WSOP Big One for One Drop champ Antonio Esfandiari (pictured) and fellow poker pro Phil Laak have hooked up with the Discovery Channel to create the pilot episode of “Underground Poker,” a show which they say goes against the grain of traditional poker programming.

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In the episode, the two longtime friends travel to New Orleans and use their connections to buy into real, private home games. “We called around to some people and said, ‘Hey look, we want to come and play, are there any games?”‘ Esfandiari told PokerNews. “They said there were a few games. They had to be okay with being on camera, but we wanted real players, real money, and real games. Not a single hand is staged. Everything is legit.”

Laak emphasized that the show wouldn’t be completely focused on poker hands. “I think the entire show is 24 minutes and they only show between two and five hands,” he said. “It’s not a lot. It’s more about the feeling a pro has as he drifts around the city trying to find home games to play in, the ‘who do you know’ aspect.”

“Underground Poker” was born when the pair met producer Jennifer Killoran while filming a cameo for the movie “Runner Runner.” While their scene never made it into the final cut, Esfandiari and Laak became fast friends with Killoran, who found the pair to be highly entertaining together.

“She said, ‘You guys need a TV show.”‘ Esfandiari revealed. “We said we already had one and she said, ‘Well, you need another one.’ We said that’s great, but nobody ever makes it happen. She said she could make it happen and the next thing you know we have a TV show.”

Esfandiari explained that the show started out as a five-minute teaser that was lengthened to 13 minutes before the production company finally decided to pull the trigger on a full pilot.

So far, only the initial New Orleans episode has been filmed. If reaction is good and the series is picked up, the two pros will travel to different cities looking for new games and filming their antics along the way. “We could go to any city where there are private poker games – Atlanta, Charlotte, San Francisco, Vancouver – there are cities all over the world that have poker games, so it could be anywhere,” Esfandiari said. Laakis pictured.

“Underground Poker” won’t be the first time the two friends have appeared on television together. In 2007, the pair starred in “I Bet You,” a series in which the two made high-stakes prop bets on anything and everything in their path. Two seasons of the series aired on MOJO, with the third having been filmed, but left unaired. The pros have also appeared on “Poker After Dark” and in movies like “Lucky You,” “Deal,” and “Freelancers.”

“The more viewers we have, the better chance we have of having the show picked up and really creating something new,” added Esfandiari. “You can never judge a series by the first show. You have to develop the characters. If we get the poker community behind us, we will have a show on Discovery for sure. Hopefully, people will like it and won’t bash it too much. We want minimal bashing.”

You can catch “Underground Poker” on Wednesday, September 10 at 10pm Eastern Time on the Discovery Channel. Esfandiari and Laak will be tuning in and Tweeting live with fans during the episode.

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