Where well-heeled celebrities sit down to play poker, the pros are sure to follow. This is for good reason. Pitted against sharks who play cards for a living, celebs tend to be fish.
Phil Hellmuth warns that this is not the case with Kevin Hart, who appears on this season of PokerGO’s High Stakes Poker. The 17-time WSOP bracelet winner should know, having rubbed elbows at the poker table with the Hollywood and Silicon Valley elite for the better part of the last two decades.
“He’s the funniest person I’ve ever played poker with,” Hellmuth told me via a phone call over the weekend. “And he is a fantastic hold’em player.”
Funny And Fearless
Hellmuth recalled a private game in Los Angeles where he played with the stand-up turned movie star.
“I won and he lost, but that night, he outplayed me,” Hellmuth admitted. “Kevin is fearless and tough. That is a very good combination.”
Hellmuth points out that just because Hart has a lot of dough, pros who go up against him should not expect the Philadelphia native to put his casg in the pot unwisely. Instead, he wields it like a weapon.
“He uses his money to his advantage,” said Hellmuth, who has a sponsorship deal with BetRivers via Rush Street Interactive. “If you know a guy will not call a $5,000 bet with 7-8 suited, you can just bet $5,000 all the time.”
“He was sitting on my left and he would reraise me with not much, knowing I couldn’t call most of the time,” Hellmuth explained. “If I limped, he would raise as well.”
Essentially, Hart made it tough for Hellmuth to get into pots with anything but premium hands.
Putting In the Work To Improve
Raising is easy for Hart, who according to IMDB earned $30 million for his work on Jumanji: The Next Level. And his standup career is legendarily lucrative.
Between making movies and performing for packed arenas, how did Hart get so good at poker?
“He played 50 hours a week and he loves the game,” answered Hellmuth. “The first time I sat down to play with Kevin, to me, he was almost a professional. He’s great for the game in that he’s fun to play with, and he gives a lot of action. I’ve watched him win big in LA.”
Busting Balls And Hauling Pots
Winning or losing, Hart’s humor comes in handy at the table.
“He’s really good at making fun of people,” said Hellmuth, acknowledging that he was not exactly spared. “One time I was playing with him, I won around $320,000 and he won a lot more. At some point in the night, Kevin said something along the long lines of, ‘Thank God you’re afraid to put a chip in the pot or else you would have won a million.’”
“He was right!” Hellmuth said with a laugh. “The cards were there. But I was afraid. The game was very big for me.”
Hart doesn’t seem to care about the money. Back in 2018, he infamously scooped a pot with just king high on the PokerStars Championship Cash Challenge series, only to return the money to his opponent after admitting he misread his hand.
Not There To Screw Around
Mori Eskandani, a Poker Hall of Famer who produces High Stakes Poker and has mixed it up with plenty of celebrities, spent a lot of time watching Hart in action. He points out that Hart might joke around at the table – which is to be expected – but he’s doing something else as well.
“Like all good players, he’s reading people,” Eskandani said. “Kevin is very good at that, and he has a lot of street smarts.”
Plus, his giant bankroll does more than just allow him to push around the pros.
“People who have a lot of money, who play no-limit hold’em with skill, they’re playing pure poker,” Eskandani explained. “They’re not thinking about the financial impact of losing a pot. And Kevin is extremely competitive. He is not there to screw around.”
Hellmuth puts Hart right alongside Ben Affleck, Tobey Maguire, and NBA star Draymond Green as top-flight celebrities who don’t give up much when the cards are in the air.
“Kevin is super aggressive everywhere,” said Hellmuth. “For the people who don’t play against Kevin, I’m sure they underestimate him. But nobody in my poker group does. We know how good he is.”
Michael Kaplan is a journalist based in New York City. He is the author of six books including Advantage Players, and has worked for publications that include Wired, GQ and the New York Post. He has written extensively on technology, gambling, and business — with a particular interest in spots where all three intersect. His article on Kelly “Baccarat Machine” Sun and Phil Ivey is currently in development as a feature film.
- Photos by PokerGO
