[Stevo]

I think that there is certainly a skill element to it and more often than not, a more skilled player will beat a less skilled player. The problem is figuring out what the "edge" is depending upon how much more skilled you may be than your opponent.

Say you are a good bit better than your opponent. Your "edge" (I'm thinking like the house edge in bj or something) might be like 5%. It's really not that big and you wouldn't recognize that kind of an edge in a single heads-up tournament. Thus, the best players aren't usually going to win because of the nature of a heads-up tourney - a 5% edge just isn't going to get you through 8 or 10 matches.

I play heads-up with my daughter and we play deep-stacked and she beats me just as often as not - of course, she appears to be unwittingly utilizing game theory because she mixes up her betting and seems to throw in the exact right amount of bluffs - I don't know, maybe she is just better than me - that can't be.

Anyway, I think that skill plays less of a roll because of the nature of 1 on 1 matches - you have to beat 10 people - skill isn't going to get you through that every time. At a sit and go with 10 people - you can choose your opponent, you can allow others to beat up on others, and I think there is much more avoidable confrontation which leads to luck playing a little less of a factor. There, I think I figured it out.