you can't measure a persons skill purely on money because they don't all play the same number of games and the games are not the same amounts. at least at the pro tourney level we are discussing, imho. money is definitely a measure for cash game people.
i like the idea the one guy posted of points for wins and places. except he used just wsop. need to include wpt, ept, aussie and number of times they sucked out larry flynt. he talked about field size being a factor with years 2k as cutoff for measure. i'm not so sure this is a factor. winners do not play the entire field. they only sit against (field size / table size ) about the same as any other player. (depending on how condensing goes some will sit against more or less). todays fields has far more , ahmmm donkies vs doyles days when all 20 players were top notch. on the other hand longevity needs to be negated to level things.
alias i to am a Negreanu fan followed by phil gorden. i loved to hear phil critiqued the celebrities.
i saw a bookie ratio for this years tourney season just before it started. top three players were almost identical with the fourth one a distant by 1/2. Negreanu was one of the 3. i wish i could refind the bookie thing cause i don't recall the other 2.