Ivey Wins First Pro-Am Equalizer Poker Match

He Will Play For $500,000 on Thursday

Phil Ivey outlasted a tough group of professionals during filming of the Pro-Am Equalizer today. He’s the first of six players to advance to the final where he has a chance to win the $500,000 first prize. He’s guaranteed at least $25,000.

By the luck of the draw, celebrities-slash-amateurs Jose Canseco and Cheryl Hines were stuck at a table with Ivey, Daniel Negreanu, John Juanda and Erick Lindgren. Each qualifying match fetaures four pros and two celebrities, but to make the matches more fair, the amateurs start with 150,000 chips, 50,000 more than the pros. Blinds start at 1,500-3,000 and went up every 20 minutes.

To read an article about the series that includes a list of all the players, click here.

In the first match, the amateurs at least ended up outlasting two of the pros.

Negreanu was the first player eliminated not long after the match began at 11 a.m. this morning. The elimination hand also gave Ivey a fairly large chip stack early in the day. Negreanu ended up all-in with pocket fours against Ivey’s AJ. Ivey flopped a flush draw then all anticipation ended when the turn filled it, sending Negreanu home.

For entertainment sake, it’s too bad it happened. Hines, who plays Larry David’s wife on HBO’s Curb Your Enthusiasm, and Negreanu chatted it up the short while before he was eliminated.



“My Goodness, it’s so sad,” Hines said as Negreanu walked away.

Juanda was next to go. His stack was crippled after he called Lindgren’s all-in with QJ. Lindgren’s AJ held, and a few hands later, Juanda was knocked out.

Canseco was next after his pocket sevens lost a race against Ivey’s A8.

“I’d rather be driving a car 200 miles an hour.” Canseco said before getting his chips into the pot.

The flop buried Canseco in the dust with T88. When he left, Hines said: “You mean you’re not going to take your shirt off now?”

Hines would soon follow Canseco out the door. She moved all-in with pocket sixes and it looked like she was in a heap of trouble when Ivey also pushed all-in before Lindgren was to act.

It ended up that Hines wasn’t in as bad of shape as she thought after Ivey turned over A9 of clubs. But, like most of the flops of the day, Ivey nailed it with a six and that was that for Hines.

“They’re awfully cute to look at, so that makes it fun, but I could see their minds clicking, and that makes it a little intimidating,” she said. “I could just tell that Phil Ivey is doing mathematical equations in his head.”

At the start of heads-up, Ivey out-chipped Lindgren about 500,000 to 200,000. At first, it looked like the two stars would end up battling for a better part of the night, but after about an hour of heads-up Ivey finally finished Lindgren off after moving all-in with pocket tens.

Lindgren nearly mucked, but wound up calling with AT offsuit. The flop helped neither player and the first match was over.

The second match of the day begins at 4 p.m. The group is made of Johnny Chan, Mike Matusow, Shawn Sheikhan, Gus Hansen, Nicholas Gonzalez and Yancey Arias.

The show will air on ABC weekends starting Nov. 11, for a total of 14 hours of poker action. The broadcast schedule is as follows (all times are east coast): Sat. Nov. 11, 2-3 p.m.; Sunday, Nov. 12, 1:30-3:30 p.m.; Sat. Nov. 18, 2-3 p.m.; Sunday, Nov. 19, 4-6 p.m.; Sunday, Nov. 26, 1:30-3:30 p.m.; Sunday, Dec. 3, 4-6 p.m.; Sunday, Dec. 17, 1-3 p.m.; and the final takes place Saturday, Dec. 23, 2-4 p.m.

News Added: 25 September, 2006

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