Joe Hachem’s 7-3: The Final Hand of the 2005 WSOP

At about 6:40 on the morning of July 16, 2005, a former chiropractor from Melbourne looked down at a seven and a three. Joe Hachem had been playing for almost 14 hours in the biggest poker tournament the world had yet seen. Across the table sat Steve Dannenmann, a mortgage banker from Maryland, holding A-3. A few minutes later a board of 6-5-4, ace, 4 would make Hachem the first Australian to win the World Series of Poker Main Event and pay him $7.5 million.

This is the story of that final hand, told street by street from contemporary reports and the sources listed at the end. It covers how a largely unknown player reached the heads-up match, what each bet looked like, why only one card could have saved his opponent, and what the hand says about the Main Event at the height of the poker boom. Where accounts disagree on a detail, the article says so.

A Record Field and an Unlikely Contender

The 2005 World Series of Poker ran from June 2 to July 15 at the Rio in Las Vegas. It was the first year the series was not based at Binion’s Horseshoe, apart from the final two days of the $10,000 no-limit hold’em World Championship, which returned to the downtown casino known as Binion’s Horseshoe. The Main Event drew 5,619 entrants and a prize pool of $52,818,610, according to the official WSOP results. Only three years earlier the field had been 631, and the 2003 field of 839 was the one won by Chris Moneymaker, whose famous bluff has its own story. The 2004 event had drawn 2,576.

The man who would win it was not a headliner. Joe Hachem had moved from Lebanon to Melbourne in 1972, and, according to The Guardian, he gave up a 13-year career as a chiropractor about three years before the tournament to concentrate on poker. He was 39, and as The New York Times reported, he had come to Las Vegas for the series for the first time. PokerNews describes him as a small-time Australian grinder whose only earlier WSOP cash was a 10th-place finish in a $1,000 event.

The final table opened with nine players, among them Mike Matusow and Ireland’s Andy Black. Hachem began it sixth in chips with 5,420,000, according to Card Player. Dannenmann, described by The New York Times as an accountant and mortgage banker from Severn, Maryland, was another first-timer, and he would be Hachem’s opponent at the end.

Folds, Doubles and a Long Night

Hachem’s route to the heads-up match was not a straight line. Card Player’s hand-by-hand review shows him growing his stack to 6.8 million early, then making several tough folds that cut it to as little as 2.1 million. He gave up a pot worth 4.5 million after facing a re-raise of 3,570,000 more from Dannenmann, and later folded on the turn against an all-in from Aaron Kanter in a 3.7 million pot.

The comeback began on hand 69, when Hachem moved all in from the big blind with A-Q against Scott Lazar’s K-9, flopped top pair with the nut flush draw on A-10-4, and doubled to about 5,000,000 with six players left. Other doubles followed: his pocket sevens held against Dannenmann’s A-J on hand 147, and his Q-7 beat Kanter’s pocket nines when a queen arrived on the flop, lifting him past 13 million.

Hachem became the chip leader on hand 206 with 20 million, though Dannenmann took the lead back. The decisive swing came on hand 226, when Tex Barch moved all in with A-6, Dannenmann and Hachem both called, and a board of 10-3-2-Q-9 gave Hachem’s pocket jacks the best hand against Dannenmann’s pocket sevens. Barch left in third place. Hachem’s stack grew to almost 40 million against just over 16 million for Dannenmann, roughly a two-to-one lead.

The Final Hand, Street by Street

According to Card Player, the heads-up match lasted just 15 minutes. The New York Times reported that the deciding hand was the sixth of heads-up play and began at 6:40 a.m. Pacific time on Saturday, July 16, after 232 hands and nearly 14 hours at the final table, which broke the previous record of 13 hours 38 minutes set in 1983. The account below follows Card Player’s hand history, which Holdem.es corroborates.

Preflop and the Flop

Dannenmann raised to 700,000 and Hachem called with 7-3. The flop came 6-5-4, which gave Hachem 3-4-5-6-7, a straight, on the spot. A straight is five cards in sequence, and it beats a pair or two pair. Hachem checked, Dannenmann bet 700,000, Hachem raised an additional 1,000,000, and Dannenmann called. Dannenmann held A-3, which on that flop was ace-high with a draw to a straight of his own.

The Turn

The turn card was an ace, which gave Dannenmann a pair of aces. Hachem bet 2 million and Dannenmann raised to 5 million. Hachem then moved all in, and Dannenmann called. With the cards face up, Hachem held the straight and Dannenmann held A-3. GGPoker’s account puts Hachem’s chance of winning at about 97 percent at that point. Only a seven could have rescued Dannenmann, and it would only have split the pot.

The River

The river was a four, making the final board 6-5-4-A-4. Dannenmann improved to two pair, aces and fours, but a straight beats two pair, and Hachem was champion. According to GGPoker, Hachem had asked his supporters to stay quiet before the last card, saying, “Please… there’s one more card.” Then the crowd surged forward. The New York Times recorded the chant that had followed him all week: “Aussie, Aussie, Aussie! Oi, oi, oi!”

Hachem took the $7.5 million first prize. Speaking to The Guardian afterward, he said: “It changes everything.” Dannenmann won $4,250,000 for second place, according to the official WSOP results, though Card Player’s account puts his prize at $4.5 million, so sources differ on that figure.

The table below shows how the nine finalists finished, using the official WSOP results. Every finalist was guaranteed at least $1 million, as the Los Angeles Times reported, which is why even the first player out, Matusow, took home seven figures.

The spread shows how steeply the payouts climbed. The gap between first and second place was $3.25 million, which is why the final heads-up hand carried so much weight for both players.

Why the Hand Still Matters

The top prize tripled in two years. PokerNews’ list of champions shows $2.5 million for Chris Moneymaker in 2003, $5 million for Greg Raymer in 2004 and $7.5 million for Hachem in 2005, while entries grew from 839 to 2,576 to 5,619. Hachem’s win came at the peak of that surge, and it came in front of a crowd that included a noisy group of fellow Australians.

Hachem became the face of Australian poker. Card Player later described him as the godfather of Australian poker. He won the World Poker Tour’s Five Diamond World Poker Classic in 2006, according to Card Player, and PokerNews notes that he finished fifth in the 2006 Main Event, the tournament covered in Jamie Gold’s 2006 Main Event win.

The hand also marked an ending. Card Player calls 2005 the last year that at least part of the Main Event was played at Binion’s Horseshoe, the casino where the tournament began, and the final table was played there.

The Other Side: The 5,000 Who Went Home

The Los Angeles Times reported that about 560 players were paid, and roughly 5,000 went home empty-handed. Their $10,000 entry fees underwrote the winnings and the administrative costs. The prizes slid from about $1,000 for the lowest paid places to $1 million or more for each finalist. For every story like Hachem’s, thousands of entrants left Las Vegas with nothing.

His run also depended on several all-in confrontations going his way. Hachem was down to 2.1 million at one point and was the shortest stack when seven players remained, according to Card Player and PokerNews. Card Player’s own review leaves it to readers to decide whether he was lucky or well-timed.

Big wins are the exception, not the rule. Poker combines skill and chance, and a tournament with thousands of entrants will always produce one winner and many losers. The legal age and the legality of real-money poker also vary by state and venue, so this story is not a guide to what any reader should do.

Myths About the Hand

Myth: Hachem won on a lucky seven-three. By the time the chips went in, Hachem had a roughly two-to-one chip lead and had already flopped a straight, and GGPoker’s account puts his chance of winning the hand at about 97 percent. Card Player leaves open whether his earlier doubles were luck or timing.

Myth: Hachem was an established star. PokerNews describes him as a small-time Australian grinder with a single earlier WSOP cash, and The New York Times noted that he was in Las Vegas for the first time. His reputation grew after the win, not before it.

Keep Reading

For another Main Event final hand that became famous, read the final hand between Johnny Chan and Erik Seidel in 1988. To understand how poker reached a television audience, see how the hole-card camera turned poker into television.

Sources & References

• WSOP.com — 2005 World Series of Poker, Event #42 results
• WSOP.com — 2005 WSOP Main Event Top 5 Hands
• Card Player — Hand History Time Capsule: Joe Hachem
• The New York Times — An Australian Captures the $7.5 Million Prize
• The Guardian — Former chiropractor wins poker world series
• Los Angeles Times — Everyone’s a Player in Poker’s New Deal
• PokerNews — Joe Hachem player profile
• PokerNews — This Day in WSOP History: Cynn, Hachem Become Main Event Champs
• GGPoker Blog — The Story of the 2005 WSOP Main Event, Part 2
• Holdem.es — WSOP 2005: Mano final, Joe Hachem vs. Steve Dannenmann