I think you’re right when you state that Joe Hachem’s accent is quite irritating. But I also think Hachem is one of the best Main Event winners from the past ten years. If you’re still not convinced on this point, have a look at the following fragment (hand is played after 10 minutes):

No I think this is a very strong play from Hachem, if you consider the extreme tight image of ‘the Nitty Professor’, Howard Lederer. First of all I like his play preflop, just calling with Jacks, a move I also often make. The same action follows on the flop, with Hachem just calling Lederer’s bet on an all spade board. The play from Lederer is horrible on the flop: he checks first and follows that up with an obvious feelerraise. Hachem notices this and has the guts to make a nice reraise here, making Howard throw away his flush. I think Lederer won’t appear in any season of HSP anymore.

I already showed you a good play from Tom ‘Durrrr’ Dwan on Poker After Dark, but after seeing the first episodes of season 5 of High Stakes Poker, I completely understand the fuzz that arised around his person the last couple of months in poker world.

Now this play on episode two is really one of the GREATEST plays I’ve ever seen. Dwan is really in the zone and is pushing the table around like he already plays for ten years with this guys. You obviously see experienced guys like Doyle Brunson, Barry Greenstein and even Daniel Negreanu feeling uncomfortable with the presence of Dwan. A new hand starts (at 2′50″ in the video below) and the very tight playing Greenstein makes a standard early position raise with AA. Because the players to the left of Barry call the pots odds grow and it becomes a family pot:

The raise on the flop from Dwan looks kinda stupid at that point, but after he only gets called by Eastgate and Greenstein, Dwan knows he can take this pot with an enormous bullet on the turn. That’s exactly what he does and with this great and courageous bet he takes this pot in a magnificent way. Notice the relief on Dwan’s face after Eastgate’s fold, as he knows this guy had the best hand, just like he says after the hand. This is poker on another level.

I didn’t write a lot about one of my heroes Eli Elezra yet, but today I have one fantastic move from this poker phenomenon. It dates from the first episode of High Stakes Poker Season 5.

Now first of all, what an impressive personality is this guy on a poker table? I mean look at that leather jacket and that magnificent accent. You can place this guy without any problem right next to Silvio Dante in the Soprano’s . His appearance also plays an important role in the following hand (first hand to play completely):

As Gabe Kaplan already mentions, this is great body language by Elezra. After he has raised the straddle from Tom Dwan, he acts very artificially distracted on the flop, like he has indeed flopped top pair top kicker, two pair or a set. You can perfectly see the reaction on Durrrr’s face: he thinks he immediately figured out this hand and folds quickly. But Tom’s still young and has a lot years in front of him to learn from this guys .

That’s what I saw David Benyamine doing the other day during an episode of High Stakes Poker (season 4 episode 17). He’s playing against one of my absolute favorite players, Daniel Negreanu. The actual hand starts towards the end of the fragment you can see right here and continues here .

Daniel calls David’s preflop Aces raise with T9 off and hits toppair on the flop. When Benyamine makes a continuation bet on the flop, Daniel just calls. I think he doesn’t really think he has the best hand here, but thinks he can make a move on the turn. After all, Benyamine didn’t play that many hands so Daniel must give him credit for like… Kings?! That’s exactly his speech on the turn when he raises another big bet from Benyamine.

I think Daniel thinks he can perfectly represent TT or 88 in that spot. Then the speech even gets better: “I don’t say I have Kings beat.”, actually true . However Benyamine shows some serious guts when moving all-in over the top and the “oh boy” from Daniel already is a classic^^.

Later on in the episode, Daniel himself shows some serious skills, when guessing exactly Doyle Brunson’s hand (a set of 3’s), right after Antonio Esfandiari exactly says what Daniel had in the hand before, where Daniel’s 88 was quiete disguised. I love those guys!

When two players share a certain history which eachother, regarding poker confrontations in the past, a hand can be played completely different than in any other normal situation. This was showed exactly by Sammy Farha and Patrick Antonius, on High Stakes Poker (S04E16). I have the fragment right here for you:

Where Barry Greenstein folds his AJ, Sammy wants to play with his K6 against Antonius. The Finnish player makes a continuation bet on the flop, but Sammy is not scared with his middle pair, this obviously is a great call. Not because Sammy’s just a loose player but because he actually is convinced he has the best hand there. Antonius however sticks with his read that Sammy is not that strong and fires two more bullets on turn and river. Sammy makes two great calls. Those two guys will without any doubt collide again in the future.

I saw some great piece of non-verbal as well as verbal action on episode 14 of High Stakes Poker (season 4). The first hand starts at around 5′20″ and the next one follows right after it:

Now in the first hands it’s professional gambler Sammy Farha against his wannabe-friend Jamie Gold. Sammy exactly shows in this hand why he’s the master and Jamie the student. After it’s checked on the flop they both make toppair and Sammy further improves his hand to top two pair on the river. Subsequently Sammy makes a great bet on the river first (making it look like a bluff) and then gives Gold a suspicious smile. It pays off.

In the following hand, the hand is again checked around at the flop and Sammy makes a set of deuces on the turn, while David Benyamine completes his straight flush. Farha makes a big raise on the turn and Benyamine’s speech gives him the feeling he has the best hand there. This had to cross his mind  when he calls the reraise. Good play.

I watched the next episode of season 4 of High Stakes Poker and I saw another interesting hand where the French player Guy Laliberté is involved. This time he faced a cunning trick from a real poker pro, Antonio Esfandiari.

You can watch the hand below, it starts at 16′:

Antonio limps preflop with AK because there was a lot of action going on and he was probably hoping he could limp-reraise. Instead a lot of players enter the pot but Antonio flops his Ace and leads out. Laliberté is the only caller and a scary diamond drops down on the turn. Now Antonio checks and Guy bets here, so Antonio has to be scared of a flush. But the Magician just pays $1k to see a card and the amateur shows him the 7 of diamonds. From that moment Antonio knows Guy doesn’t have a flush. Besides, if the river was a diamond, Antonio was sure he was beat. Nice move there.