tilt!

One of the things that I have been proudest of in my career is my ability to reduce and eliminate tilt. Tilt is not a good thing to have, as it can cost you a buyin (or two) or your tournament. For those of you who do not frequently play poker, tilt is where you just make irrational decisions out of frustration or anger. Think Scott Lazar at the WSOP ME final table last year.

Last night, I could not control it. I was in a 2 table heads up match (four enter, one leaves with all the money). I love these things - if I go 2-0 (not unusual) i win 3 buyins, not 2. The second table is usually deeper money than the first (again, for the uninitiated, there's more play) at least at first, though it shrinks pretty quickly as it goes along.

So the first match was frustrating enough. I was against a player who could not miss a hand and I was struggling to make anything. Often when a match begins this way I usually spot the player a solid lead (1500 starting chips - I usually will be down 2000 to 1000 pretty quickly). He caught a miracle card, then had top two pair against my TPTK (top pair top kicker - AJ on a J high board) to get a 2500 to 500 chiplead. I remember IMing with Eric and mentioning "I think I'm still the favorite." Well, I slugged it back, got him to double me up drawing nearly dead, played actual good poker to take the lead, gave a lot of it back by donking a hand quite badly, then got him to put his chips in drawing dead. It was really gratifying winning the match, because it was such a struggle (though I made it sound really easy).

Going to the next match, it was disgusting. The player was awful, which was good (and the only reason I hung around as long as I did) but he could not miss. He would call me on the flop with no pair, no draw and either pair his overcard or, on a couple of occasions, runner runner something. Two pair, flush, straight. He couldn't miss. He never hung around pointlessly and caught a hand that was worse than mine - he'd either catch two pair against my one pair or a bigger pair than my top pair. He'd make a straight against my two pair or a flush against my straight. It was really disgusting. The last hand he checked Q6 on the Q63 flop, on the Q turn and on the 2 river. I pushed my deuces full (I had 22 in the pocket) and he called, obviously, busting me. I hadn't bet to that point in the hand, and was just stunned that this could happen (I make a miracle only for it to be no good) after all he was catching.

In writing it over, it really seems like nothing, but at the time it really set me off. Like I said, I've gotten incredibly good at just shrugging these things off, and I'd like to think that had I still had chips in the match I would have been able to, but since the match was over I just let the frustration loose. I closed the software so that I wouldn't jump into another game, and decided to play a little World Cup to cool off. It worked, I calmed down (helped by destroying Peru 5-0 with Argentina) and went to bed.

Alarming that it arose, but sensationally good that I didn't do anything stupid about it.