PokerGO’s High Stakes Duel 4 resumed Thursday night in Las Vegas with Daniel Negreanu taking on Doug Polk in a $100,000 buy-in winner-take-all heads-up match.
The two high rollers were at one point bitter rivals, choosing to settle their beef in a high-stakes heads-up match, but have since buried the hatchet. That didn’t stop a fierce competition for the High Stakes Duel $200,000 payout, however.
The match ended up taking about three hours, although it could have ended just 15 minutes into play when Negreanu was mulling over a call for his tournament life with A
J
on a board reading A 7
3 K 2. He ultimately made the right decision, folding to Polk’s 5 4 for a rivered flush.
Despite falling behind 2:1, Negreanu was able to take control after flopping the nuts with A J on a board of 10 8 4 2 7. Polk, who held K 3, lost a lot of his stack by firing on all three streets with his missed flush draw.
On the final hand, Polk once again emptied the clip, firing three barrels with 9 7 on a board of K 8 6 A
Q. Negreanu picked off the bluff with A 10, dragging the final pot of the night.
“The hard thing about playing against Doug is that he isn’t one of those people that are afraid to put you in really tough spot,” Negreanu told PokerGO. “Sometimes you’re going to have to dig deep and make the call with marginal hands like that last hand.”
Having won his first match with casino owner Eric Persson for $50,000 each, the poker hall of famer had the option to cash out with his $150,000 profit, or let it ride in a $200,000 buy-in match.
“I’m done,” Negreanu said. “I win the belt, right? I don’t want to put the belt on the line. But they can come back and get it in [the next] round 1 if they want it, and I defend it that way.”
With his victory, Negreanu becomes only the second player in the show’s history with more than one win, improving his record to 2-3. Tom Dwan is 1-1, Jason Koon is 1-0, and Phil Hellmuth sits at the top with a 9-2 record.
Watch the key hands from the match below, or the full replay on PokerGO.
First blood is drawn by
DougPolkVids</a> in High Stakes Duel 4 Round 2.<br><br>Polk rivers a flush against <a href="https://twitter.com/RealKidPoker?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">RealKidPoker's top pair but Negreanu finds the correct fold to extend the heads-up match.– Watch live here: https://t.co/R2gEb2tXuE pic.twitter.com/zBYcRHtqEW
— PokerGO (@PokerGO) August 25, 2023
Negreanu is back in the driver's seat of High Stakes Duel 4 Round 2 after making the nut flush in this huge pot.
RealKidPoker</a> flops the goods and gets paid when <a href="https://twitter.com/DougPolkVids?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">DougPolkVids pulls the trigger on a three-street bluff.– Watch live here: https://t.co/R2gEb2tXuE pic.twitter.com/1YdoG14WbF
— PokerGO (@PokerGO) August 25, 2023
It's all over!
RealKidPoker</a> defeats <a href="https://twitter.com/DougPolkVids?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">DougPolkVids in Round 2 of High Stakes Duel 4!With that, Negreanu claims the $200,000 prize and walks away with the belt as the High Stakes Duel 4 Champion.
– Watch a replay of Negreanu's match against Polk here: https://t.co/R2gEb2tpF6 pic.twitter.com/IlF24m8Uan
— PokerGO (@PokerGO) August 25, 2023
Well in fairness, I already bought him one so yeah.
— Daniel Negreanu (@RealKidPoker) August 25, 2023
