In the 5th street chapter he talks about a rough made 8 vs 2 smooth draws. He says if each player has a 49% chance to outdraw u then I will beat both of them only 28% of the time. So how could each hand that has a 49% chance to outdraw u be more that 28% if we are the favorite over each one individually?

If each one has a 49% chance to beat you individually, then you beat THEM 51% of the time individually. To beat both of them is .51*.51=.26 = 26% meaning you'll only beat them both 26% of the time. I don't know if he got the math wrong or if it's 28% because they'll have some of each other's outs or what, but, that's where the reduction comes from.

The chance 1 of them, or both of them will out draw you is the product of the two probabilities that they will make their draw. Or, for you people who like actual numbers: 0.49*0.49 = 0.2401. So actually, you'll beat them even less than 28% of the time :P

Bah, ninjas.

Note that you need to be a 58% favorite against 2 people individually before you're a favorite against both of them together. This is one reason why limiting the number of people in the pot is such a good idea.

This is the probability that both of them will beat you.

Yeah, I realized that after Rusty posted, but I had only been awake for an hour, so bleh.

In practice, they probably will have some of each other's outs, but in the book it clearly states that the hero will beat them both about 28% of the time because that's the equivalent of parlaying 51% x 51%. The paradox comes about because with the hero having the best made hand, the equity the villains would have HU against each other isn't specified so you can't do the same calculation from their points of view. In this contrived example it only matters that they are both drawing smooth and will suck out on the hero 49% of the time.

FWIW, I've contrived a pretty close demonstration example of Sklansky's contrived example.

Dead cards: 6d 4d Qd 9d
Player 1: 8s 7s 6s 5s 3s
Player 2: Ac Kc 6c 4c 2c
Player 3: 3h Jh 6h 5h 4h

Player 1 is a 51.3% fav heads-up against player 2.
Player 1 is a 50.8% fav heads-up against player 3.
In a 3-way pot player 1 has 28.4% equity, player 2 has 36.4% and player 3 has 35.1%.

Note that player 2 has the worst heads-up equity but the best 3-way equity!

Here are the workings from twodimes:

pokenum -mc 500000 -r 8s 7s 6s 5s 3s - ac kc 6c 4c 2c / 6d 4d qd 9d
Razz (7-card Stud A-5 Low): 500000 sampled outcomes
cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
8s 7s 6s 5s 3s 256284 51.26 243716 48.74 0 0.00 0.513
Ac Kc 6c 4c 2c 243716 48.74 256284 51.26 0 0.00 0.487

pokenum -mc 500000 -r 8s 7s 6s 5s 3s - 3h jh 6h 5h 4h / 6d 4d qd 9d
Razz (7-card Stud A-5 Low): 500000 sampled outcomes
cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
8s 7s 6s 5s 3s 250549 50.11 243011 48.60 6440 1.29 0.508
Jh 6h 5h 4h 3h 243011 48.60 250549 50.11 6440 1.29 0.492

pokenum -mc 500000 -r 8s 7s 6s 5s 3s - ac kc 6c 4c 2c - 3h jh 6h 5h 4h / 6d 4d qd 9d
Razz (7-card Stud A-5 Low): 500000 sampled outcomes
cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
8s 7s 6s 5s 3s 140897 28.18 356423 71.28 2680 0.54 0.284
Ac Kc 6c 4c 2c 182066 36.41 317867 63.57 67 0.01 0.364
Jh 6h 5h 4h 3h 174290 34.86 322963 64.59 2747 0.55 0.351

Value of smoove draw, imo.

Smoove. So smoove.

Agreed, baby.