Playing Till it Hurts?

It's happened to all of us at one time or another. One afternoon, you walk into a card club with absolute certainty that it will be a profitable day. You put your name on the board for the game of your choice and wait to be called. Maybe you order a little food while you're waiting, read the newspaper, or get a shoeshine. Supremely confident, it's just going to be your day. The stars are aligned and the poker gods are with you and nothing can go wrong.

You sit down, buy in for a couple of racks, and prepare for triumph and glory. Then, strange little things start to happen. Every time you have high cards, the flop comes low. When you hit your flop, you get rivered by a flush or a straight. Every time YOU need a river card, it never comes. Loose maniacs are burning your chips left and right so that you are never able to see hand for cheap. Your chips start to diminish at a rapid pace, thus causing you to have to re-buy rather quickly. Annoyance turns into anger, anger turns into frustration, and frustration turns into desperation.

Your play becomes more and more sloppy. You've lost all ability to read tells on the players, and you have been taken completely out of your game. You're breathing quicker, your hands shake a bit, and your mood has considerably darkened.

You are officially on tilt.

The definition of being on tilt is when a player is frustrated or angry, and as a result, ends up playing way too aggressively. Being on tilt is one of the worst things that can happen to a poker player. It usually results in a huge loss for the day and can completely demoralize a player. It makes you question your confidence, your abilities, and can promote bad habits that you may never be able to shake.

How do you know when you are on tilt? One of the most obvious tells is when you are playing just about every single hand regardless of value or position. You are constantly chasing, hoping to get lucky and turn things around. In essence, you have become the "fish" at the table. And since there are always at least a couple of "sharks" in any game… waiting for an opportunity to take advantage of a player on tilt, you have just made their day a lot more enjoyable.

Another obvious tell to being on tilt is when you are verbally abusive towards the dealer at the table. Most players on tilt tend to blame the dealer for everything, be it being dealt bad hands, losing with those bad hands even though they shouldn't be playing them in the first place, or getting sucked out on. Players cannot stand the idea that their own poor choices and bad attitudes are a major contributing factor to the losing session, so they blame the poor bloke who's just pitching the cards. Everyone has abused a dealer at some point in time.

The funny thing is most poker players don't leave when they are on tilt. Perhaps it's denial or the belief that things can turn around in an instant. Sometimes, but rarely, it can happen. But most of the time, being on tilt just results in a terrible losing session that can leave you steaming for days to come.