be the first win for an amateur on Poker After Dark a “My Favorite Pro” episode will air including online qualifiers Craig Ivey from Australia, James Ashby from Alabama, Jens Voertmann from Germany, and 2009 Howard Lederer Charity Event winner Steve Bartlett playing alongside Hellmuth and Ferguson.

In a match similar to the “Battle of the Sexes” theme of Season 2, a “He Said, She Said” episode will include Erica Schoenberg, Jean-Robert Bellande, David Grey, Matusow, Annie Duke and Karina Jett, making her Poker After Dark debut.

The next cash game show has a $100,000 minimum buy-in and includes some of the biggest cash players in the world. Here Hellmuth will take on Eli Elezra, Doyle Brunson, Tom “durrrr” Dwan, Gus Hansen, and Laak.

A “Lonesome Shark” show will feature bachelors Lindgren, James Akenhead, Esfandiari, Matusow, David Williams, and Brad Booth and there is a “Mixed Martial Arts” show featuring Bruce Buffer, Dan Henderson, Randy Couture and Patrik Antonius.

The third and final cash game has a $150,000 minimum buy-in and includes Dwan, Antonius, David Peat, Elezra, Kaplan, and Alan Meltzer.

Finally, the season wraps up with a “Charity in Mind” show, highlighting the charity work of players including Phil Gordon, Jennifer Harman, Andy Bloch, Duke, Lederer and Ferguson.

Season 6 begins Jan. 4 in Poker After Dark’s regular 2:05 a.m. timeslot on NBC.

For more information and the entire schedule, check out the Poker After Dark page on NBC’s website.

Christmas Time with Annie Duke

Poker News Daily: We heard that you’ll be launching a new trail mix company, MyMixedNuts.com, just in time for the holidays. Can you tell us about it?

Duke: It’s a custom mixed nuts and trail mix company that I started with my boyfriend, Joe, and Ryan Sympkins. You have your choice of nuts and all sorts of dry fruits and candies. Ryan had this idea for a long time. Ryan is one of the producers on “The Apprentice” and we became very good friends during the show. Ever since, we’ve wanted to work together. I spend all of my time picking things I don’t want out of my trail mix, so I’ll go and buy individual ingredients from the store.

At MyMixedNuts.com, you add items into your cart. We’ll have personal and corporate gifting. There are also ready-to-go mixes where $1 goes to charity. If you buy my mix, for example, $1 goes to Ante Up for Africa. There’s one that goes to an AIDS hospice and one that goes to a rain forest preservation charity.

PND: That’s quite an undertaking. What kind of marketing are you doing for it?

Duke: Our marketing is through social media to start with. Once we get going and things are going smoothly, then we’ll do placements in health magazines and parenting magazines. It’s ironic that Ryan and I met on a show about fake business and now we’re doing a real business. Trail mixes run 14 ounces each and will be between $8 and $15.

PND: We noticed that you weren't at the World Poker Tour’s (WPT) Doyle Brunson Five Diamond World Poker Classic.

Duke: Christmas comes up on me and I have four kids. I literally looked at my schedule and said I can’t do it. Christmas won’t happen if I go to the tournament. This is the kind of decision I have to make a lot. Sometimes I have to choose my kids over poker. I’d rather make sure my family has a good holiday.

PND: What have your kids asked Santa for this year?

Duke: Nelly asked Santa for a computer and I think that’s totally appropriate. All of my kids have laptops except for her and she wants a netbook, which is inexpensive, and some earrings. Lucy asked for a hermit crab. Santa might consider whether he could transport a hermit crab from the North Pole. Lucy’s other big request was a Kindle. Leo, outside of a Kindle, is really interested in anything having to do with the Denver Broncos. Maud is into anime stuff, so maybe some sort of comic book or graphic novel would be good.

PND: What did you ask for?

Duke: I asked for a trip to Mexico for New Years Eve because Annie Duke hates New Years. I have never had a good New Years. How can you possibly have a good time when there’s a huge pressure to have a good time? There’s no spontaneity. My good times are unexpected. I don’t drink, either. The goal on New Years is to get so plastered that you vacate your body and that’s not fun. For someone who is not drinking to speak to someone who is really drunk is not fun. If we go to Mexico, there’s no pressure. The odds of that coming through are good since Santa was asking me for places to stay.

PND: Give us your thoughts on the UB.com-sponsored poker news show “Poker2Nite,” which airs on Fox Sports Net every Wednesday night.

Duke: It’s really good. I think that Joe Sebok is going to grow into it. Scott Huff is incredibly talented. The set is great and I was pleasantly surprised. I like it better than “ESPN Inside Deal.” Joe just needs to get off the prompter. He’s very good just going with the flow.

PND: How tough is it to balance providing a credible news show with accepting guests from other online poker sites besides UB.com?

Duke: You have to do it. It’s one of the things that Full Tilt was ahead of the market on. They’ve done this back to the “Learn from the Pros” days on Fox Sports Net. They didn’t let you wear a logo, but they gave you a shout out. What Full Tilt understood was that it’s their show, but it’s going to be more credible if it has pros from other brands. It’ll be a higher quality show if you open it up to the world. They’ve done it with “Poker After Dark” and that was a mistake they made with “Face the Ace.”

“Poker2Nite” is supposed to have quality coverage of the poker industry. If its guests are from PokerStars, that’s fine. If they’re from Full Tilt, that’s fine. If they’re from UB, that’s fine too.

PND: We understand you just had an interesting experience with eBay.

Duke: At UB, one person can’t make multiple accounts. As a policy across the industry, it’s one player to an account and there are strong reasons why you have to do that, which have to do with fraud.

On eBay, my ex-husband used to have an account associated with my e-mail. I went onto eBay to check on some things for Christmas and wrote in to get the User ID. I called up my ex-husband and he gave me some passwords that could have been right and couldn’t remember the security questions, so I got onto Live Chat and asked for help. They said that he was the owner of the account and asked that he get in touch with them.

Finally, they said, “What you need to do is create a new e-mail address and open a new account with it.” So, I could open up a new account even though they knew I had an account? I asked them if I could do that 20 times and they said yes. At that point, I started screaming into the chat. The policy of allowing someone to have more than one account is mind-boggling. This is one huge site that the Federal Government seems to be okay with, but they are concerned with online poker.

Negreanu on Hellmuth: he’s delusional

Poker After Dark finale to feature high stakes cash game

Last Night: First episode of Poker After Dark “Railbird Heaven Cash Game”

Poker After Dark indulges their viewers for two weeks in a row. PAD’s fifth season grand finale is the “Railbird Heaven Cash Game”. During the first week Patrik Antonius, Daniel Negreanu, Gus Hansen, Phil Ivey, Tom Dwan and Phil Hellmuth will fight each other in a $200/$400 ($100k minimum buy-in) No Limit Hold’em cash game. Although the stake will rise quite quickly to $300/$600.

After the first week, Daniel Negreanu will make room for David “Viffer” Peat:

Week of December 7 – NEW SHOW (Railbird Heaven Cash Game #1)
Patrik Antonius, Daniel Negreanu, Gus Hansen, Phil Ivey, Tom Dwan, Phil Hellmuth

Week of December 14 – NEW SHOW (Railbird Heaven Cash Game #2)
Tom Dwan, Gus Hansen, David Peat, Phil Ivey, Phil Hellmuth, Patrik Antonius

You can watch the first episode from NBC later today - link.

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Last Night: First episode of Poker After Dark “Railbird Heaven Cash Game”

The Nightly Turbo: Assault at the Poker Table, Poker After Dark, and More

Todd Brunson Interview with Poker News Daily

Among those present at a press conference welcoming the newest member of the DoylesRoom Brunson 10, Dani “ansky451” Stern, was Todd Brunson, son of poker legend Doyle Brunson.

Brunson owns over $723,000 in lifetime earnings from World Series of Poker (WSOP) tournaments and captured a bracelet in 2005 in a $2,500 buy-in Omaha High-Low Eight or Better event for $255,000. He finished 13th in the 1992 WSOP Main Event and grabbed 459th 15 years later when Jerry Yang took home the crown. Along the way, Brunson won the 2006 Poker Superstars Invitational for $500,000 and took down the series’ Las Vegas stop the same year for another $400,000. In the 2007 Doyle Brunson Five Diamond World Poker Classic, a stop on the World Poker Tour (WPT), the younger Brunson earned $96,000 for his 15th place showing.

Nowadays, Brunson serves as a recurring participant in the DoylesRoom weekly Bounty Tournament, a $27.50 buy-in contest that takes place each Wednesday on the USA-facing online poker site.

Poker News Daily: Give us your thoughts on Dani “ansky451” Stern becoming the newest member of the DoylesRoom Brunson 10.

Todd Brunson: He’s a great player and we’re glad to have him. I hope it works out well.

PND: Tell us about your latest travels.

Brunson: It’s been busy, so I hope it slows down a little bit until February. I need a rest.

PND: You’re a sponsored pro of DoylesRoom. What makes the site a good place for poker players to head to as opposed to some of the larger rooms like PokerStars and Full Tilt?

Brunson: It’s a smaller community where you get to know your players better. On a lot of the other sites, if you’re playing $5/$10 No Limit, there are so many other players that you have to make notes on, so it’s harder to find your games. DoylesRoom is a little smaller. It’s a little easier to keep track of people and jump in.

Not to bash PokerStars, but I’ve been playing on DoylesRoom and their site at the same time and I get so frustrated with PokerStars. It’s so much slower than DoylesRoom, it’s unbelievable. I could probably get in 50% more hands at DoylesRoom.

PND: You mentioned that you’re looking for a break. What are your plans in the coming months and what have you been doing recently?

Brunson: There are just busy times of the year. We’re just concluding one and the next one is going to be in January for the L.A. Poker Classic. I just got back from Europe, I had my tournament in Montana, and then I filmed 12 episodes of “Poker After Dark.” I’ve had a ton of stuff to do and haven’t really had a rest, so I’m worn down.

PND: How will the Brunson family celebrate Christmas?

Brunson: It’ll probably be at my house. We’ll have everyone over and do the Christmas thing.

Next week on Poker After Dark: “Railbird Heaven Cash Game”

Poker After Dark announced their upcoming schedule and it’s going to be great for all the poker fans. There’s going to be all the top pros playing cash games.

Whole schedule:

Week of December 7 – NEW SHOW (Railbird Heaven Cash Game #1)
Patrik Antonius, Daniel Negreanu, Gus Hansen, Phil Ivey, Tom Dwan, Phil Hellmuth

Week of December 14 – NEW SHOW (Railbird Heaven Cash Game #2)
Tom Dwan, Gus Hansen, David Peat, Phil Ivey, Phil Hellmuth, Patrik Antonius

Will Hellmuth have one of his famous blowups again? Who is going to dominate the games? You can watch the trailer here!

Source: NBC Sports

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Next week on Poker After Dark: “Railbird Heaven Cash Game”

Have you tried out Full Tilt Pokers new features?

Full Tilt Poker has added “Run It Twice” and “Cashout Tournament” to their arsenal.

Full Tilt Poker has lately announced two new features on their site, which are a really good addition to their normal games.

Run It Twice

“Run It Twice” is familiar to the viewers of “High Stakes Poker” and “Poker After Dark” shows. When there are two players on the hand and they go all in, they have an option to run the remaining community cards twice.

Because of the “Run It Twice” option the players get two separate boards for the remaining cards. The pot is divided in half and the winner of each outcome wins half the pot.

These games can be found only at the NLHE, PLO and HA Ivey’s Room tables. This feature is going to be added to the smaller stake tables as well.

Cashout Tournaments

“Cashout Tournament” is a totally new tournament format. Some portion of the tournament’s buy-in (normally half) goes to the prize pool and the other portion goes to the “cashout pool”.

How does it work then? Something like this:

Let’s say that the tournament buy-in is $20 and each player gets 1000 chips, then 100 chips is worth $1. A player can cashout during any point of the tournament, except right at the start and during the final table. All the player’s chips are converted to cash.

Do you want to test the new features? Register to Full Tilt Poker through HighStakesNews and get a $600 first deposit bonus and 27% rakeback. Click here.

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Have you tried out Full Tilt Pokers new features?

Shark Out of Water Poker Movie Released

Over the weekend, a brand new poker movie debuted, “Shark Out of Water.” The film, which stars Matty Finochio and Artine Brown, also features poker pros Brad Booth and Ultimate Bet front man Phil Hellmuth.

“Shark Out of Water” is a Made in the Shade and Strangeways production showing the ups and downs of professional poker life. Producer Andrew Halliwell told Poker News Daily how the flick came to fruition: “The director and I worked on a small project before this, a television pilot. He approached me with a script he had written. He’s an avid player and he wrote a script for a short film and asked if I would produce it. I gave it a read and we went to work on it. That was two years ago.”

“Shark Out of Water” was nominated for Leo Awards for Best Short Drama, Best Direction, Best Performance, and Best Musical Score. It weighs in at 18 minutes and its DVD is available for purchase via Visa, MasterCard, American Express, and PayPal for $9.95. It will ultimately be released through iTunes to ensure wider distribution, but is currently only available through the “Shark Out of Water” website.

In the movie’s trailer, Hellmuth, clad in Ultimate Bet attire, is seated next to Brown. Upon seeing his opponent’s shark card protector that looks like a keepsake Humberto Brenes would use, Hellmuth inquires, “That’s a nice shark you have there. Is that what you are, a shark?” According to Halliwell, Booth sucks out in a hand against one of the protagonists and Hellmuth gives the viewing audience a top-tier “Poker Brat” moment.

Hellmuth requested a fee to appear in “Shark Out of Water” and his part of the movie was recorded in a casino in Vancouver. Halliwell recalled, “Phil Hellmuth was in town to do an event with Annie Duke. We sent a taxi to bring him to a local casino. After we finished shooting his scenes, we got one of our directors (Juan Riedinger) to play him heads-up for a fee. You have to watch the DVD’s bonus features to find out what happened.” Hellmuth is the all-time World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet winner with 11, one more than Doyle Brunson and Johnny Chan. His last piece of hardware came in 2007 in a $1,500 buy-in No Limit Hold’em event.

On Finochio’s and Brown’s performances in the film, Halliwell noted, “They brought the realism of poker to life. It’s a double-edge sword and that’s what we were trying to convey with the film. A lot of people enjoy the game and have no problems, while others get too deep.” The 50-second trailer available on the movie’s official website includes such memorable quotes as “I guess sometimes luck comes into play” and “I’m having a bad run. It happens.”

“Shark Out of Water” was an Official Selection at the Miami Short Film Festival, the Edmonton International Film Festival, the Tacoma Film Festival, the Mississauga Independent Film Festival, and the Nevada City Film Festival. Despite its 18-minute runtime, the movie’s bonus features add a considerable amount of content. Its website explains, “The DVD is jam-packed with bonus features which include behind-the-scenes footage of ‘Yukon’ Brad Booth and Phil Hellmuth.”

“Shark Out of Water” isn’t Hellmuth’s first gander onto the silver screen. The pro also appeared in “All In,” Woody Harrelson’s “The Grand,” and the Eric Bana classic “Lucky You.” He could be spotted on the NBC reality franchise “Celebrity Apprentice” earlier this year supporting Duke and has also appeared on a variety of poker television programming including NBC’s “Poker After Dark” and GSN’s “High Stakes Poker.”

High Stakes Poker Season 6 Filmed at Golden Nugget

The sixth season of the GSN franchise “High Stakes Poker” filmed this week at the Golden Nugget in Downtown Las Vegas. Friday marked the third of three days of filming for the $200,000 buy-in show.

A bevy of poker pros have wandered the halls of the Golden Nugget since Wednesday, each looking to strike it rich in the sixth cycle of the poker television staple. Last year, Tom “durrrr” Dwan made his “High Stakes Poker” debut in style, scooping the largest single pot in the show’s history at the expense of Team PokerStars Pro member Barry Greenstein. Dwan took down $919,000 when his K-Q drew out on Greenstein’s aces and, given the dramatic pots up for grabs, Dwan told Poker News Daily that he’s looking forward to Season 6: “I’m excited to be back. We’re playing for a whole lot of money this time around.”

One player making his “High Stakes Poker” debut is 2008 World Series of Poker (WSOP) November Nine member Dennis Phillips, who took third in the $10,000 buy-in feature tournament last year for $4.5 million. The St. Louis native told Poker News Daily about his mindset headed into the high-stakes cash game: “I’m ready to do this and rock and roll. I sat down at ‘Poker After Dark’ last week and had some fun.” On making a run in the world of cash games, Phillips explained, “I played cash before I played tournaments. I played cash in London and in Monte Carlo as well.” Phillips admitted that he normally plays $25/$50 or $50/$100 cash games.

Common in previous seasons of “High Stakes Poker” were a variety of prop bets, many orchestrated by poker regulars Antonio Esfandiari and Phil Laak. While waiting to head into the “High Stakes Poker” suite, Laak explained the stance of Executive Producer Mori Eskandani towards prop betting in Season 6: “The prop bets where people would guess on cards, for example, they’ve been trying to get rid of that. Mori is trying to steer towards less betting at all. The bottom line is that he doesn’t want viewers at home to be bogged down with players prop betting in addition to poker.” Prop bets during Season 5 revolved around push-ups, movie ratings, and hole cards.

Daniel Negreanu commented on his Twitter feed that he’s looking forward to running into more quads during the show’s sixth season. He’s appeared on every cycle of the program so far and told Poker News Daily how this year’s installment has varied from previous airings: “The show has progressed really far from Seasons 1 to 5. Season 1 was the smaller names because most of the guys who played were at higher stakes anyway. Now, the antes are up, the buy-ins are up, and the percentage of good players to bad players has gone up. It’s definitely more serious poker now. It’s more cutthroat.”

Also found at the Golden Nugget this week is Barry Greenstein, who, like Negreanu, has been a staple of “High Stakes Poker” ever since Season 1. Greenstein explained how the sixth season differs from years past: “The poker economy is down, so the money seems tougher to come by. There are few guys who you know play big online that have money, but the majority of people are thinking they’re taking a $200,00 shot and they’ll see what happens. The first year we did this, players felt better funded. I think what will happen is that there will be two guys like Phil Ivey and Durrrr who will try to muscle everyone around. Others will try to pick their spots.”

Released in the original cast list for Season 6 of “High Stakes Poker,” but not participating, was cash game player Sammy George. Those slated to take part in the festivities include Patrik Antonius, David Benyamine, Doyle Brunson, Dwan, Eli Elezra, Esfandiari, Greenstein, Phil Hellmuth, Andreas Hoivold, Ivey, Mike Matusow, Allan Meltzer, Negreanu, Phillips, Lex Veldhuis, and Yevgeniy Timoshenko. The series premieres on Sunday, February 14th at 8:00pm ET and features Kara Scott reporting on action from the “High Stakes Poker” suite.

Joe Sebok Tops One Million Twitter Followers

If Twitter is any indication, Ultimate Bet sponsored pro Joe Sebok (@JoeSebok) is the 177th most popular guy on the internet.  At least, that is the ranking Twitter tracking site Twitterholic gave to Sebok based on his number of followers, which now exceeds one million.

His massive and dedicated group of Twitter fans puts him on par with sports reporter Bill Simmons, the publication Newsweek, comedian Kevin Nealon, and the musician Moby in terms of popularity.  By comparison, Ashton Kutcher has the most fans with nearly four million, followed by Britney Spears and Ellen Degeneres.  Twitterers who wish they had the traffic of Sebok include Dr. Phil McGraw (175,000 followers), reality star Lauren Conrad (748,500 followers), and the NASA space program (164,000 followers).

Perhaps in a testament to the popularity of Sebok’s poker entertainment website, PokerRoad, “Poker After Dark” announcer Ali Nejad (@Ali_Nejad) is 216th on Twitterholic’s list with more than 840,000 followers.  Sebok and PokerRoad have been longtime proponents of the microblogging site.  This past summer, they launched a unique Twitter platform called PokerRoad Nation, which organized poker-related Tweets from the World Series of Poker (WSOP).  The platform sorted tweets based on events, former bracelet winners, PokerRoad family members, media members, and several other criteria, allowing followers to customize their WSOP coverage as they saw fit.  The PokerRoad Nation platform garnered both poker media and national media attention and Sebok was profiled in the New York Times for the new innovation.

Despite the extensive Twitter-related success, Sebok told Poker News Daily that he is taking the million followers in stride.  “I think that people overvalue this whole Twitter thing,” he explained.  “It’s been fun, but it is definitely not an ego boost.”

Sebok also elaborated on how he came to have such a large group of followers.  “Twitter decided to put me on their suggested users list and I’ve just been enjoying the ride…It’s been fun.”  A longtime music fan, Sebok entertains his followers with frequent album recommendations along with tweets about his antics with his friends and family, which include Gavin Smith (@olegsmith) and his father, Barry Greenstein (@barrygreenstein).

More recently, he has also posted behind the scenes photos from his own appearance on “Poker After Dark” and Greenstein’s appearance on the most recent season of “High Stakes Poker.”  On Thursday night, Sebok also documented a disastrous road trip from Las Vegas to Los Angeles with Greenstein where their truck broke down on the side of the road in the middle of the night.  Never fear, PokerRoad fans, Sebok and Greenstein made it back to Los Angeles in one piece.

Sebok had to make his way back to Los Angeles to get the last-minute details together on his latest project, the Fox Sports poker news show “Poker 2Nite.”  The show, which will be sponsored by Ultimate Bet, is set to begin airing on Wednesdays at 11:00pm ET starting on November 25th.  Sebok told Poker News Daily he and co-host Scott Huff will be filming the first show on Tuesday night.  Sebok hopes that the series can capitalize on the heightened interest in poker following Joe Cada’s recent WSOP Main Event victory and become a mainstay on the cable network.

Fans will likely hear more about “Poker 2Nite” in the coming days via his Twitter, but any followers expecting some commemorative posting in honor of hitting the million-person mark shouldn’t hold their breath.  Sebok said he did not plan anything special in honor of crossing the benchmark and will continue tweeting as usual.

Tom Dwan (durrrr) Joins Team Full Tilt

The elite group of 13 poker pros that comprise Team Full Tilt Poker has a new member joining its ranks.  The online poker room just announced that its 14th member of the team will be 23-year old high-stakes online poker pro Tom “durrrr” Dwan.

Full Tilt Poker recently added Dwan to its roster, but Dwan has been a noticeable presence on the site for quite some time prior to the new sponsorship deal.  Full Tilt has been hosting Dwan’s “Durrrr Challenge” cash game tables since the epic bet first came to light in February and the youngster is a mainstay on all of the highest stakes cash game tables on the site as well.

Prior to Dwan, the last addition to the squad was Patrik Antonius, who joined Team Full Tilt in the summer of 2008.  The other members of the exclusive group are Howard Lederer, Jennifer Harman, Allen Cunningham, Chris “Jesus” Ferguson, Gus Hansen, Mike Matusow, Andy Bloch, Erik Seidel, Phil Ivey, John Juanda, Phil Gordon, and Erick Lindgren.  The group has a collective 37 World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelets and is widely considered to represent some of the best tournament and cash game players in the world.  Dwan is now the youngest member of the group, but in his brief career, he has made an indelible impression on both the online and live poker communities.

In a press release announcing the news, Lederer spoke about the young pro and why they decided to include him on the team: “Team Full Tilt doesn’t take adding a team member lightly, but Tom Dwan has proven, through skill and dynamic play, that he will be a force to be reckoned with for many years to come. We are proud to count Tom as one of our own.”

Dwan’s list of accomplishments include over $1 million in tournament poker winnings, three WSOP final tables, a World Poker Tour final table, and several successful appearances on poker television shows like “Poker After Dark” and “High Stakes Poker.”  Dwan holds the record for both the largest pot in “High Stakes Poker” history as well as the largest pot in televised poker history, which he recently won off of Ivey during the filming of the “Full Tilt Poker’s Million Dollar Cash Game.”  Dwan won the $1.1 million pot when he turned a seven-high straight against Ivey’s five-high straight and the two players got it all-in.  The big hand is scheduled to air as part of the show on U.K.’s Sky Sports in January of 2010.

Now that Dwan is a member of Team Full Tilt, he will be facing off against his fellow team members as action continues in his “Durrrr Challenge” bet.  Dwan and Antonius have played a little over 27,000 hands of the 50,000 required.  Dwan currently holds a $779,248 lead over Antonius.  Once Antonius finishes his 50,000 hands against Dwan, fellow Team Full Tilt member and recent seventh place finisher in the 2009 WSOP Main Event, Ivey, will step up, as will David Benyamine.

Dwan is set to take part in the upcoming season of “High Stakes Poker,” which will be filming at the Golden Nugget in Las Vegas from November 11th to 13th and will likely be sporting a Full Tilt Poker patch as part of his duties.

Patrik Antonius, Howard Lederer and Erick Lindgren vs The MMA Champions!

Patrik Antonius, Howard Lederer and Erick Lindgren have been playing against many people and that must include very strange personalities. But probably never have these three played against people who get their paycheck from hitting people in the face.

Randy Couture - One of the greatest MMA fighters

The three pros will be facing their dreaded opponents in a special Poker After Dark sit & go tournament. On the MMA (Mixed Martial Arts) corner will be the former UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championship) heavyweight champion Randy Couture, Dan Henderson (former champion in two weight classes) and none other than the UFC announcer Bruce Buffer.

Dan Henderson with his two title belts

Full Tilt Poker has been doing some very apparent co-operation with UFC lately and Bruce Buffer and Matt Hughes have a red status on Full TIlt. Bruce Buffer is known to be a very blazing personality, so we are probably going to get treated with some of the most memorable moments of PAD.

It will be Antonius’ ninth appearance on PAD, Lederer has visited the show 13 times, from which he has been able to win three. This special tournament has been filmed already, but the airing date hasn’t been announce yet.

Want to play with the pros or against some of the MMA superstars? Join now and get 27% rakeback and a great first deposit bonus offer. Click here.

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Patrik Antonius, Howard Lederer and Erick Lindgren vs The MMA Champions!

High Stakes Poker Season 6 Cast Released, Kara Scott Confirmed as Co-Host

In a press release distributed by cable station GSN on Thursday, Kara Scott was confirmed to be the new co-host of “High Stakes Poker,” replacing A.J. Benza. In addition, a list of 17 players was revealed.

Scott replaced Benza, who had flanked “Welcome Back, Kotter” star Gabe Kaplan in the “High Stakes Poker” announcing booth for the first five seasons. Scott’s role will not be play-by-play; instead, the television personality and expert poker player will “report from the High Stakes Poker suite, interviewing poker players about poker strategy, big hands, and the table dynamics,” according to network officials. The show will take on the same feel as NBC’s “Poker After Dark” for its sixth season. The two franchises are produced by the same company, Poker PROductions.

Season 6 of “High Stakes Poker” will begin airing on Valentine’s Day – Sunday, February 14th, 2010 – at 8:00pm ET. Encore presentations will air at 11:00pm ET and 2:00am ET on Sunday nights, meaning that poker fans have three chances to catch new episodes every week. Each of its contestants coughed up $200,000 of their own money as a minimum buy-in.

Five players are making their first appearance on “High Stakes Poker,” including Yevgeniy “Jovial Gent” Timoshenko. The youngster has been on a tear on the live poker circuit despite only weighing in at 21 years of age. Timoshenko was born in the Ukraine and won the 2009 World Poker Tour (WPT) Championship for $2.1 million. In September, Timoshenko took down the Main Event of the PokerStars World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP) for another $1.7 million and is a former winner of the Asian Poker Tour’s (APT) Macau feature tournament.

Also making his debut on GSN’s “High Stakes Poker” is Dennis Phillips, who gained notoriety by making back-to-back deep runs in the World Series of Poker (WSOP) Main Event. Last year, Phillips finished third in the $10,000 buy-in gala for $4.5 million after entering the final table as the chip leader. Phillips came armed to the Penn and Teller Theater at the Rio with a throng of followers donning red St. Louis Cardinals baseball caps and white button up shirts. This year, Phillips finished 45th for $178,000 after being sent to the rails when an opponent made a flush with A-K suited; Phillips also held A-K.

High-stakes cash game player Sammy George will be right at home in the Golden Nugget when filming of the GSN poker franchise kicks off next week. George, who has earned the nickname “Any Two,” was scheduled to face off against Tom Dwan in the live version of the Durrrr Challenge in London back in September. However, the festivities never took place, although organizer Eddie Hearn noted that the mano-a-mano live contest may occur in December in Las Vegas. Dwan will take to the felts once again as part of “High Stakes Poker” Season 6 after making his debut last season.

Returning to “High Stakes Poker” after a two season hiatus is WSOP November Nine member Phil Ivey, who currently appears on the cover of “ESPN: The Magazine.” Ivey last appeared on the GSN series back in Season 3 and is seeking his third WSOP bracelet of 2009 when the Main Event resumes on Saturday from the Rio. Ivey has career tournament winnings in excess of $12 million and is the horse of many pros in this weekend’s Main Event final table.

Andreas Hoivold and Lex Veldhuis will both be appearing on “High Stakes Poker” for the first time during Season 6. Returning to the program are Patrik Antonius, David Benyamine, Doyle Brunson, Eli Elezra, Antonio Esfandiari, Barry Greenstein, Phil Hellmuth, Mike Matusow, Allan Meltzer, and Daniel Negreanu. The season will once again be taped at the Golden Nugget in Downtown Las Vegas from November 11th to 13th.

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Kara Scott to be Named New Host of High Stakes Poker

According to several industry insiders, poker podcasts, and online sites, poker player and announcer Kara Scott will take over for A. J. Benza as co-host on the popular GSN poker program “High Stakes Poker.”

Poker News Daily has been able to confirm through several industry insiders that there is “a deal worked out” for Scott to flank Gabe Kaplan when the high-stakes cash game picks back up for its sixth season on November 11th at the Golden Nugget in Las Vegas. According to Poker News Daily’s sources, the only obstacle is Scott obtaining a permit that would allow her to work inside of the United States. As a foreign national, this document is critically important, as without such documentation, Scott would face criminal charges.

The ESPN poker show “Inside Deal” has discussed the issue and listed Scott as the top contender. A thread on the popular poker forum TwoPlusTwo has all but crowned Scott as the heir apparent to Benza. For the record, and possibly because of the hurdle of the working documents, neither GSN nor the producers of “High Stakes Poker,” Poker PROductions, has announced that Scott has been hired.

Since Benza announced in October that he would not be back for the new season of the show, there has been speculation that “High Stakes Poker” was looking at a female to team with longtime poker player Kaplan. Whether in the booth breaking down the hands in play or serving as a hostess who would interview players while the game was in action, many poker insiders and forum posters have commented that the show is moving in the direction of another poker television program, “Poker After Dark” (also produced by Poker PROductions).

With these thoughts in mind, there have been various ladies of the game that have drawn attention as the new replacement. One of the first names bandied about as Benza’s replacement was poker professional Vanessa Rousso, which also raised diverse opinions on the internet. Once Poker News Daily broke the news that Rousso would not fill the role, the return of former World Poker Tour (WPT) hostess Shana Hiatt gained steam. It took an announcement from her publicist at Creative Management Entertainment Group to squash those rumors.

Even poker professional Daniel Negreanu, who has played in every edition of “High Stakes Poker” and claims knowledge as to the new host, put up such other names as current WPT hostess Amanda Leatherman as well as Sabina Gadecki, Kimberly Lansing, Lacey Jones, Tiffany Michelle, and even “Big Game” regular Jennifer Harman, who has appeared on previous seasons of “High Stakes Poker.” Negreanu later noted that none would take to the “High Stakes Poker” set for Season 6. Strangely enough, former WPT hostess Courtney Friel, who is a correspondent for Fox News, has not been named as a potential candidate.

As a tournament poker player, Scott has over $500,000 in career earnings, with $453,450 in 2009 alone. She has finished inside the final 250 players in the last two World Series of Poker (WSOP) Main Events (238th this year, 104th last year) and was the runner-up at this year’s Irish Open. As a broadcaster, Scott has done commentary on the European Poker Tour (EPT), made-for-television poker shows like “Poker Night Live,” and also covered tournament backgammon on television and the internet.

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