12 PM Jan 13 2012, Caesar's, 81st (145 entries)

This is an excellent deep-stacked tournament with starting stacks of 20K in chips, 30-minute levels, and re-buys allowed through the first six levels. For the first seven levels my stack stayed between 15K and 27K. I was not getting very good cards either before or after the flop, but things went just well enough to continue hanging around. I played fairly well for nearly four hours, then suddenly committed a fatal error.

In the last hand I caught

in the small blind. Two or three players limped, I added 600 more chips to make the call, and the big blind checked. The flop came

This was a pretty good flop for me. I checked, the big blind checked, then the first limper put in a near-minimum bet of 1300 chips. Everyone but me folded. I called. The turn came

We both checked, then the river came

I bet 2200 chips. The early limper had a large stack. He probably thought I hit a straight on the river, because he put me all-in. At this point I obviously need to fold because it's clear he would not make this bet without a stronger hand than a set with medium kicker. Inexplicably, after deliberating for a bit I ended up making the suicidal call. He turned over

This is one of the absolute worst ways to go out of a tournament. I still had a medium stack of about 24K in chips at the beginning of the hand. To call off your entire stack in a situation where you stand little chance of winning the hand, is an embarrassing mistake no experienced player should ever make. This other player had been getting lucky cards all day, and this was no situation where he might be bluffing.