The Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino may be the property that is hopping right now in Las Vegas, what with the 2015 World Series of Poker going on, but ARIA Resort & Casino is doing its very best to get poker players over to its venue. The WPT500 is currently being held there as a cheaper alternative to the WSOP and in a few days, it will serve as host to Poker Central’s Super High Roller Celebrity Shootout.
Poker Central is an up-and-coming 24/7 poker-only television network set to debut (hopefully) sometime this year. Its first big production will be the Super High Roller Bowl, a $500,000 buy-in tournament to be held July 2nd to July 4th at ARIA. The event already has nearly 50 entrants signed-up and should be a fun way for many big names to warm-up for the 2015 WSOP Main Event.
Redefining the word “first,” though, Poker Central is putting on the Super High Roller Celebrity Shootout before the Super High Roller Bowl, as it will be held this weekend. The Celebrity Shootout will feature five poker pros and five celebrities from the entertainment world. The pros will be at one table, the celebs at another, with each table playing in a shootout sit-and-go format until just one pro and one celebrity remain. Those two will then square off heads-up in a best-of-three match.
The winner will receive $1 million. There is no mention on Poker Central’s website of a buy-in. Here are the participants:
Celebrities
Hank Azaria – four-time Emmy award winner, Azaria is an actor and comedian, best known today for voicing many of the characters on “The Simpsons.”
Don Cheadle – star of Showtime’s “House of Lies,” he is one of the best actors on the planet. He has appeared in many films, such as Hotel Rwanda, Crash, and the Ocean’s series. Like all of the celebrities in the competition, he is an avid poker player; he beat Phil Ivey in the 2007 National Heads-Up Poker Championship.
Brad Garrett – his unmistakable voice appeared along with his entire body in the long-running hit sitcom, “Everybody Loves Raymond,” amongst other television shows. His voice alone has also been in many films.
Norm MacDonald – legendary comedian best known for his five years on “Saturday Night Live” and his three years behind SNL’s “Weekend Update” desk that made network executives a bit uneasy at times. MacDonald is a huge poker buff and is regarded as a very good player.
Kevin Pollak – actor, comedian, and expert at impersonations, Pollak has appeared in tons of films, most notably The Usual Suspects, in which he played Hockney.
Poker Pros (we’ll dispense with the bios for them – if you are on this site, you know who they are)
Vanessa Selbst
Doyle Brunson
Phil Hellmuth
Antonio Esfandiari
Daniel Negreanu
The Super High Roller Celebrity Shootout will be broadcast on the NBC Sports Network starting in late July. Here is the broadcast schedule (all times ET):
July 29 – 9:00pm-11:00pm – Episode 1 and Episode 2
July 29 – 11:00pm-1:00am – Episode 1 and Episode 2
August 5 – 7:00pm-9:00pm – Episode 1 and Episode 2
August 5 – 9:00pm-11:00pm – Episode 3 and Episode 4
August 5 – 11:00pm-3:00pm – Episode 1 through Episode 4
August 12 – 7:00pm-9:00pm – Episode 3 and Episode 4
August 12 – 9:00pm-11:00pm – Episode 5 and Episode 6
August 12 – 11:00pm-3:00pm – Episode 3 through Episode 6
