Go get Peacock
A fan-favorite poker show from the heyday of poker television is set to make its triumphant return. On Monday, PokerGO and PokerStars announced that they are bringing back the National Heads-Up Poker Championship (NHUPC), which went off the air more than a decade ago.
The NHUPC will debut on the Peacock streaming service this fall and then rebroadcast on PokerGO and PokerStars at some undetermined date later.
“Bringing back shows like the National Heads-Up Poker Championship is one of the most exciting ways to reignite interest in poker,” said Francine Watson, PokerStars’ Associate Director, Content & Creative Services. “With a mix of celebrities and top pros, it’s the kind of event that draws in poker enthusiasts while appealing to the masses.”
The show has confirmed several poker pros and celebrities so far, including Liv Boeree, Shaun Deeb, Phil Galfond, Bryce Hall, Jason Koon, T.J. Lavin, Rob “Boston Rob” Mariano, Michael Mizrachi, Chris Moneymaker, Doug Polk, Rob Riggle, Erik Seidel, Richard Seymour, and Nick Wright.
The best square off
The original National Heads-Up Poker Championship debuted on NBC in 2005, the first poker event produced and televised by a major US television network. NBC later broadcast the popular Poker After Dark sit-and-go poker series.
The NHUPC was held each year through 2011, skipped 2012, then had one more run in 2013 before the event was canceled. The champions were a “who’s who” of the poker boom years: Phil Hellmuth, Ted Forrest, Paul Wasicka, Chris Ferguson, Huck Seed, Annie Duke, Erik Seidel, and Mike Matusow.
While we don’t know the exact number of participants that will be invited, the competition sounds like it will follow the same or close to the same format as the original NHUPC. It will be a $25,000 buy-in, single-elimination, one-on-one, bracket-style tournament. The original version featured four brackets, each named after a playing card suit, and the seedings were drawn randomly the day before the tournament started – the matchup selection was an event in and of itself.
The winners of the Hearts and Diamonds brackets and the winners of the Clubs and Spades brackets met in the final four. The championship round was a best-of-three contest.
Image credit: PokerGO.com
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