All That Separates a Really Good Poker Player from a Great One is Luck

Poker is the definition of an enigma, while it is most definitely a game of skill in the long-run, the short-term luck involved in the game can often times be the difference between a player having to grind out a living day after day, and a player who has endorsement deals and money thrown at them. In order to elevate yourself from a solid winning player to a megastar typically depends on one factor: L-U-C-K!

Virtually every superstar player can trace the beginning of their stardom to one particular moment, and often times it all boils down to catching the right hand at the right time in a tournament, or getting a hot run of cards at the right time. For every player who wins a coin-flip for the chip-lead with 5 players left in the Sunday Million there is a player who finishes 5^th. Change the result of that coin-flip and you likely have a new champion.

Just look how easily the face of poker as we know it could be different simply by changing the outcome of a few individual hands:

• What if, Chris Moneymaker folded to Dutch Boyd’s bluff, or didn’t spike a set of 8’s on the turn to outdraw Humberto Brenes’ pocket Aces, or if Sammy Farha had called Moneymaker’s bluff when the tournament was heads-up?
• What if, Erik Seidel didn’t walk into Johnny Chan’s trap in 1988?
• What if Mike Matusow’s set of Kings held up in 2006, would he have been the champion?

All of these scenarios were either really close-calls that could have gone either way, Bad Beats, or coin-flip scenarios where the outcome is very much in doubt. This is the fine line that separates a poker mega-star from a really solid winning player! And unfortunately for the loser in these scenarios they may never have another opportunity like this again!

On the other hand, the player who wins will find himself on the receiving end of endorsement deals, or at the very least able to find a backer. So, the winners will have a better chance of duplicating their success simply because they will have more, and better, opportunities.

Think about all the players who jump up in limits and hit a horrible cold streak; did they play poorly? Of course not! They simply had some bad luck. And it might have been enough to cripple them, or at the least crush their confidence. On the flipside you have players who are mediocre and catch a heater, and win hundreds of thousands of dollars. In poker skill only brings you so far, sometimes you just need to be in the right place at the right time!

Think about Tom Dwan’s struggles last year; the superstar player lost millions, but fortunately he had already established himself. But what would have happened if he ran this bad when he started out? Would he have quit the game? We’ll never know the answer to that question, but I can guarantee you that there are a bunch of players with Dwan’s skills who had this very thing happen to them that we will never hear about.