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Maybe you are right, but in Poker championships you see many of the same names in the top from one year to the next, right? (I could be wrong about this)

That could suggest the variance is manageable.

I'd like to see more players because we have seen so many two-player AI contests before (chess, go). It would for example be interesting to see MCTS in this setting.

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The variance is manageable if you play enough hands. This is one reason why a lot of pros prefer to play online - by playing many tables at once, you get more hands in and can better overcome the variance.

As for tournaments, the variance is even greater, since it is closer to all or nothing. To mitigate this, pros "buy a piece" of each other. Or swap equity. If either wins they pay the other a percentage. If you do this with enough other pros, you even out your swings...

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