Remember that televised poker tournaments are heavily edited. They only show you the final table, which has fewer players at a single table and a much different play style from the rest of the game. A professional player spends most of the tournament throwing hands away. It's that selectiveness of picking the right battles to fight that distinguishes the pro from the amateur. Up until the final table, all tournament tables will generally have eight to ten people at a single table, which decreases the starting value of most hands and calls for a much tighter style of play to survive.