Basic Strategy:Tips : Position : Starting Hands : Bluffing : Betting : Money Management

Your position at the poker table will often be more important than the cards that you are dealt... seriously. You will find that the outcome of every hand will be largely dependent on the position of each of the players at the table.

The strength of your starting hand in Texas Hold'em can help you determine your chances of winning, even before the remaining cards are dealt. From a pair of aces — the strongest starting hand — to a 2 and a 7, knowing the strength of your starting hand is an important part of your success at the table. So if you want to know how to be a better poker player this is the start. Winning hand sequence; starting from the best, 1: Royal Flush. Ace, King, Queen, Jack, Ten all of one suit, ie diamonds or hearts or clubs or spades. A rare hand, the best hand in p0ker, statistically you are only likely to see one every 650,000 hands. Hands without a number are the weakest starting hands. As a general rule, books on Texas hold'em present hand strengths starting with the assumption of a nine or ten person table. The table below illustrates the concept: Chen formula. The 'Chen Formula' is a way to compute the 'power ratings' of starting hands that was originally developed.

So, I think its pretty important that we learn about the importance of position before the next time we play a hand. You will never look at a hand in the same way again...

What is table position in Texas Hold'em?

If you take a close look at an online poker table, you will notice that the dealer button moves to the left after every hand. This allows for each player to put an equal amount of blinds into the pot as the game is played through each rotation of the dealer button. In addition to this, the dealer button changes the order of which players are going to act on each betting round.

If you are to the left of the button (i.e. in the blinds or just to the left of those), you will be one of the first players to act on the flop, turn and river, and there will be a number of players acting after you. Conversely, if you are on the button or just to the right of it, you will be one of the last players to act, as the majority of the other players at the table will have to make their plays before you.

Why is table position in Texas Hold'em important?

Table position is important because it is going to be incredibly useful to be able to act after our opponents. If we are the last to act on a hand, we can see whether our opponents have checked or bet before us, whereas we would not have this sort of information on our opponents if we were acting before them. The actions of our opponents is going to help us a lot, as it gives us a strong indication of the strength of their hand.

Texas Hold'em position example.

Lets say we are up against one opponent on the flop and we have not managed to improve our hand. If our opponent checks to us, we stand a good chance of being able to run a successful bluff, because we can infer from their check that they are weak by not wanting to bet out. However, if we were the first to act we would have no idea of whether they are strong or weak, because we have not had the opportunity to see what action they are going to take.

You really want to try and avoid playing hands from early position, that is unless your hand really is too good to fold.

That was a pretty basic example, but the theory can be applied to almost every situation in poker. So if you can see why position is important from this example alone, you have already come a long way in developing your game.

Playing hands depending on your position.

As a general rule:

You need a stronger hand to play out of position than you do when you are playing in position.

So basically, if you are going to be one of the first to act on each betting round, you will want to stick to playing premium hands like:

• AA
• KK
• QQ
• AK
• AQ
• JJ

However, if you have good table position and you are going to be one of the last to act on each round, you can comfortably open up your starting hand range to include the following hands (along with the hands listed above, and assuming that there hasn't been too much action before you):

• AT
• KJ
• TT
• 99

This is all because of the fact that being out of position is going to be quite a big problem, and it is going to make the hand a lot more difficult to play. Therefore you will want to give yourself a much better opportunity to win the hand by only the playing better cards, and avoiding the ones that are likely to get you into trouble.

You can find out more about choosing the best starting hands in the starting hand strategy article, which should be your next stop on the strategy tour anyway.

General Texas Hold'em table position tips.

The big and small blind seats are horrible.

Don't be fooled by the blinds! You may be one of the last to act before the flop, but for every betting round after that, you will either always be first or second to act. So make sure that you stick to playing the best cards in these seats and throw away any marginal hands. You will want to look throw away the vast majority of your hands in these seats as they will lose you money more often than not.

The button is awesome.

The button is the best seat in the hand. If you are on the button, you can guarantee that you will be the last to act on every betting round after the flop. This doesn't mean that you should play anything and everything from the button, but you can really open up your starting hand requirements to get in on the action from such a great seat.

You should be playing a lot more hands from the button than you should from early position.

Middle position is okay.

Middle position is in the middle between the good and bad seats, funnily enough. When you are in middle position you will want to keep an eye on whether players have limped in or raised before you, because you could either end up being one of the first or last to act on each round depending on which players decide to see the flop. The less players acting after you, the better your position becomes.

Texas Hold'em position overview.

Every time you play a hand in Texas Hold'em (or any other poker variant for that matter), you should always take into consideration your position relative to the dealer button. You may well be surprised at how much of an influence your position at the table can have on the outcome of a hand, so don't just look at your cards the next time you decide whether or not to play your hand.

If you are familiar with the principles behind table position, you may want to take it up another level by having a look at the article on relative position.

Go back to the sublime Texas Hold'em guide.

Can You Afford Not To Use
Poker Tracker 4?

“I wouldn’t play another session of online poker without it”

“I play $25NL, and in under 1 week PT4 had paid for itself”

Comments

In the poker game of Texas hold 'em, a starting hand consists of two hole cards, which belong solely to the player and remain hidden from the other players. Five community cards are also dealt into play. Betting begins before any of the community cards are exposed, and continues throughout the hand. The player's 'playing hand', which will be compared against that of each competing player, is the best 5-card poker hand available from his two hole cards and the five community cards. Unless otherwise specified, here the term hand applies to the player's two hole cards, or starting hand.

Essentials[edit]

There are 1326 distinct possible combinations of two hole cards from a standard 52-card deck in hold 'em, but since suits have no relative value in this poker variant, many of these hands are identical in value before the flop. For example, A♥J♥ and A♠J♠ are identical in value, because each is a hand consisting of an ace and a jack of the same suit.

Therefore, there are 169 non-equivalent starting hands in hold 'em, which is the sum total of : 13 pocket pairs, 13 × 12 / 2 = 78 suited hands and 78 unsuited hands (13 + 78 + 78 = 169).

These 169 hands are not equally likely. Hold 'em hands are sometimes classified as having one of three 'shapes':

• Pairs, (or 'pocket pairs'), which consist of two cards of the same rank (e.g. 9♠9♣). One hand in 17 will be a pair, each occurring with individual probability 1/221 (P(pair) = 3/51 = 1/17).

Alternative means of making this calculation

First Step

As confirmed above.

There are 1326 possible combination of opening hand.

Second Step

There are 6 different combos of each pair. 9h9c, 9h9s, 9h9d, 9c9s, 9c9d, 9d9s. Therefore, there are 78 possible combinations of pocket pairs (6 multiplied by 13 i.e. 22-AA)

To calculate the odds of being dealt a pair

78 (the number of any particular pair being dealt. As above) divided by 1326 (possible opening hands)

What's The Best Starting Hand In Texas Holdem Card Game

78/1326 = 0.058 or 5.8%

• Suited hands, which contain two cards of the same suit (e.g. A♣6♣). 23.5% of all starting hands are suited.

Probability of first card is 1.0 (any of the 52 cards)Probability of second hand suit matching the first:There are 13 cards per suit, and one is in your hand leaving 12 remaining of the 51 cards remaining in the deck. 12/51=.2353 or 23.5%

• Offsuit hands, which contain two cards of a different suit and rank (e.g. K♠J♥). 70.6% of all hands are offsuit hands

Offsuit pairs = 78Other offsuit hands = 936

It is typical to abbreviate suited hands in hold 'em by affixing an 's' to the hand, as well as to abbreviate non-suited hands with an 'o' (for offsuit). That is,

QQ represents any pair of queens,

KQ represents any king and queen,

AKo represents any ace and king of different suits, and

JTs represents any jack and ten of the same suit.

Limit hand rankings[edit]

Some notable theorists and players have created systems to rank the value of starting hands in limit Texas hold'em. These rankings do not apply to no limit play.

Sklansky hand groups[edit]

David Sklansky and Mason Malmuth^[1] assigned in 1999 each hand to a group, and proposed all hands in the group could normally be played similarly. Stronger starting hands are identified by a lower number. Hands without a number are the weakest starting hands. As a general rule, books on Texas hold'em present hand strengths starting with the assumption of a nine or ten person table. The table below illustrates the concept:

Chen formula[edit]

The 'Chen Formula' is a way to compute the 'power ratings' of starting hands that was originally developed by Bill Chen.^[2]

Highest Card

Based on the highest card, assign points as follows:

Ace = 10 points, K = 8 points, Q = 7 points, J = 6 points.

10 through 2, half of face value (10 = 5 points, 9 = 4.5 points, etc.)

Pairs

For pairs, multiply the points by 2 (AA=20, KK=16, etc.), with a minimum of 5 points for any pair. 55 is given an extra point (i.e., 6).

Suited

Add 2 points for suited cards.

Closeness

Subtract 1 point for 1 gappers (AQ, J9)

2 points for 2 gappers (J8, AJ).

4 points for 3 gappers (J7, 73).

5 points for larger gappers, including A2 A3 A4

Add an extra point if connected or 1-gap and your highest card is lower than Q (since you then can make all higher straights)

Phil Hellmuth's: 'Play Poker Like the Pros'[edit]

Phil Hellmuth's 'Play Poker Like the Pros' book published in 2003.

What's The Best Starting Hand In Texas Holdem Poker

Statistics based on real online play[edit]

Statistics based on real play with their associated actual value in real bets.^[3]

Nicknames for starting hands[edit]

In poker communities, it is common for hole cards to be given nicknames. While most combinations have a nickname, stronger handed nicknames are generally more recognized, the most notable probably being the 'Big Slick' - Ace and King of the same suit, although an Ace-King of any suit combination is less occasionally referred to as an Anna Kournikova, derived from the initials AK and because it 'looks really good but rarely wins.'^[4][5] Hands can be named according to their shapes (e.g., paired aces look like 'rockets', paired jacks look like 'fish hooks'); a historic event (e.g., A's and 8's - dead man's hand, representing the hand held by Wild Bill Hickok when he was fatally shot in the back by Jack McCall in 1876); many other reasons like animal names, alliteration and rhyming are also used in nicknames.

Notes[edit]

What's The Best Starting Hand In Texas Holdem Games

1. ^David Sklansky and Mason Malmuth (1999). Hold 'em Poker for Advanced Players. Two Plus Two Publications. ISBN1-880685-22-1
2. ^Hold'em Excellence: From Beginner to Winner by Lou Krieger, Chapter 5, pages 39 - 43, Second Edition
3. ^http://www.pokerroom.com/poker/poker-school/ev-stats/total-stats-by-card/^{[dead link]}
4. ^Aspden, Peter (2007-05-19). 'FT Weekend Magazine - Non-fiction: Stakes and chips Las Vegas and the internet have helped poker become the biggest game in town'. Financial Times. Retrieved 2010-01-10.
5. ^Martain, Tim (2007-07-15). 'A little luck helps out'. Sunday Tasmanian. Retrieved 2010-01-10.

10 Best Starting Hands In Texas Holdem