Layne Flack, Six-time WSOP Champion, Dies

By Jerry Smith Staff Writer Updated: 07/26/2021

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Jerry’s greatest advantage is his extensive experience on the casino floor. His time as a casino manager taught him everything about what makes a player tick. Besides being a skilled poker player, he has deep knowledge of all live table games and gambling regulations in the US.

Layne Flack

Layne Flack has died at 52 years of age, during sleep, with no evidence yet of what could be the cause of death.

At just 52 years old, Layne Flack, also known as ‘Back-to-back Flack’, was found dead at his home in Las Vegas. Flack from South Dakota moved to Reno at the age of 24 to build a career as a poker player and ended up becoming a living legend while still very young and a player respected and loved by all.

Poker was part of Flack’s life from an early age. In the 1990s, he was a dealer in a small Montana poker room, which he managed himself. What Layne was passionate about was what happened across the table, and in 1996, Huck Seed encouraged him to move to Reno to pursue the career of a professional poker player.

Becoming “Back-to-Back” Flack

Flack took the top starting position in the race for fame that began with the poker boom. They called him “Back to back” Flack because he won two parallels in a row at the 1999 Legends of Poker, but he survived the nickname by winning two WSOP bracelets in 2002 and another two in 2003, the edition of the famous Moneymaker Main Event.

Everyone who knew him treasures in their memory some fun moment lived with him; because, according to what they say, he was one of those people who illuminated the room with his personality and his sympathy. So why wasn’t it a fixture on the television shows that cemented the golden age of poker? What kept him from stardom if so many capacities for entertainment were guessed at?

The answer is not pleasant, and although it was sadly evident to those around him, he clearly recognized it in an autobiographical book.

He was enjoying great success at the tables in 2002 and 2003, but the lifestyle he was leading was quickly affecting him.

In 2004, things really started to go downhill. I was living in a one-bedroom apartment with my girlfriend, Paulette. I couldn’t pay the rent. I wasn’t eating. The drug use had nearly consumed me, – stated Flack once.

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Many people tried to help him out. Johnny Chan, Daniel Negreanu, or Jennifer Harman banked him on several occasions, and they have been among the first to regret the news.

Flack never quite corroborated the galactic level he was guessed at the turn of the century. But at least he had a farewell from the circuit befitting his legend when he won his sixth bracelet in 2008, obtaining the best prize of his career, $ 577,725.

Matusow, who shared many of the same ghosts from the past with him, recalled how, that last week, Flack told him how much he had managed to change his life.

After all, poker was still his means of earning a living in cash games, and he had also continued to visit the Rio with monastic regularity for his beloved WSOP every year.

Flack had a lot of poker stories stored in his memory. He told some of the most incredible in a podcast recorded in 2019 with the people of Cardplayer, about his games at Larry Flint’s house or when the mafia wanted to sneak him into Michael Jordan’s private games, but journalist David Letterman burst his front.