Ego, tilt, and gender issues at the tables.

OK, I said I'd comment on everyone's favorite question from their non poker-playing friends, but I have to put that off so I can jot down my thoughts after two amazing live cash game sessions I had this weekend.

Let me preface by describing my style a bit. I'm generally a happy person, and I tend to smile a lot, laugh a lot, and get involved in table talk when I play. (aside: this is probably something I need to work on a bit, but that will be a big change) I am generally seen as a conservative player, but who is able to make moves when warranted. I'm not mean, I don't talk shit, I don't angle shoot or pull douchebag moves.

Thursday I decided to head to Pala and play on day/evening shift, and leave around 11 pm. I arrived around 2 pm, and sat down at a new $1/$2 NL game that started when the board hit 6 names. There wasn't a 2/5 game going. Joining me at the table were a few regs and a middle-aged guy (MAG) whom I had played with before, but wasn't what I'd call a "regular". He was seated two seats to my left. I recalled him as a semi-tight, conservative player. He mentioned he was on a 7-day vacation, and he would frequently head out to the pits to play blackjack, miss a blind or two, then come back to poker for several rotations, rinse, repeat.

We had all bought in for $200, and he was playing pretty tight for a few hours. From his comments, I could tell this guy had quite an ego, but I really didn't start noticing it until he had lost a few pots and had to rebuy. He would pull out his roll of hundreds and peel off 2, always making a comment like "what the hell, it's only chips, right?" or something of a similar vein.

Long story short, I stacked him a few hands after he'd returned from a blackjack stint when I raised my T9s on the button and he called me from the big blind with AJos. I caught trip 10s on the turn. As he peeled off 2 more hundos, I heard him mutter, "un-fucking-believable, stupid girl hits everything."

At this point, MAG apparently goes off the proverbial deep end. Something I have done has sent this normally calm guy on full out, freight train screaming down the side of a mountain, massive steaming monkey tilt. This was the most spectacular example of tilt I have EVER seen at the tables. Ever. He started 3-bet shoving with ATC, or attempting to bully me out of every pot I was in with him. This went on for, I kid you not, TWELVE HOURS. My intent to leave at 11 pm went out the window, and I ended up leaving at 11 am Friday.

Why is this comment-worthy? People tilt all the time, it's not new in poker. But as my skills have evolved over the past months, I can look back on this session and realize that I was able to do Thursday what I hadn't been able to do previously, and that was effectively adjust my tactics to exploit this guy. Once I picked up on what was going on, which took about 3 hands, I went from an obvious TAG style to something different.

Now, if a random 2p2-er or poker pro sat down and watched a few hands between me and MAG, with no other prior information, they would say I was playing very strangely, passive with some hints of aggression. I started check-calling a lot. I min-raised more in this session than in 5 previous sessions combined. I limped nearly every hand I wanted to play. Sometimes I would check-raise, but not often. All of this style change was based entirely on my read of MAG.

See, MAG had an ego problem, and based on his age and background (New York, born and raised, probably in his late 50's) and the one comment I heard, I knew he couldn't handle getting beaten by a girl. I knew exactly what he was going to do every hand I played with him. I suppose you could say I "had his number." I knew when he would bet or raise, and it was very very easy to let him lead himself into trouble.

I see this a lot. I know when I sit down at a table (especially a $2/$5NL game) that several of the guys there are thinking "yesss....easy money." So they start throwing their chips around, trying to bully me out of pots. They try to bluff more often. I'm a female, I MUST be weak-tight, right? They cannot believe that I would raise 97s preflop and get pissed off when I hit my straight or two pair. They cannot believe I could possibly know what they have, read their betting patterns, and make a hero call when they try to 3-bet shove light. They also cannot believe that I could ever bluff. My fold equity when I sit down at a table of unknowns is higher than my chip stack might indicate.

I went back to Pala on Saturday evening, and found MAG there at the $2/$5 table, in the same clothes. He hadn't slept, I have no idea how much he was stuck. This was a tougher game, and there were some good players at the table, but you can guess who my focus was. I had taken $600 off him Thursday night/Friday morning. He was back to conservative play for a while after I sat down, then I won some pots from him and he was sliding down that tilt-mountain again. I cashed out at 1 AM, up $800 for the session.

The bottom line is: girls, use this. Guys, beware of this. so many times I see guys let their penises get in the way of their poker playing.

Next time I'll post some of the memorable hands from these sessions....

All in...I guess...

My name is Andi. I am currently unemployed and married to a great and very patient guy. In my spare time (HA! that's ALL the time) I skydive, play video games, and play poker, mainly low stakes No-Limit cash games at the local casinos. Hence the only slightly clever and thought-provoking blog title.

Saturday, April 3rd, my plans for the summer changed drastically.

I won a seat to the 2010 World Series of Poker Main Event via a satellite at one of the local casinos.

It's been a long time since I've had a short-term goal this concrete, so I decided that I'd better just shove all in and start a blog to document my journey. Hopefully it will keep me sane, on-track, and accountable (to myself, if anything). Why? Because I want to spend the next 3 months learning and studying and getting better at tournament poker.

Who the heck am I? Just another no-name donk who luckboxed her way to the big show. But I don't want to be that person. I don't want to be Darvin Moon, who all the regs on the poker sites laugh at for going deep with little skill.

See, I'm generally a quitter. I start things with grandiose dreams and ideas and after a few weeks or some realization that what I want to do might actually take some work, my interest wanes and I'm on to the next thing. Since I'm 34 years old and never was actually diagnosed with anything like ADHD, I've just learned to accept myself this way. This probably isn't the best outcome, since acceptance has led to laziness and apathy.

Not this time. I never expected to ever play in the Main Event. I had considered saving some cash game winnings to head out and play one of the $1000 or $1500 buy-in events in June at the WSOP. The Main Event was something so far out in the stratosphere for my meager bankroll that I honestly never even thought about doing anything but railbirding it in between some juicy cash game play in July.

So here I sit, with a summer which was partially filled with skydiving events and training camps, and now includes a couple of trips to Las Vegas. I'm still a bit overwhelmed with this new development, and wondering where to start. I get impatient with online tournaments, and I know I need to get over that and play those for practice. I also know I will need to play some cash games to keep me sane and grounded during all this.

Anyway...enough with the semi-introspective rambling and on to a description of the tournament on Saturday which got me here. Can't be a sort-of poker blog without, yanno, some poker!

First, my win could be ranked up there among the great comebacks of the century...the Buffalo Bills over the Oilers, or the Niners over the Saints...Because I was felted in level 2. Yes folks, I had to rebuy and addon to even keep playing. I had lost a pot early (rofl, set over set) so was already short. Picked up AKo on the button and got 1 caller to my pf raise. Flop was K-high with rags, rainbow. I bet out, he called. Turn was a rag. I shove. He calls with KJo, of course, because apparently to donks KJ is the nuts. River is, of course, a jack, and the optional rebuy and addon became mandatory for me.

The payout structure of this tourney was a bit odd, admittedly. 1st place was the WSOP seat, obviously, but 2nd-21st got the same prize, $550 to use to buy into a deep stack tourney the casino is hosting in a month. So everyone was playing fairly tight. I basically stole my way into the money. At this point, I was pretty shortstacked, as I was perfectly happy with the $550 seat. So I learned that playing with nothing to lose sometimes is the way to go.

Had a couple of well-timed wins, a few losses, and it was on to the final table. I lost a big pot there and was pretty much crippled. I had seven 5k chips. Seven. Chips. I'm sitting there looking at 200k stacks and thinking, oh what the hell, ATC, baby!

And then it was like the hand of God reached down and touched the cards and said "Andi will win today". I won 3 or 4 all-ins in a row, then it was me who had the shortstackers covered. I knocked out 3 people, and then I was heads up with what was probably a 7-1 chip lead over another solid player. I kept looking at my stack with this expression of sheer bewilderment on my face, struggling not to laugh.

Heads-up is not a good skill of mine. I was nervous. But when 3 people came up to me during the break and said they had money on me to win, I vowed to not roll over. But it was my opponent who was rolling over, and playing passive. I think back now and know I played the best heads-up game of my short poker life. Now I just need to figure out why. See, the fundamentals of this game, I think I have a decent grasp on. It's the psychology that needs work.

I'll close with my well-timed trap on the final hand. As I said, I had been raising nearly every hand I had the SB. I'm SB again, and I look at AKo. I acted like I was about to fold, then I called the BB. Villain shoves all-in, and I snap call. He turns over As9s, and I show my AK. Flop came out 4c2s3d and I'm smiling. Turn is 3s and I'm not smiling, I'm praying: "nospadesnoninesnospadesnonines". River is a 6d and I take it down.

Enough for now. Next up..."how much have you lost?"

PS: Thanks to Pala casino and their amazing poker room for quickly becoming one of the best rooms in the San Diego area. I'll be more than happy to wear your stuff at the ME.