After much hype, Poker Central, the world’s only round-the-clock poker television network, will make its debut on Thursday, October 1st. On Tuesday, it announced its inaugural programming lineup. Many of the shows, at least initially, will be pre-existing series that originally aired either in the U.S. or overseas, but Poker Central is developing original programming, as well.
“Poker Central is about to super serve the tens of millions of passionate and sophisticated poker fans in the United States and around the world. With thousands of hours of new, fresh content, Poker Central aims to entertain as well as it informs,” said Poker Central CEO Clint Stinchcomb in a press release. “Television and internet have made poker play global and universal, giving rise to a new set of stars outside of Hollywood and traditional sports. We are excited that launch day has arrived and so has mainstream poker.”
Things kickoff on October 1st at 8:00pm ET with the popular UK show, “Premier League Poker.” It will air Monday through Saturday and is initially set to span seasons six and seven.
At 9:00pm will be the two-hour show, “Heads-Up Grand Slam,” which will feature 32 players competing for a $100,000 top prize. After that, Poker Central will show the now-classic “Poker After Dark,” a six-handed Sit-and-Go competition that originally aired on NBC.
On October 2nd at 9:00pm and 10:00pm and each Friday thereafter, the network will air the “Doubles Poker Championship.” This one sounds interesting: 32 players buy-in for $50,000 each, but are randomly paired and play as two-person teams.
Over the weekend, another former U.S. show, “Face the Ace,” will be shown at 8:00pm on Saturday. Sunday night will start with “100 Greatest Poker Moments” at 8:00pm, followed by the very popular shows “High Stakes Poker” and “The Big Game VI.”
Next week’s programming includes “Women’s World Open I” on Tuesday night, “The Big Game VII” on Wednesday, and the World Poker Tour’s “Alpha 8” on Thursday.
Later this year, on December 2nd, Poker Central will premiere its first episodes of the “Super High Roller Cash Game.” The related “Super High Roller Bowl” has already been showing on NBC Sports Network, with the newest episodes slated for this coming Friday night at 10:30pm ET.
Poker Central, despite promoting itself as the first 24/7 poker network, has yet to actually announce where on the television dial it will actually exist. As mentioned, the “Super High Roller Bowl” has been airing, but that has been on NBCSN, not Poker Central’s own channel. According to a Facebook post, though, it appears that Poker Central will reveal where fans can guide their remotes on the various cable and satellite systems on October 1st.
