Joe Hachem is an Australian poker player best known for winning the WSOP Main Event Champions 2003-05. The following year, he won the World Poker Tour Five Diamond World Poker Classic. These two results combined earned Hachem over $9.7 million.
Hachem was an inaugural inductee into the Australian Poker Hall of Fame in 2009.
Biography
Hachem was born in Lebanon in 1966 and moved to Melbourne, Australia six years later. Having picked up the poker bug in the mid-1990s, Hachem started playing poker at the Crown Casino while working as a chiropractor.
After years of casual playing, Hachem first travelled to Las Vegas in 2005 to play in the WSOP. After missing out on the final table of a $1,000 No Limit Hold'em event, finishing in 10th place, he backed that up with victory in the Main Event.
Related: Joe Hachem Reflects on Main Event Win 10-Year Anniversary
He defeated a 5,619-player field to win $7.5 million after defeating Steven Dannenmann heads-up. The following year, he backed up his Championship win with a fifth-place finish in the 2006 WSOP Main Event.
However, this wasn't just the only stand-out accomplishment in 2006 for Hachem. He won the Bellagio Five Diamond World Poker Classic to take down his first WPT event and over $2 million in prize money. This win also put him in a very select group of players that have won both the WSOP Main Event and the WPT Championship, which includes Doyle Brunson, Juan Carlos Mortenson, and Scotty Nguyen.
A former Team PokerStars Pro — he left after a six-year stint in 2011 — Hachem is often refered to as the 'Godfather of Australian Poker' due to the poker boom he ignited in Australia after his win in the 2005 WSOP Main Event. It was because of this win that the 2007 Aussie Millions Championships held in his home of Melbourne boasted the larger field to date of a poker tournament outside the United States.
In recent years, Hachem would continue to cash in Australia and the Untied States. His best result was a third-place finish in the $10,000 Pot-Limit Omaha Hi-Lo Event at the 2019 WSOP Main Event for $201,041.
WSOP Main Event Winners 1996-2005
| YEAR | ENTRIES | CHAMPION | COUNTRY | PRIZE |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2005 | 5,619 | Joe Hachem | Australia | $7,500,000 |
| 2004 | 2,576 | Greg Raymer | United States | $5,000,000 |
| 2003 | 839 | Chris Moneymaker | United States | $2,500,000 |
| 2002 | 631 | Robert Varkonyi | United States | $2,000,000 |
| 2001 | 613 | Carlos Mortensen | Spain | $1,500,000 |
| 2000 | 512 | Chris Ferguson | United States | $1,500,000 |
| 1999 | 393 | Noel Furlong | Ireland | $1,000,000 |
| 1998 | 350 | Scotty Nguyen | Vietnam | $1,000,000 |
| 1997 | 312 | Stu Ungar | United States | $1,000,000 |
| 1996 | 295 | Huck Seed | United States | $1,000,000 |
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