The GSN cash game franchise “High Stakes Poker” will be undergoing a makeover of epic proportions for its seventh season, which kicks off on Saturday, February 26th at 8:00pm ET. Former “Saturday Night Live” regular Norm MacDonald (pictured, right) will assume the role of host, supplanting Gabe Kaplan, and no Full Tilt Poker pros will play. Nevertheless, a rock solid lineup of pros turned out to Season 7 of “High Stakes Poker,” which was filmed at the Bellagio in Las Vegas in December.

Members of the online poker community were buzzing about the addition of MacDonald in a thread in Poker Discussion. The reception, as has been the case around the Web on Monday, was quite mixed. Longtime PocketFives.com member CalBandGreat (pictured) opined, “I love Norm as much as everyone else in this thread, but does he know enough about poker to carry this show all by himself? I mean, even if Norm is clueless about poker, he will still be better than a lot of poker commentators because at least he will be funny, but I think Norm would do a lot better with a play by play guy to call the action and Norm can just insert a bunch of random funny stuff.”

Another member of PocketFives.com felt equal concern for the end product: “Norm is a really funny guy (to me), but a big-time acquired taste. Ask his bosses at NBC. I simply cannot envision Norm calling action or telling jokes to himself.” One other poster explained, “To be fair, I think people are right to be concerned – I’m not sure Norm is the best fit to host a poker show, despite being funny as hell.”

To top that off, the seventh season of “High Stakes Poker” was filmed in 3D. It can be seen exclusively on DIRECTV’s 3D channel, n3D, and will feature a trio of former World Series of Poker (WSOP) Main Event champions – Doyle Brunson, Johnny Chan, and Jonathan Duhamel. The latter will be making his “High Stakes Poker” debut, while Chan will grace the set for the second time. Brunson has appeared on every season of the GSN show.

Several members of the online poker community will be part of the groundbreaking season, including bracelet winner Jason treysfull21Mercier (pictured), Andrew good2cuRobl, Phil OMGClayAiken Galfond, and Barry barryg1Greenstein. Full Tilt pros, however, will be noticeably absent purportedly due to PokerStars‘ sponsorship of the series. With that in mind, here’s the full cast list for Season 7 of “High Stakes Poker” on GSN:

Mike Baxter
Eric Boneta
Doyle Brunson
Johnny Chan
Robert Croak
Jonathan Duhamel
Antonio Esfandiari
Phil Galfond
Bill Klein
Phil Laak
Jason Mercier
Julian Movsesian
Daniel Negreanu
David Peat
Bill Perkins
Andrew Robl
Phil Ruffin
Vanessa Selbst
Bob Voulgaris

Kara Scott will reprise her role as hostess and the show has a minimum $200,000 buy-in. The blinds will hold steady at $400/$800 and, as text found in a GSN press release details, “Several players were felted, so rebuys and add-ons were prevalent.” Players can buy in up to a maximum of $500,000 dollars.

Scott, a PartyPokerpro, replaced A.J. Benza to open Season 6, meaning that the show’s on-air talent has completely turned over in the last two seasons. It also moved from its familiar Sunday night time slot to Saturday for Season 7. If you miss the action at 8:00pm ET each week, a replay will air at 11:00pm ET.

What do you think? Weigh in by commenting here or posting in Poker Discussion.