The Greatest Accomplishment in WSOP history

[Al Mirpuri]

The following appears in the spiel for Harrington On Hold'em on the title page of this web site:

"he [Dan Harrington] was the only player to make it to the final table in 2003 (field of 839) and 2004 (field of 2576) - considered by cognoscenti to be the greatest accomplishment in WSOP history."

I think not. I am sure even Harrington does not think that. Who thinks this? Mason? David? Let the cognoscenti identify themselves.

Have you been seduced by the bloated fields? It is probably minimally more difficult to win a 2000+ tournament than a 1000+ tournament but you never play all the field simultaneously. This is not the greatest achievement in WSOP history.

The greatest achievement in WSOP history was either a drug ravaged Stu Ungar winning his third title or Johnny Chan winning 88, 89 and coming second in 90.

[ClaytonN]

Well, it really depends on how you define the word "great". If "great" means accomplishments that further impact the world of poker in itself, then you couldn't argue against Harrington. He made the final 3 in the last two WSOP main events, the first two to be so heavily covered.

If you argue "great" for skill, then you could probably make the argument for Chan.

Paul Phillips made a great post about multi table tournaments and standard deviation. I think a main point of his post was you could pick up to 8 world class players for 1 to cash and you'd end up around even money. Luck is a prevailing factor in these multi table tournaments, especially when the fields are that damn big.

[NotMitch]

[ QUOTE ]

It is probably minimally more difficult to win a 2000+ tournament than a 1000+ tournament but you never play all the field simultaneously.


[/ QUOTE ]

I don't think this is true.

[Greg (FossilMan)]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

It is probably minimally more difficult to win a 2000+ tournament than a 1000+ tournament but you never play all the field simultaneously.


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I don't think this is true.

[/ QUOTE ]

You are correct, it is not true. It is the kind of statement made by people who don't really understand math that well. Especially statistics when very small and very large numbers are involved. People are notoriously bad at dealing with extreme numbers, a point Paul Phillips and others have made previously on these forums. I'm bad myself, but not as bad as most.

Later, Greg Raymer (FossilMan)

[jakethebake]

nm

[deacsoft]

Anyone have a link to Mr. Phillips' post?

[dogmeat]

IMHO, Ungar winning three times is by far a greater accomplishment. My feeling is based on how hard I believe it is to actually come in first, not just get to the last table. However, it is still an amazing accomplishment for Harrington to get there in 2003 and 2004.

Your belief that it is only minimally more difficult to win against 2000 players than against 1000 players makes me think you have never played any tournaments.

Dogmeat [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]

[ClaytonN]

Well, you have three different extremes.

1) Harrington finishing high in 2 extremely large field events (~800 and ~2600), and not winning

2) Chan winning two straight events and finishing second in events where the field was around 150 deep.

3) Ungar winning when the field was small (in the seventies) and when the field was large (350 or so in 1997).

*note: my numbers on field size are probably off

One played awesome when the fields were gigantic, one played awesome when the fields were average sized, and one played awesome in both kinds of fields in different times.

All amazing accomplishments, though I don't think you could peg one any "greater" than another.

[Mason Malmuth]

Hi Everyone:

I think the greatest accomplishment is winning against over 2,500 people. Is there anyone here who agrees with this?

Best wishes,

Mason

[dogmeat]

Not me. I think Greg played fantastic, and someday I hope to be just half as good as he is, however, somebody was going to win, and I am not ready to claim any single victory as the "greatest" accomplishment. If Greg were to make the final table again in 2005 - I'd rethink my position.

Dogmeat [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]