Bracelet Streaks

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Bracelet Streaks

Consecutive Wins

Who was the last player to win consecutive WSOP events? There are so many more events now that you'd think it would happen more often. But it's actually gotten much harder because the field sizes have grown so much.

Layne "Back to Back" Flack is a great guess, but he didn't actually win consecutive events on the schedule, as he skipped quite a few tournaments between winning Event #4 and Event #19 in 2002.¹

The actual answer is Hilbert Shirey, way back in 1995. His other major claim to fame was bubbling the final table of the 1991 Main Event, although he also won the $1,500 No-Limit Hold 'Em event in 1987.

Consecutive WSOP Events Won

Player	Year	Events
2	Bobby Baldwin	1977	#2: $10,000 No-Limit Deuce-to-Seven Lowball; #3: $5,000 Limit Seven-Card Stud
2	Lakewood Louie	1979	#1: $1,000 Limit Ace-to-Five Draw; #2: $2,000 Limit Draw High
2	Gary Berland	1979	#4: $1,000 Limit Seven-Card Stud Hi/Lo; #5: $500 Limit Seven-Card Stud
2	Billy Baxter	1982	#9: $2,500 No-Limit Ace-to-Five Draw; #10: $10,000 No-Limit Deuce-to-Seven Lowball
2	Sam Mastrogiannis	1986	#4: $1,000 Seven-Card Stud, #5 $5,000 Seven-Card Stud
2	Ted Forrest	1993	#5: $1,500 Limit Razz; #6: $1,500 Limit Omaha Hi/Lo (also #17: $5,000 Limit Seven-Card Stud)
2	Phil Hellmuth	1993	#18: $2,500 No-Limit Hold 'Em; #19: $5,000 Limit Hold 'Em (also #7 $1,500 No-Limit Hold 'Em)
2	Hilbert Shirey	1995	#18: $2,500 Pot-Limit Omaha (w/Re-buys); #19: $2,500 Pot-Limit Hold 'Em

Notes:

Johnny Moss may have won consecutive events in 1971, but I now have his non-Main Event victory (Limit Ace-to-Five Draw) as the first tournament of the festival, not the fourth (and it may have been a cash game anyway).
Jimmy Casella may have won consecutive events in 1974, but I now have his wins as Events #2 ($10,000 Seven-Card Stud) and #5 ($1,000 Limit Razz).
Howard Andrew may have won back-to-back events ($1,000 and $2,500 No-Limit Hold 'Em) in 1976, but the order of tournaments is unknown.
On the flip side, Bobby Baldwin's events may not have been consecutive in 1977, although the matching tourneys were back-to-back in 1978.
Johnny Moss was the only Main Event winner to also win the previous event.
Both the Hendon Mob's 1993 WSOP page and WSOP.com incorrectly indicate that Ted Forrest and Phil Hellmuth won three events in a row, but the events are incorrectly listed in reverse alphabetical order by the winners' last names, with the dates backfilled.²

Source: Poker Brat: Phil Hellmuth's Autobiography, page 169 and 52 Greatest Moments World Series of Poker, page 73, which includes what looks like an old screenshot with the correct event numbers.

Consecutive Years With a Bracelet

What two players have won at least one bracelet in four consecutive years? Not surprisingly, both did it during the WSOP's first decade. Bill Boyd won the Limit Five-Card Stud event every year from 1971 to 1974 before they killed it. Doyle Brunson matched him from 1976 to 1979³ but won six bracelets during the span, including two Main Events (both in double-bracelet years).

Consecutive Years Winning a WSOP Bracelet

#	Player	Years
4	Bill Boyd	1971-74
4	Doyle Brunson	1976-79
4	Loren Klein	2016-19
3	Johnny Moss	1974-76
3	Bobby Baldwin	1977-79
3	Gary Berland	1977-79
3	Lakewood Louie	1978-80
3	Erik Seidel	1992-94
3	Allen Cunningham	2005-07
3	Matt Matros	2010-12
3	Michael Mizrachi	2010-12
3	Robert Mizrachi	2014-16
3	Kevin Gerhart	2019-21
3	David Peters	2020-22
3	Brad Ruben	2020-22
3	Jeremy Ausmus	2021-23

Nobody hit a three-bagger from 1981 to 1991 and 1995 to 2004. We would have gone a quarter of a century without one if not for Seidel.

Many players have won bracelets in consecutive years, but only four have won multiple bracelets in back-to-back years:

Doyle Brunson (1976-77)
Gary Berland (1978-79)
Layne Flack (2002-03)
Jeremy Ausmus (2021-22)

Consecutive Decades With a Bracelet

What player has won at least one bracelet in the most consecutive decades? Phil Hellmuth (5) won the Main Event in 1989, added five bracelets in the 1990s and five in the 2000s before tying the record in 2012 and setting a new record in 2021. Jay Heimowitz was the first to reach four decades in 2000 (the 1970s to the 2000s), and Billy Baxter joined him in 2002.

Brunson, Chip Reese, Erik Seidel, Farzad Bonyadi, and Josh Arieh get honorable mentions for winning bracelets in three out of four decades.

Consecutive Decades Winning a WSOP Bracelet

#	Player	Years
5	Phil Hellmuth	1989 1992 1993 [3] 1997 2001 2003 [2] 2006 2007 2012 [2]⁴ One in Europe. 2015 2018 2021 2023
4	Jay Heimowitz	1975 1986 1991 1994 2000 2001
4	Billy Baxter	1975 1978 1982 [2] 1987 1993 2002
4	Daniel Negreanu	1998 2003 2004 2008 2013 [2]⁵ One Asia-Pacific and one Europe. 2024
3	Amarillo Slim Preston	1972 1974 1985 1990
3	Johnny Chan	1985 1987 1988 1994 1997 2000 2002 2003 [2] 2005
3	Berry Johnston	1983 1986 1990 1995 2001
3	Mickey Appleman	1980 1992 1995 2003
3	T.J. Cloutier	1987 1994 [2] 1998 2004 2005
3	Men Nguyen	1992 1995 [2] 1996 2003 [2] 2010
3	Sam Farha	1996 2006 2010
3	Peter Vilandos	1995 2009 2012
3	Mike Matusow	1999 2002 2008 2013
3	David Chiu	1996 1998 2000 2005 2013
3	Ted Forrest	1993 [3] 2004 [2] 2014
3	Shankar Pillai	2007 2019 2021
3	Eli Elezra	2007 2013 2015 2019 2022
3	Scott Seiver	2008 2018 2019 2022
3	Nick Schulman	2009 2012 2019 2023
3	Jason Mercier	2009 2011 2015 2016 [2] 2023

Amarillo Slim Preston became the first of the twenty players to have a bracelet in three consecutive decades in 1990, a year before Jay Heimowitz.

Four players are on both the events and years lists (Baldwin, Berland, Moss, and Louie), three are on both the events and decades lists (Hellmuth, Cloutier, and Forrest), but nobody is on both the years and decades lists.

Winning the Same Event in Consecutive Years

Bill Boyd officially holds the record of four consecutive wins in 5-Card Stud from 1971 to 1974, but one of those years he won by default when nobody dared challenge him (also, the first two "bracelets" may actually have been by vote).

Adam Friedman thus set the unofficial record with three consecutive wins in the same event when he won the 2021 $10,000 Dealer's Choice Championship. He won the event in 2018 and 2019, and it wasn't held in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Although his first championship in 1970 was by vote, we can consider Johnny Moss to be the first player to win the same event in back-to-back years when he won the 1971 Main Event.

Since then, the feat has been accomplished a dozen times, with Gary "Bones" Berland the only player to do it twice:

Bones Berland: 1977 & 1978 $500 Razz (buyin increased from $500 to $1,000)
Lakewood Louie: 1978 & 1979 Limit 5-Card Draw High (buyin decreased from $5,000 to $2,000)
Bones Berland: 1978 & 1979 $500 7-Card Stud
Doyle Brunson: 1976 & 1977 $10,000 Main Event
Stu Ungar: 1980 & 1981 $10,000 Main Event
Johnny Chan: 1987 & 1988 $10,000 Main Event
Phil Hellmuth: 1992 & 1993 $5,000 Limit Hold 'Em'
Susie Isaacs: 1996 & 1997 $1,000 Ladies Championship (7-Card Stud)
Nani Dollison: 2000 & 2001 $1,000 Ladies Championship (7-Card Stud/Hold 'Em)
Thang Luu: 2008 & 2009 $1,500 Omaha Hi/Lo Split
James Moore: 2016 & 2017 $1,000 Super Seniors
Dan Cates: 2021 & 2022 $50,000 Poker Players Championship
Aaron Cummings: 2024 & 2025 $1,500 Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw 6-Max

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[Updated 20250627]