Am I a decent poker player?

Another question comes to mind, a co-worker has won 3 online tourneys and has the gall to brag about the wins and asks me if I need to be taught how to play, then I had started Questioning my play and found later that these tourneys hes entering have a $33-50 buy-in and the amount of players in the tourney are min or just above.
My question is this: If I enter a tourney with a field of 1800-2000 and I come in the top 20(the tourney is a $3-re-buy) is it safe to say that I'm equal if not a better player than my co-worker?
He plays at party, and for those who play there, you'll know how many players enter those tourneys.

Uh, it's probably not "safe" to make any judgment based on one MTT. Robert Varkonyi won the 2002 WSOP; is it safe to say he's a better player than your co-worker? Probably not.

Shine, I don't think you can get a true clear answer to the question you posed (at least not in my mind). Your comparing apples and oranges. He's playing minimum table tournies with higher buy-ins. You're playing $3 rebuy mega-tournies and consistently placing at/near the top. However, for the sake of mixed fruit, I'd venture a guess to say that you are probably playing better overall poker than your co-worker as you have a much larger, land-mine filled field to navigate. At a minimum, I would bet you are playing much more disciplined than he is.

Thanks JD, not looking for a crystal clear answer and your answer is the type of answer that makes me feel better about my play.
Thanks again.

Every man and his dog should be able to win a handful of tourneys if they are, say, 45 to 100 seater type affairs. If he brags about his wins it probably means he is just suffering from a little 'post victory elation'. Any subsequent cold streak will soon put the old ego in check.

Poker is a very fragile game, where we often exploit relatively small margins, so bragging after victories just tends to indicate a degree of inexperience rather than any degree of great ability. And on that point I wouldnt therefore be concerned that he is 'better than you'.

Winning a handful of tournies at say the 500-1000 people entry levels, and converting a good ROI over a large dataset of MTTs, well that gets into the possibilities of a little more class. Unless he has say 500 MTTs where he has sustained some decent stats, then i'd say he was just talking through heat, having yet to experience much cold.

A good indicator of ability I like to use for MTTs (as well as ROI%) is the % of times that someone finishes in the top 10% of the field over a large dataset. 15%+ definately signifies class. The best player I have ever come across achieved 24% over a 1000 MTT dataset (along with a 154% ROI). It would be interesing to see where he ended up after 1000 MTTs

Personally Shine I think you are much much better than him . Dont let him tell you different.

Thanks for the positive feedback guys, greatly appreciated

I think you are the better player, Shine. You are defeating more opponents.

As to whether you are a decent player, I know of no reason to think otherwise. I presume you don`t play while wearing ladies` underwear ?

Do I look like Kenzie......lol

Your co-worker may have won 3 but i bet he lost at least twice that before his "big wins"!!! lol
It takes a lot more controland skill to navigate through the wild players that arrise when you have 2000 apponents.

One way to get to the bottom of it all is to have a race of heads up tournaments between the both of you. Make it like the best out of a hundred and by the time you get done you should have some pretty good statistics of where you stand against that individual!

No. Robert Varkonyi is the only decent player left. Get out NOW, before he dominates us all!

It's all about consistancy....if your getting in the money on a daily bassis on tourneys that have 1.5k + people then you are a damn good player...that says more than making the final table once and not getting in the money again till months later..