New poker/gambling shows, one featuring Antonio Esfandiari and Phil Laak

[Daredevil]

http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/201...ber-10/298850/

Could be interesting depending on how fake/over produced it is...

[Dan Druff]

They claim these are three poker-themed shows, but the first two have little (or nothing) to do with poker.

Casinos, lotteries and bookies all use math and science to stack the deck against you. Now you can fight back. In HUSTLING THE HOUSE, airing at 8pm ET/PT, get the scoop that the House does not want you to have.

This looks like it will likely be lame and dumbed down.

Next up is CASINO SECRETS at 9pm ET/PT. Every single detail in a casino is designed to keep the gambler from leaving. The longer than gambler stays, the more likely that gambler is to lose money. In CASINO SECRETS, insiders reveal the hidden world of high rollers. From the true odds of roulette, to the inner workings of a slot machine, the truth is about to come out.

Again, this is probably something really dumbed down and not meant for anyone who has knowledge of the casino world (meaning most people on this site won't get anything out of it). I am guessing they will probably reveal the house edge on various casino games, and show the calculations of what happens when you stay for X number of hours betting Y amount of money.

Finally, UNDERGROUND POKER premieres at 10pm ET/PT. Phil Laak and Antonio Esfandiari are two of the most feared and successful players on the poker circuit today. Phil holds a World Poker title, a World Series of Poker bracelet, and owns the world record for the longest time spent playing poker in a single session, lasting 115 hours at the Vegas Bellagio in 2010. Antonio’s won two World Poker Tour championships and three World Series of Poker bracelets, including the “Big One for One Drop” in 2012, where he took home the largest cash prize ever awarded at a single poker event – in excess of eighteen million dollars!

But though it’s the tournament circuit that made them famous, their bread-and-butter venues are the ones that average Joes never see – ultra-exclusive and closely guarded underground games where fortunes are won and lost and won again, all in the course of a single night. Just to sit at these tables takes a lot of nerve, and a LOT of cash, but first you have to get in the door, and that means knowing the right people.

Luckily that’s not a problem for Phil and Antonio – they know everybody who knows anybody in the poker world. In this special, they head to New Orleans, home to some of the most coveted underground games in the nation, and use their connections to hone in on the action, whether it’s at a luxurious loft on Bourbon Street or in the back room of seedy, swamp-side dive. Down in the Big Easy, high stakes and danger preside with every raise and every call, and that’s why it’s exactly where Phil and Antonio want to be.

This will probably be the most interesting of the three, but it's likely yet another over-the-top Phil-and-Antonio show. I doubt that they will be playing in any "seedy, swamp-side dives" unless the whole thing was a setup to begin with. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the whole thing was fake, so as to protect these games (and the people running them) from prosecution.

[BeerAndPoker]

I give every show poker/gambling related about five minutes to win me over and if they don't then I turn them off.

Maybe one of these three shows will be watchable but I doubt more then that will be.

[ShadyJ]

They claim these are three poker-themed shows, but the first two have little (or nothing) to do with poker.



This looks like it will likely be lame and dumbed down.

Next up is CASINO SECRETS at 9pm ET/PT. Every single detail in a casino is designed to keep the gambler from leaving. The longer than gambler stays, the more likely that gambler is to lose money. In CASINO SECRETS, insiders reveal the hidden world of high rollers. From the true odds of roulette, to the inner workings of a slot machine, the truth is about to come out.

Again, this is probably something really dumbed down and not meant for anyone who has knowledge of the casino world (meaning most people on this site won't get anything out of it). I am guessing they will probably reveal the house edge on various casino games, and show the calculations of what happens when you stay for X number of hours betting Y amount of money.

Finally, UNDERGROUND POKER premieres at 10pm ET/PT. Phil Laak and Antonio Esfandiari are two of the most feared and successful players on the poker circuit today. Phil holds a World Poker title, a World Series of Poker bracelet, and owns the world record for the longest time spent playing poker in a single session, lasting 115 hours at the Vegas Bellagio in 2010. Antonio’s won two World Poker Tour championships and three World Series of Poker bracelets, including the “Big One for One Drop” in 2012, where he took home the largest cash prize ever awarded at a single poker event – in excess of eighteen million dollars!

But though it’s the tournament circuit that made them famous, their bread-and-butter venues are the ones that average Joes never see – ultra-exclusive and closely guarded underground games where fortunes are won and lost and won again, all in the course of a single night. Just to sit at these tables takes a lot of nerve, and a LOT of cash, but first you have to get in the door, and that means knowing the right people.

Luckily that’s not a problem for Phil and Antonio – they know everybody who knows anybody in the poker world. In this special, they head to New Orleans, home to some of the most coveted underground games in the nation, and use their connections to hone in on the action, whether it’s at a luxurious loft on Bourbon Street or in the back room of seedy, swamp-side dive. Down in the Big Easy, high stakes and danger preside with every raise and every call, and that’s why it’s exactly where Phil and Antonio want to be.

This will probably be the most interesting of the three, but it's likely yet another over-the-top Phil-and-Antonio show. I doubt that they will be playing in any "seedy, swamp-side dives" unless the whole thing was a setup to begin with. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the whole thing was fake, so as to protect these games (and the people running them) from prosecution.

They claim every hand of poker is 100% real.

[Dan Druff]

Post on 2+2 from a guy who claims to have met with the show's producers, and heard about the finished product:

When they came down to film the pilot I had a couple of meetings with one of the producers, sounded like they had some great ideas and a particular direction that they wanted to go that would have been well liked by the 2+2 crowd. We actually discussed how important it was to represent this community by name--he knew nothing of this message board when I mentioned it, but said satisfying the "internet kids" was a priority for P + A.

They also wanted to get the stamp of approval from other poker communities/circles/cliques in putting together a show. From what he said it sounded like this was important to Phil and Antonio. He talked about how the producers wanted to realistically capture the local community's poker scene in the games in each city they visited. I thought was kind of genius. Who wouldn't tune into see the regulars from every locale sit in a game with P+A? I gave him a list of guys that I thought would represent a wide swath of players locally, with a heavy influence on players that would be entertaining.

I had very high hopes for the show. It overlapped some ideas I had about a reality poker show that I think could be a hit. That said, I saw some of their early footage they used to sell the idea to the network. Very stylized, and felt like some quasi-reality quasi-drama show. Essentially, the ugly embodiment of what you get when use "reality" personalities to not pay actors but want to film a scripted show. I have no idea if the pilot or series continued in that direction or if that segment I saw was simply a tool to sell the concept.

From people that were filmed and helped with the show in New Orleans I heard that Antonio and Phil were great. However, the local "scene" that they captured for one locale was a bunch of Teamsters (?) who don't even play and they played down to stale Louisiana stereotypes that are all over TV. Instead of showing what New Orleans poker is really about they went a fictionalized route. One player in particular who occasionally posts on here expressed disappointment to be "lopped" in with that group and confided to me he thought the final product wouldn't do us locals any favors.

I'm hopeful the finished product does a service for poker. The producer seemed genuine and earnest (producers seeming genuine... lol) that he wanted to do a good thing for poker. I'm going to watch it and hope for the best, and I think it's kind of awesome Phil and Antonio are getting these kind of shows through. Even if it's not perfect, hopefully it'll be a plus for all of us, and hopefully all the wonderful things we talked about will show up on TV.

Of course, none of the idiots in the thread bothered to respond to this, and instead just made comments like, "Can't wait to watch!"

If Mason hadn't banned me, I would have a lot of questions for this guy, but oh well...

[jacosta24]

Seen the preview for the Phil laak show, it looks fake AF

[Pooh]

Post on 2+2 from a guy who claims to have met with the show's producers, and heard about the finished product:

When they came down to film the pilot I had a couple of meetings with one of the producers, sounded like they had some great ideas and a particular direction that they wanted to go that would have been well liked by the 2+2 crowd. We actually discussed how important it was to represent this community by name--he knew nothing of this message board when I mentioned it, but said satisfying the "internet kids" was a priority for P + A.

They also wanted to get the stamp of approval from other poker communities/circles/cliques in putting together a show. From what he said it sounded like this was important to Phil and Antonio. He talked about how the producers wanted to realistically capture the local community's poker scene in the games in each city they visited. I thought was kind of genius. Who wouldn't tune into see the regulars from every locale sit in a game with P+A? I gave him a list of guys that I thought would represent a wide swath of players locally, with a heavy influence on players that would be entertaining.

I had very high hopes for the show. It overlapped some ideas I had about a reality poker show that I think could be a hit. That said, I saw some of their early footage they used to sell the idea to the network. Very stylized, and felt like some quasi-reality quasi-drama show. Essentially, the ugly embodiment of what you get when use "reality" personalities to not pay actors but want to film a scripted show. I have no idea if the pilot or series continued in that direction or if that segment I saw was simply a tool to sell the concept.

From people that were filmed and helped with the show in New Orleans I heard that Antonio and Phil were great. However, the local "scene" that they captured for one locale was a bunch of Teamsters (?) who don't even play and they played down to stale Louisiana stereotypes that are all over TV. Instead of showing what New Orleans poker is really about they went a fictionalized route. One player in particular who occasionally posts on here expressed disappointment to be "lopped" in with that group and confided to me he thought the final product wouldn't do us locals any favors.

I'm hopeful the finished product does a service for poker. The producer seemed genuine and earnest (producers seeming genuine... lol) that he wanted to do a good thing for poker. I'm going to watch it and hope for the best, and I think it's kind of awesome Phil and Antonio are getting these kind of shows through. Even if it's not perfect, hopefully it'll be a plus for all of us, and hopefully all the wonderful things we talked about will show up on TV.

Of course, none of the idiots in the thread bothered to respond to this, and instead just made comments like, "Can't wait to watch!"

If Mason hadn't banned me, I would have a lot of questions for this guy, but oh well...

Use one of your 20 dupes

[4BET]

Made it 9 minutes and had to shut it down, Awful

[BeerAndPoker]

I recorded all three shows and will see if I can make it past 5 minutes in any of them later on or tomorrow.

[Dan Druff]

Hopefully someone will YouTube it so I can play clips next week on radio and make fun of it.

The "playing clips and making fun of them" segments are my favorite parts of radio nowadays.

[Dan Druff]

I am watching Hustling the House now, which I just turned on 20 minutes late.

I saw Andy Bloch attempting to give advice for blackjack.

But instead of teaching people how to count (which would obviously be too hard on a 1-hour TV show meant to entertain), they come up with an awful poor man's version of card counting, telling you to sit down at a table if you see a bunch of small cards exposed on the current hand.

That is terrible advice for two reasons:

1) If it's a 6 or 8 deck shoe (or continuous shuffler), this means little to nothing

2) It is possible (in fact probable) that these small cards are coming out because there was a disproportionate number of big cards earlier, so you may still be playing in a worse-than-average deck. There's no way to know without watching the deck from the start.

Yet the show is telling you that you will have the house 'on the run' with such a strategy.

I can't believe Andy Bloch associated with this nonsense.

[Dan Druff]

In "Hustling the House", Erica Lindgren appeared as a craps expert.

You read that right.

Yes, THAT Erica Lindgren.

[BeerAndPoker]

In "Hustling the House", Erica Lindgren appeared as a craps expert.

Well... she did marry a piece of shit.

[BeerAndPoker]

So I struggled but got through the Husting the House show.

A few thoughts:

Andy Bloch was in a blackjack card counting instructional video I saw that was over an hour long discussing it more in depth. That video was way better then his five minute segment on this show which was a big waste of time.

Erica Lindgren is no expert at anything except flirting with poker pros. Eric Lindgren was in decent shape financially at the time they got together with his FTP money coming in and she was with that fat ass David Benyamine before Eric so I lean towards gold digger who got married and had a baby now she is stuck with E-Dog.

The horse racing segment was horrible. That guy who proclaims to be crushing it says "We're all gambling against each other! Your not betting against the house." ROF! While that is somewhat true the tracks take a big percentage out of the betting pools and some places in horse racing are shady as fuck where some jockeys will throw races,etc...