Sky Poker Guest Slot

Last week I was a guest on the Bounty Hunter, one of the live Sky Poker shows that is also broadcast on Sky Sports 3. The format has changed significantly since I last appeared on live TV a few years back, thankfully.

Previously the guests played the online tournament being discussed along with the players, which led to my first 2 minutes on air being a bit of a nightmare. Grub Smith was the presenter back then and he came to me just as I had flopped a full house in the tournament. Poker instinct kicked in and I decided to pretty much ignore him as he started talking to me. It didn’t help that he also took the opportunity to make fun of my hair for his opening line which I wasn’t prepared for, all of which made for 2 minutes I have never dared watch back.

The format last week was much easier; it was more of a cosy chat, albeit a 4 hour cosy chat. I was sandwiched between James Hartigan playing a bit of an anchor role and Tony Kendall going for the comic foil persona (At least I assume that was the intention, because that’s how it played out). It was actually really hard to get a word in edgeways with Tony, but that I think was a good thing, it really took any pressure off and allowed me to just sit there and once in a while come up with a one liner and look smart.

That’s at least how I feel it went. My hand analysis was actually pretty bad, having worked on this book with Jared I know all too well about how the mind can go blank in pressure situations and this is one area where I felt I fell a bit short on the night. But overall I think it went well, I got a couple of decent gags in and was able to get some solid plugs for the Mental Game of Poker too (Which was a surprise to me because I was expecting to be talking about PokerNews).

We also played a fun game called ‘Masters of the Twitterverse’ where it was me vs Tikay in a ‘which poker player tweeted this?’ quiz. I must say that if there was ever a game where I was probably in the world elite, it would be this. As a result I battered Tikay 16-4 and feel ready to take anyone (Other than KevMath obv).

Although I would say it was quite ‘easy’ being a guest on the show, four hours later when it was over I really felt it. I was exhausted, really really shattered. It was then that I realised what a tough job it is and was eternally thankful to James and Tikay for making sure there was never any dead air and allowing me to travel along at my own pace.

It was quite a novelty going to the Sky Sports studios, this was the first time I had been to the head office and it was a very impressive fortress. It must be an great place to work (If you are a bloke) because every other room had an enormous HD TV showing sports 24/7. I had my makeup done next to a couple of the Sky Sports News presenters and Tikay showed me channel 405 being filmed live, which looked awesome. I resisted the temptation to crack a “Did you smash it?” joke, felt a bit too soon.

Good fun, I certainly would do it again but how they do it regularly is beyond me, because I am still cream crackered.