Past Five WSOP Champions Have Mixed Results

For the 20th year in a row, there will not be a back-to-back winner of the World Series of Poker main event, since last year’s champion, Jerry Yang (pictured at right), hit the rail on his second day.

Johnny Chan was the last to do it in 1987 and 1988, winning a total of $1,325,000 for outlasting a combined 317 players. An individual main event didn’t surpass that combined attendance number until 1998, when 350 players entered (and Scotty Nguyen won).

The other players to win back-to-back main event championships were Johnny Moss (1970-71, when the players voted for the champion), Doyle Brunson (1976-77), and Stu Ungar (1980-81).

Repeating in a poker event is one of the most difficult things to do in sports; just ask the last 20 champions. And if you don’t think tournament poker is a tough racket to begin with, hunt down one of the last five champions and ask them how their poker lives have fared.

Here’s a cheat sheet:

Chris Moneymaker (2003), Greg Raymer (2004), Joe Hachem (2005), Jamie Gold (2006), and Yang (2007) have had a mixed amount of poker tournament success after their big main event scores. Results vary from abysmal to grand, with only Hachem winning an event — major or small buy-in — since he slipped the WSOP main event bracelet on his wrist.

Hachem (pictured at left) is the most successful poker champion of the last five. He’s won nearly $3.5 million since bagging the $7.5 million he won in the 2005 main event. The largest score came a year and a half after he won the main event, when he won the $15,000 World Poker Tour Doyle Brunson North American Poker Classic and it’s nearly $2.2 million top prize.

He also fell just one player short in becoming a multi-bracelet winner during the $2,500 six-handed no-limit hold’em event in 2006. Just 10 days before he became the 2005 main-event champion, he went deep in a $1,000 WSOP event. He won $25,000 in that event for finishing 10th out of a field of 894.

All in all, Hachem cashed in nine WSOP events, including two this year (neither better than 23rd), since winning his bracelet. He also cashed in the main event the year he defended his title, but only could reach 238th place. Raymer bettered Hachem with his follow-up attempt a year after winning his title when he finished 25th the year Hachem won.

Raymer (pictured right) had 13 cashes before winning the $5 million that came with the WSOP bracelet in 2004, and five of them were for five figures. His best pre-WSOP championship cash was for $48,960 for third in a $4,100 event at the 2000 World Poker Finals.

After he won the main event, Raymer cashed for nearly $870,000 total in a variety of events. His biggest cash came in defense of his WSOP title, when 25th was good for $304,680, and he’s cashed 11 times in WSOP events since he became champion. His best finish was for fourth in the 2007 $2,000 seven-card stud eight-or-better event. He also has two fifths and a sixth.

Moneymaker (pictured at left), who won his title five years ago, has won about $300,000 since taking the $2.5 million top prize in 2003. Most of that came at the 2004 $5,000 WPT Bay 101 championship, when he finished second for $200,000. He’s cashed three more times in WSOP events for more than $30,000, the largest being $21,000 for finishing 10th in the 2004 $5,000 pot-limit Omaha event.

Gold (pictured at right) scored three cashes since winning his main event and its $12 million prize. He cashed twice in the 2007 WSOP but didn’t finish better than 44th, and he also placed 35th in the 2007 $19,800 WSOP Europe event held in London, which was good for $54,300 (the buy-in is odd because of the exchange rate). Gold has won a little more than $68,000 after his main event victory.

With only a year as champion under his belt, Yang by far has earned the least playing tournament poker since winning $8.25 million last year. Three months after winning the main event, Yang cashed for $1,324 in a $1,000 event held at Binion’s. He did not cash at this year’s WSOP.

Related Articles

Egbert Captures WSOPC Thunder Valley Title

Estes Wins WSOPC Horseshoe Hammond Main Event

Campisano Wins WSOP Europe Mini Main Event

Most Viewed Articles