Season 14 of the iconic poker show High Stakes Poker kicked-off yesterday with PokerGO airing the first episode and the action getting quite spicy right off the bat.
The new season is set to be one of the most star-studded of all time, with the likes of Phil Hellmuth, Alan Keating, Scott Seiver, and Nik Airball all set to make their appearances in later episodes.
The first episode featured a mix of familiar faces and HSP newcomers. Andrew Robl and Brandon Steven were the two players all HSP fans know well, while PLO crusher Jared Bleznick made his debut on the show and immediately left a significant mark.
The table was filled with a mix of poker pros and recreational players, with Seth Gottlieb, Marc Kulick, Markus Gonsalves, and Justin Gavri taking up the remaining seats.
Robl Runs Into Bleznick’s Brick Wall
Andrew Robl entered the 14th season of High Stakes Poker as the biggest winner in televised live poker and one of the absolute fan favorites.
Somewhat uncharacteristically, Robl bought into the $200/400 game for “just” $150k, but it quickly became clear he was more than willing to gamble that starting stack.
In the very first minutes of the episode, Robl made a few extremely aggressive play, but quickly ran into Bleznick’s pocket Aces to stop his momentum.
The hand started with the Blez opening A♥A♦ to $4k from early position. From the $800 straddle, Robl moved all-in for $139k total, which got snap called by Jared.
With almost $280k in the middle, Bleznick’s Aces were a huge favorite against the A♠Q♣ of Andrew Robl, and the board brought no help to the high-stakes crusher.
This hand saw the start of Bleznick’s momentum, which would last for the majority of the first episode of High Stakes Poker Season 14.
Andrew Bounces Back with Trip Queens
After losing to Bleznick’s Aces, Robl quickly reloaded, but ended up losing a few more significant pots to dig an even deeper hole.
Fortunately for him, he was able to patch the hole up soon enough, when Kulick’s curiosity got the better of him about half-way into the episode.
Robl opened to $2k from early position with A♦Q♣ and got four callers. The flop brought Q♠J♦4♥, giving him top pair with top kicker, while a couple of his opponents caught a little piece as well.
Robl’s flop c-bet of $5k was called by Gavri’s [invalid notations]. While he had to fade a few cards, Andrew was in sitting in the driver’s seat.
When the turn brought the Q♥, it seemed like he might not get too much action, but he opted for a sneaky check, which was enough to trap Kulick.
Kulick went for a $15k bet, which Robl quickly check-raised to $45k. Not believing the story, Marc called the turn bet, and felt compelled to call off the remaining $66k on the 2♦ river as well.
The $248k pot went Andrew’s way, and one of the most iconic HSP players was back on his way to rebuilding his stack.
Steven Gets Trapped for $170k
One of the biggest pots of the day went down between Brandon Steven and Seth Gottlieb, and it was quite the cooler.
Gottlieb opened the pot with A♥A♣ only to see Kulick make the call with 7♠6♠ and Steven pop it up to $10.7k with a monster hand of his own.
Steven’s A♠K♠ was utterly dominated by Seth’s Aces, and the money would have probably gone in preflop as well, but Gottlieb decided to slow-play it and make sure he gets more action.
This brought in Kulick as well, and the dealer put out a flop of K♣7♦5♥, giving everyone a reason to hope.
Steven c-bet for $14k and Gottlieb went for a small re-raise to $32k to protect his hand. Brandon wasted little time and re-raised it once more, with all the money quickly going into the middle.
A pot worth just a smidge under $350k was formed and the two agreed to run it twice. Neither of the run outs was any help to Brandon, who is more than used to losing and winning pots of this size.
Ultimate Cooler to End the Day
The biggest cooler of the session went down in the dying minutes. The Blez had been cruising up to that point, and it seemed like Lady Luck was on his side once again.
Kulick opened action to $2.2k with his A♦Q♠ and Bleznick put in the re-raise to just $6k holding a dominated K♣Q♣. Kulick called and then fired a flop bet of $2.5k in the dark before the dealer put out the flop.
To Jared’s great surprise, the flop was J♥10♦9♣, giving him the absolute nuts and his opponent and open-ended straight draw.
This was a dream scenario for Bleznick, who quickly re-raised to $10k and got called by Kulick. A clean 7♦ on the turn was good enough to help Bleznick win another $25k on the turn, and everything seemed to be going to his plan.
Had an 8 hit the turn, Bleznick would probably have won all of Kulick’s chips. Instead, the dealer put out the K♠, the absolute disaster card for the sports cards aficionado.
Kulick wisely checked once more and this prompted a $50k bet from Jared. When Kulick put in the remainder of his $183k stack, it seemed like Bleznick knew he was in trouble, but there was little he could do.
Holding a straight and only losing to AQ, the Blez made the reluctant call, only to be shown the bad new and lose the biggest pot of the session.
Bleznick still ended up winning for the episode, but announced to the table that this was the “worst beat of his poker career,” which was probably a reasonable representation of the hand that just played out.
The same group of player comes back for another session next week, with significantly more money on the table to start with and emotions already in play after several huge hands and significant coolers.
The next couple of months will bring a lot more High Stakes Poker action, as poker legends like Hellmuth and Keating join the table and make more poker history on PokerGO.
