Five of the Biggest Australian Poker Winners
Australian poker players find themselves in a similar position to their American cousins. Online poker options are limited for player from Down Under, so many turn their attention to the live poker tournament world.
Living so far away from places such as Las Vegas means Australian players tend to go big or go home in live events. The top five Australian poker winners are a testament to this strategy. Those five heroes have $53,513,268 in combined winnings, and more than a dozen WSOP bracelets!
Michael Addamo is the biggest-winning Australian
Anyone who frequents these pages knows all about Michael Addamo’s poker prowess. The high rolling Australian is an absolute beast of a tournament player. Addamo has $17,722,094 in live winnings, and even more from online poker events.
Addamo first cashed in a live event in August 2012. He finished eighth in an A$20 rebuy tournament for A$99 ($103). How times changed. His first trip to the World Series of Poker (WSOP) in Las Vegas happened in 2016. Addamo cashed seven times, including a third-place finish in a $1,500 No-Limit Hold’em event for $196,202.
He won the first of four bracelets at the 2018 WSOP. The Australian took down the $2,620 Marathon for $653,581. Bracelet number two came a few months later in the European edition of the WSOP. Addamo bulldozed his way to victory in the €25,500 High Roller and won €848,702 ($973,360).
Addamo was crushing online tournaments by this stage, winning millions of dollars. Most of his live score from this point weigh in at six figures or more. He enjoyed his first million-dollar score online at partypoker in a $102,000 buy-in event. Addamo finished second to Justin Bonomo and banked $1,187,500.
The Australian ended 2021 in style. He crushed the Super High Roller Bowl for $3,402,000 and won two more bracelets in Las Vegas. one came in the $50,000 High Roller ($1,132,968) the other in a $100,000 High Roller ($1,958,569).
Joe Hachem is the Australian former WSOP Main Event champion
Joe Hachem was a relative unknown quantity when he headed to the 2005 WSOP. That soon changed when the Australian outlasted 5,618 opponents to win that year’s Main Event. Hachem won $7,500,000 that day, the bulk of his $12,737,464 winnings.
Hachem became a World Poker Tour champion 17 months later, again in Vegas. He won the $15,400 WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic for a cool $2,207,575.
The popular Aussie players has enjoyed some success since those life-changing scores but has failed to reproduce similar results. He still grinds, but nowhere near the volume of yesteryear.
Kahle Burns the $10 million man
Kahle Burns is something of an Australian poker refugee. He spent most of his time playing cash games at Crown Melbourne and online, before leaving Australia to continue his online career.
Burns went on a heater in 2017 and has not looked back since. He won $1,823,167 in 2017, $610,933 in 2018, and a cool $4,364,547 in 2019. Burns netted $2,906,320 last year despite the COVID-19 restrictions.
He won both his bracelets in 2019, both in Europe. Burns triumphed in the €2,500 Short Deck Hold’em event for €101,834 ($113,263) before winning the €25,500 Platinum High Roller for €596,883 ($667,035). He almost won a third bracelet online in August 2021. However, he finished second in a $25,000 buy-in event and consoled himself with $934,604. Burns has $10,730,710 in winnings.
Jeff Rossiter swapped poker for cryptocurrency
Jeff Rossiter is best known for being an Australian online poker grinder, but he also racked up $6,650,070 from live tournaments. Rossiter is fourth in the Australian all-time money list despite not playing since 2017. Rossiter turned out for the A$10,600 Aussie Millions Main Event, finished four for A$440,000 ($332,301), and has not played since.
The highly-intelligent Aussie switch his attention to the world of cryptocurrency and now trades for vast sums of money. Will he return to poker? We would not bet against it.
Jeff Lisandro has six WSOP bracelets
Jeff Lisandro is the Australian with the most WSOP bracelets of any of his fellow Aussie. He is known as the “Iceman” and has six gold bracelets to his name. Lisandro has $5,709,067 in cashes dating back to 1995, making his a poker veteran.
He enjoyed a golden spell in 2009 when he won three bracelets at the WSOP. Lisandro last scooped poker cold in his native Australia in 2014, but it still a force to be reckoned with.
- $2,000 Seven-Card Stud at the 2007 WSOP for $118,426
- $1,500 Seven-Card Stud at the 2009 WSOP for $124,959
- $10,000 Seven-Card Stud Hi-Lo Championship at the 209 WSOP for $431,656
- $2,500 Razz at the 2009 WSOP for $188,370
- £5,250 Pot-Limit Omaha at the 2010 WSOP Europe for £159,514 ($245,287)
- A$1,650 Pot-Limit Omaha at the 2014 WSOP Asia-Pacific for A$51,660 ($44,796)