NBC’s Poker After Dark has announced its weekly line ups and 2009 broadcast schedule, which contains new episodes mix together with re runs of popular episodes from the past seasons. This week the show will air a new episode called “Speak Your Mind” , which features the 11 time WSOP bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth, professional poker player Phil Gordon, and “High Stakes Poker” announcer Gabe Kaplan.

The rest of the programming for January will include the re run of the “Dream Table” (Mike Matusow, Phil Hellmuth, Mike Sexton, Jennifer Harman, and Gavin Smith) on January 19th and a special episode on January 26th featuring the veterans of the legendary Mayfair Club, including Howard Lederer, Dan Harrington, and Steve Zolotow.

On February 9^th, NBC will air a special episode properly named “Brilliant Minds Week”, which features the math geniuses Chris “Jesus” Ferguson, William Chen, and David Sklansky putting their mental skills on a trial. The next new episode will run on February 16^th and its called “Nets vs. Vets.” The episode will feature two online poker players (Taylor “Green Plastic” Caby and David “Raptor” Benefield) facing two veterans and legends of poker (Doyle Brunson and Eli Elezra).

February’s programming will end on the 23rd with a special sit ‘n go featuring the World Poker Tour event winners Daniel Negreanu, Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi, Erick Lindgren, and Gus Hansen.

The most exciting episodes in the March programming include the $50,000 “The Big Game” on March 9^th.The lineup for that week will include David Benyamine, Barry Greenstein, Phil Ivey, and Allen Cunningham. Benyamine will return to the screen on March 30th, for the “International Game” episode in where he’ll meet the 2008 Player of the Year John Phan and the 2008 World Series of Poker Main Event runner up Ivan Demidov.

PAD schedule also includes a special cash game and roast of Phil Hellmuth called the “Hellmuth Bash Cash Game”. The episodes feature Phil “The Unabomber” Laak, Antonio “The Magician” Esfandiari, noted cash game player Kenny Tran, and Tom “durrrr” Dwan will begin airing over a two week period starting on May 4th.