Poker After Dark Gus Hansen
The second season of Poker after dark. In “International” week, Gus Hansen was knocked out after 6 hands, and heads-up play started after 53 hands, both record lows for the show. Week 8 (Mega Match) required a $50,000 buy-in rather than the usual $20,000, resulting in a $300,000 first prize. Gus Hansen at Online Poker. Well, Gus is a great player at any poker tournament but it seems the online platform is not really a profitable platform for him. According to a report, Hansen is one of the top losers in the online poker history. As of March 2015, it was reported that he lost a total of $21.7 million USD on Full Tilt.
Special Poker After Dark This Week
High-stakes Durrr vs. Ivey + Everyone Else cash games
The Poker PROducers showing they can feed the poker die-hards:
This week, and next, Poker After Dark is forgoing its usual $20,000 short-handed sit-n-go (yawn) for a Full Tilty high-stakes cash game with a $100k min and $250k max buy-in. (No rebuys maybe? Not sure … ). The players: Tom Dwan, Patrik Antonius, Phil Ivey, and Gus Hansen + Daniel Negreanu (representing PokerStars) and Phil Hellmuth thrown in for good measure.
I’m guessing Mori Eskandani doesn’t know who Isildur1 is either?
While PAD generally makes solid stumble-upon viewing, it’s been a while since they’ve assembled such a unique game that should play as real what everyone’s been watching on their computer screens lately. Sounds like there should be a lot of interesting (big) hands … and you gotta wonder just how much at least four of these people really want to give up about their cash-game play under the watchful eye of the hole-card cam.
I also wonder: would they ever do a similar show with the game being Omaha? The biggest hands (in history) these days seem to be playing out mostly in PLO … but conventional poker wisdom says, supposedly, that non-Texas hold’em doesn’t play well on TV.
12:28
09 Mar
Gus Hansen, a popular figure on the original Poker After Dark is back on the show’s new, exclusively online incarnation, playing PLO.
As we reported last week, Hansen boasted about his trip to the King’s Casino in Rozvadov on Instagram. He spent most of his time in the Czech city playing open-face Chinese poker - and according to the Great Dane himself, he finished his trip €100K up despite losing a €500K pot to casino owner Leon Tsoukernik.
Later, he had more exciting stuff to share with us on the picture sharing social media platform - Hansen announced he’s on his way to Las Vegas, Nevada to play in front of the cameras of Poker After Dark again.
“The Great Dane” was a regular during the the original PAD on NBC - he appeared a total of 9 times over the course of the show’s 7 seasons on the American network. He isn’t the only one of the old school pros who played both on the NBC and the new version of the poker series: among others, Antonio Esfandiari, Daniel Negreanu, Doyle Brunson and - this made the biggest splash - Tom Dwan also returned in the new installment of the classic show.
During the NBC times of PAD Hansen’s presence “leaked into” the mainstream, not poker-specific media as well: in 2004 he made People Magazine’s sexiest men list.
A great difference between the classic and new version of PAD is that nowadays Pot-Limit Omaha is also in the selection - PLO was played this time as well, Hansen took on Matthew Kirk, Ben Lamb, Brian Rast, Chris Macfarland, Lan Ashby and Sam Soverel in this 7-handed $100/$200/$400 - that turned into $200/$400/$800 part way through the match - PLO cash game.
During the stream we learnt from the commentator that actually Aussie Matt bought half of Hansen’s $30K starting stack - that was quickly lost after the Danish pro ambitiously called an all-in bet pre-flop with 8632, two spades. The rest of hand was almost just as crazy: it ended up being a 4-way all-in pot with $172K total in the middle in three side pots. The players agreed to run the board twice - on the first runout three people made three of a kind...
Gus Hansen Poker After Dark
However, Hansen quickly made back what he lost, doubling through his backer Kirk twice during the first hour and ended the session in profit. He wasn’t involved in the most discussed hand though - that was between Rast and Macfarland. Rast decided to call a flop all-in bet with nothing but a pair of deuce for which he was relentlessly taunted by Soverel despite winning half the pot since the board was run twice.