I was playing a B&M NL Holdem tourney over the weekend. I was getting very short stacked and the blinds we getting pretty big. My M was less than 3 so I was clearly desperate when I was delt KQ offsuit in late position. Someone from middle position min raised. The small stacked called. I raised for the rest of my chips and the original raiser called. He flips over 55 and the small stack flips over A-J. I'm happy just to have two live cards.

The flop comes QQ7 and I pretty happy. Then the dreaded 5 comes on the turn and a rag on the river, so my trip queen loses to his full house. Then someone at the table says "Wow, bad beat!"

I hear this term used often in this situation, but I don't agree that this was a bad beat. We were almost a coin flip when the money went in and he won. If I had enough money to just call his raise preflop and then I made a big raise when the two queens flopped and he called to catch the 5 on the turn, then that would have been a bad beat, since he would have had only two outs.

To clarify:
1. It's not a bad beat when you limp with pocket aces and the BB with 72 cracks your aces when the flop is 772. It's just bad poker on your part.
2. It is a bad beat when in the above situation when he raises you all in and you call to catch an A on the turn or the river. You just handed out a bad beat with pocket aces because your money went in when you were a huge dog.
3. It's not a bad beat when your opponent rivers the flush when you underbet the turn. If you gave him drawing odds then it can hardly be called a bad beat. Again, just bad poker.

Obviously, this is just my opinion and applies more to NL holdem than limit games, since you can put all your money in at once and with a sufficient stack always give your opponent incorrect odds to draw out on you. I do think that the term should be defined by losing as huge favorite when the money was put in, and if that's not the correct definition then it should be.

Yours was obviously not a bad beat since the 55 was the (small) favourite the whole way.

From http://www.seriouspoker.com/dictionary.html#backdoor

True, but I don't think it would have been a bad beat if I had won the hand either even though I was a small underdog. According to how I define "bad beat" the odds were too close when the money went in.

I chose option 3

I think additionally, the pot must matter to you.
If you are the chip-leader in a tournament and the short stack goes all in with his last two big blinds and sucks out on your superior hand, it's not a bad beat in my opinon.

I disagree. There is a difference between a bad play and a bad beat. You can give someone a bad beat by making a technically correct play. For example, you are in early position with J9clubs and push with your 3xBB stack, or an M of 2 or less. You are clearly desperate and it is technically correct to push with anything at this point. You actually should have made a move sooner. When the big stack calls with JJ and you flush him or catch two 9's to beat him it's still a bad beat, but no one can fault you making a move in this situation. I think it's still a bad beat because the hand that was extremely dominated won after the money was put in. The difference in this situation is that the player is not a donkey for making this suck out, and usually they are.

Thanks for you opinion and your post though.

A bad beat is when someone draws to 5% to 10% and hits it

So basically a two outer after the flop. What if someone hits their 3 outer? Say A-K vs. A-7 with a A-J-2 rainbow flop and your opponent needs one of the three remaining 7's to win. Since it's more than 10% it's not a bad beat? If you bet the pot with your TPTK and some one with TPWK calls it sure feels like a bad beat when he draws out on you.

Again, if you give him a free card to draw out on you it's your own damn fault, but if you protect your hand by not giving him proper odds to call then and he hits his three outer then I think that's a bad beat.

A true bad beat is when someone hits a one outer on you.