High Stakes Poker

High Stakes Poker is a television show that airs on the Game Show Network (a basic cable network), currently airing new episodes at 9pm on Mondays. It is hosted by AJ Benza and Gabe Kaplan.

It is unique among televised poker shows in that it does not show a tournament; instead, it is a televised ring game featuring high-stakes NLHE held in a private room at the Golden Nugget, Las Vegas. Each episode is one hour long, and appears to have been edited down from about 90 minutes or so of action. It appears to have been filmed at a series of poker games that took place over about a week, for a number of hours each night. Occasional episodes end with the players saying "see you tomorrow night" or such, as the game breaks up for the night before resuming the following day. The minimum buy-in at the table is $100,000, though Daniel Negreanu bought in for a straight $1,000,000. Daniel is also the only player who appears to have played during the entire multi-day session; other players come and go as they please.

The players at the table include Daniel Negreanu, Sammy Farha, Freddy Deeb, and a number of other poker professionals who sit down or get up and leave whenever they feel like it. The player's spouses are often seen in the background, waiting for their loved ones to finish playing so they can get back to shopping (or whatever it is the spouses of poker players do in Las Vegas).

Players who have appeared in various episodes have included Mimi Tran, Barry Greenstein, Todd Brunson, Johnny Chan, Doyle Brunson, Antonio Esfandiari, Phil Hellmuth, Jennifer Harman, Eli Elezra, Ted Forrest, and well-known amateurs like Jerry Buss, Bob Stupak, and Sean Shiekhan.