The Meaning of Tilt

The evening before yesterday, I had a fairly even night.

On the one hand, the bad news is that I lost 2 $3.40 Sit and Go's. I finished 4th place in both - just out of the money.

On the other hand, I won $4.48 in NL2 cash play in 217 hands. The next night, I was not as fortunate.

Encouraged by my success the previous evening in cash, I decided to fire up 4 tables at NL2. Unfortunately, the cards ran really cold, and after 3 and a half hours, I was down $4, nearly a full buy-in. At this point, its 1:15 a.m. A rational person would call it quits and hope for a better day tomorrow. BUT NOT ME!!!

Instead, I'm angry that I spent so long at the tables without hitting a hand with action (the only big pair I had out of 440 hands last night was KK. Everyone folded to my pre-flop raise, netting me $0.03). So, exhausted and angry, what do I do?

Why, I buy in two levels above! NL10! And not only that, I do it on a table format I haven't been playing -> 6 max! The land of aggressive players.

Needless to say, my play from that point on was not pretty. I started up a couple of dollars with a nice hand, but within 20 minutes, I had spewed away one and a half full buy-ins.

I fully deserved what I got. A prime example of my awful play was a hand like this:

Poker Stars $0.05/$0.10 No Limit Hold'em - 6 players - http://www.thehandconverter.com/hands/428598
The Official DeucesCracked.com Hand History Converter

Hero (UTG): $10.00
MP: $12.50
CO: $7.20
BTN: $10.00
SB: $6.80
BB: $7.15

Pre Flop: ($0.15) Hero is UTG with 5d Kd
Hero raises to $0.30, 4 folds, BB calls $0.20

Flop: ($0.65) 4d 5c 3h (2 players)
BB bets $0.20, Hero raises to $0.70, BB calls $0.50

Turn: ($2.05) Ts (2 players)
BB bets $0.10, Hero raises to $0.90, BB calls $0.80

River: ($3.85) 6s (2 players)
BB bets $0.20, Hero raises to $3.60, BB raises to $5.25 all in, Hero calls $1.65

Final Pot: $14.35
Hero shows 5d Kd (a pair of Fives)
BB shows Qd 2h (a straight, Deuce to Six)
BB wins $13.65
(Rake: $0.70)

SURE, he should not have been calling my flop and turn raises with the low end of a straight draw (they were priced too high), but I certainly had no business making those raises with a pair of 5's.

So, in summary, my total loss for the night was $18.83. WAY TO GO, ME! That's a whole week's work destroyed.

I suppose the only redeeming thing is that as I while writing this, I played 19 NL2 hands, and recouped $1.53. Hit trips twice, and was dealt KK (cowboys) on the last hand. Woo-hoo! Anyways, time for this post to end. No more poker tonight.

Bankroll is now $233.71