Exploiting Tilt and Cashing out with their Chips
We’ve talked about getting on tilt and how to handle it, now let’s focus on some tips to get other players aggravated and take advantage of their misery, which ultimately can increase your bankroll.
Poker can be a ruthless game, but if you’re not going to take advantage of a tilting player, then someone else at your table will profit off their misfortune. That’s why it’s important to recognize when a player is about to tilt and quickly manipulate the situation before they calm down or lose all of their chips.
The easiest way to pad your bankroll is to sit at a table with players making poor decisions. Another is playing against someone having a bad night.
Sometimes you can patiently wait for an opponent to take a bad beat and go on tilt. Other times, you can push a player to the brink of tilt with an unorthodox style of play. Not that we recommend this aggressive style of play, but when presented with the opportunity, be ready to take advantage of it.
You never know when a player will go on tilt and spew all of their chips, so you have to be ready to pounce. More often than not, especially in tournaments, tilted players will lose their chips in one or two hands.
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Magic Word Everyone Loves
In cash games, there’s nothing better than hearing a player on mega-tilt utter the word, “Rebuy!”
It doesn’t happen every session, but we all dream about playing against a fishy player on tilt who has deep pockets and willing to buy-in multiple times. Those situations tend to loosen up the entire table because even the biggest nits in the game want a chance to bust the real-life ATM. So, then it becomes a competition to see who gets a chance to bust the tilted mark.
Nothing sends me on tilt quicker than a bad beat. If you see that happen to an opponent at the table, then keep an eye on that player in the ensuing hands because that’s the person most likely to tilt and made bad decisions.
Implied Tilt Odds
The Tiltboys were an infamous crew of poker players and computer nerds from Stanford that loved to gamble on anything and everything. They shared their hysterical Las Vegas trip reports and poker experiences old-school bulletin boards and forums like 2+2.
Dave “Dice Boy” Lambert was one of the original Tiltboys, and he coined the phrase “implied tilt odds.” He expanded the theoretical poker concept of implied odds to incorporate a potential situation where you’re statistically behind in the hand, but it has beneficial implied tilt odds because if you win the hand, it will send your opponent on instant tilt.
Basically, you stay in a hand you have no business playing for the sole reason of watching your opponent go ballistic. It’s one thing to fool around in a home game and try to put your friends on tilt, but it takes a lot of courage to tilt someone in a live — or online — casino setting.
When I first moved to Las Vegas, I discovered that implied tilt odds were easy to find in poker rooms off the Strip like Sunset Station or at Green Valley Ranch that are packed with retired locals.
My roommate Grubby and I loved playing low-stakes poker for the sole reason of tilting locals. We’d be the youngest player at a table with a 40-plus year age gap. When you’re the loosest player at the table, almost every hand had implied tilt odds against the AARP crowd.
Poker rooms on the Strip have a lot of tourists that are drinking and looking for a good time, so the games are loose and often juice. Locals’ casinos had poker rooms that were populated with elderly nits and rocks who only peddle the nuts, but they love to kvetch about their latest doctor’s appointment or brag too much about their golf game. However, if you can slap a bad beat on a local, they’ll often lose their mind and it will loosen up the table.
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The Bloody Gutshot
I played an interesting hand late one night at the old Excalibur Poker Room on the Strip. This was back in the early 2000s when you got to spin the money wheel if your pocket Aces were cracked.
A British tourist and I were involved in a hand. He was the tightest player at the table. We all knew he had a big hand when he re-raised a loose local cab driver named Ed. I defended my big blind with the 7-5 of diamonds and called.
The flop was Kd-10h-6c. I had absolutely nothing, but I bet out anyway. Ed the cabbie raised me, and the British guy re-raised. I was reminded about Dice Boy’s implied tilt odds. It was a the rare opportunity to tilt a tourist and a local player in the same hand. I called, and Ed also called.
The turn was the 4s, and I picked up a gutshot straight draw. I bet out once again, Ed the cabbie called, but the British guy raised. I re-raised, Ed the cabbie fold and muttered, “Enjoy the big blind special!” under his breath. At this point, everyone assumed the tight-playing British guy had a narrow range of hands that included pocket Aces, pocket Kings, or possibly Big Slick.
The 3d spiked on the turn, which filled in my straight. I bet out and a raising war ensued.
“Only thing that beats me is a bloody gutshot!” declared the Brit after he moved all in.
I called and knew he held pocket Kings before he even tabled his cards. I turned over my 7-5 of diamonds and dragged the pot with a seven-high straight.
Rubbing Salt in the Wound
“A bloody gutshot? Lucky fool!” snapped the Brit.
Ed the cabbie turned to the Brit and rubbed it in a bit.
“I folded pocket threes,” said Ed. “Too bad you didn’t have pocket Aces, at least you could’ve spun the wheel. You get zilch with cracked cowboys.”
“A bloody gutshot on a one outer?” I heard the Brit moan as a I slowly stacked up his chips.
Yes, I chased a one-outer and a gutshot, but the implied tilt odds were immense. The Brit demanded a stiff gin drink from the cocktail waitress and asked the dealer for a rebuy. As expected, he went out of his way to get involved in every hand that I played. He pounded drinks and donked off another rebuy while complaining about the bloody gutshot.
The deck was in my favor over that next hour. I flopped a set of Queens to win another big pot against the Brit when he tried to bluff me on the river with top pair and a busted flush draw.
I won the last of his chips on a flush over flush situation. Floppingd a nut flush draw with Ace-King of hearts, I hit my flush on the turn. He had just the Queen of hearts and an unsuited rag. He thought he had the best of me with a runner-runner four flush. A waterfall of F-bombs came out when I turned over the Ah-Kh for the nuts.
It’s fun to tilt drunken tourists, and turn the tightest player at the table into a total fish. It was even more fun to cash out two racks of their chips.
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