A rare occurrence

As I've said before, I get used to seeing the usual suspects when I play MTT-R NLHEs. It's always a pleasure to last longer in a tournament than many of them, even if I don't make the money. The night before last, one of the usual suspects bubbled the final tournament I played, while I finished in the final money spot. Last night, I finished one spot ahead of this same usual suspect in the only MTT-R NLHE I played, though neither of us made the money. Finishing one spot ahead of the same opponent in two tournaments in a row (where each tournament has a healthy number of entries) is quite a rarity. In this particular case, there was a 1 in 3,294 chance of it happening. That's rarer than being dealt the same hand twice in a row (1 in 1,326). It's also rarer than being dealt the same hand twice in a row, where the cards have been dealt in the same order (1 in 2,652). It's not quite as rare as getting dealt four of a kind in five card draw (1 in 4,165), but you get the idea :-)

style flavor buy_in entry players hands entries paid place winnings

MTT-R NLHE    43500  6500       9    60      62   15    19        0
KO    NLHE    42500  7500       9    14       9    3     4        0
KO    NLHE    42500  7500       9     5       9    3     7        0
KO    NLHE    42500  7500       9    14       9    3     4        0

delta: $-300,000
MTT with rebuys NLHE balance: $20,353,500
2017 balance: $21,009,455
balance: $32,427,285