I believe that like elite athletes, there is an inherent difference in truly competitive players that just makes them better than most. Hand-eye coordination, reflexes, etc.

For example I've been playing for over 20 years and I'd say among regular players I'm in the middle of the pack, and my skills have peaked. There's a couple of people locally that only started playing a few years ago and they are 100x better and consistently so than I am, despite my experience. No amount of practice is going to make me as good as them, just like no amount of practice at basketball would make me Michael Jordan.