• What Percentage Of Hands Should You Play In Poker Quiz
• What Percentage Of Hands Should I Win In Poker
• What Percentage Of Hands Should You Play In Poker 2020
• What Percentage Of Hands Should You Play In Poker
• What Percentage Of Hands Should You Play In Poker Chart
• What Percentage Of Hands Should You Play In Poker Calculator

Poker is a highly engaging casino game. One of the concerns that strike players often is how much of the hand you should play. After all, Poker is a game that keeps changing and calls for your decisions to be adjusted according to your opponent’s actions. Especially, when playing with real money, you will not want to make mistakes and so, this guide can help you understand as to when it’s the appropriate time to call or raise.

When Should You Call In Poker?

Experts suggest that if you have a hand that you want to play when it’s your turn, it’s a good time to raise but in case you feel it isn’t a good hand, better to simply fold instead. By doing this, you might prevent your opponents from putting you on a weak hand as well as have them pool in more money at a time when you hold a good hand.

You can see the extremely low average winning poker hand percentages for commonly played hands like Q-10 or J-9 so my advice would have to be to stick to the premium hands as you learn the game. As you gain more experience you can experiment with those lower percentage starting cards, but you’ll need to be disciplined enough to learn when to continue beyond the flop. Every poker hand’s strength. And with a total of 14 of the 169 starting hands (6.3% of all hole cards dealt), 80% of all profits are made. So this should make it obvious that you should only play few hole cards in Texas Hold’em Cash Games. And in poker tournaments like Sit and Go’s, Double or Nothing or MTT, you should play even less starting hands. The bigger the gap, the more selective you should be with these hands. Two-gappers include hands like KTs, J8s and 74s, three-gappers are hands like K9s, J7s, 73s, etc. The top gapper hands (like KJs) play well as raises from the middle to late positions.

The chances of getting a top starting hand (of double aces, picture pairs or A-K.

The Starting Hands in Different Positions in Poker

In a game of 9 handed tables, at least 6 players might wait to act. Even if it appears as a tight position, it calls for risking 3 blinds to win 1.5 blinds in case the 6 opponents fold. If called, you might also have to play out of position. This can be a disadvantage and having a string hand prior to the flop is a better approach.

What Percentage Of Hands Should You Play In Poker Quiz

The middle position is referred to the 2nd and 3rd positions in a 6 handed game and with fewer players, you get more chances to play in the position. The important players here are the ones between you and the button and if they call, you will have to play out of position. The number of hands you can play can be determined by how tight the hands are. You can add hands in the 2nd category if you are confident. Check for loose players on your left for it can may it a little tight for you.

The Cut-Off Button in Poker and Adjustments to Be Made

In a situation where you see the ‘cut-off’ button playing almost 70% of your hands, you may then have to tighten up. You can open up on a cutoff that has a tight button and raise it to 50%. This can guarantee you to stay in position in case you get called.

Keep a track of the small blind. If the big blind folds by 62.5% or a little more, you may raise 2 cards in your favour. It is best to keep the small blind range of raising similar to the cutoff range. A raise in front of you means that you need a stronger hand than your opponents or hold one with implied odds. 3-bets should be used either when you have better hands than opponents to fold or get called by a range that’s worse than yours.

Some adjustments are always required when playing Poker tournaments. In case you see that antes are impacting your game, you can think of winning it and raise an expansive range of your hands before the flop. In occasions where the stacks are shallow, it’s better to make overpairs rather than hit sets or make flushes. Instead of playing pairs or other weak-suited connectors, it’s always wiser to play high-card value hands in such situations. An ante signifies the presence of at least 2.5 big blinds that could appreciate your bet by almost 25% or even more without having to compete in a situation when everyone else folds. This will also make it possible for you to double up when you are called.

Consider this an intervention. You play too many hands. You should cut back.

Sure, I’ve never watched you play no-limit hold’em. I’ve never sat behind you and looked over your shoulder as you limped into pots with Q J or 9 6. I’ve never actually witnessed you calling that preflop reraise cold with 8 8.

But I’ve seen a whole lot of people play no-limit hold’em at the $1-$2, $2-$5, and $5-$10 levels, and darn near 100 percent of them play too many hands. Great players, good players, regulars, amateurs, nits, and tourists. One and all, these players play too many hands.

I’ll give a pass to the great players, since these guys have reason to play too many hands. But for everyone else, you play too many hands. You should cut back.

More Hands Preflop Means More Folding Postflop

Here’s the excuse I hear most often for playing too many hands. “Oh, I play that one because I know how to get away from it if I miss the flop.”

Most folks seem to think that the main problem with playing too-weak hands is that you can make a second-best hand and get yourself stacked. As long as you avoid that bugaboo, their thinking goes, slinking into pots with J 8 or 8 7 is A-OK.

There is a massive problem with this line of thinking. It comes in two pieces.

First, I can’t find the profit. The whole idea is, “I know how to lose only a little with this hand, rather than a lot.” Folding doesn’t make money — it loses money. You aren’t going to fold your way to riches.

There is an implicit assumption. Those times you hit the flop hard, you’ll make such a killing that you’ll win back everything you lost and more.

In today’s games, I think this assumption is generally flat wrong. It isn’t so easy to get paid off these days. Many of your opponents are just trying to make hands and stack the guy who doesn’t know how to fold. If you make hands against these players, there’s no way you can expect to win stacks just because you made a small flush. They simply won’t pay.

If this assumption is a key part of your poker thinking, it needs to leave immediately. You can’t just assume that all those folds you make are OK because the big score is on the way. It’s not. Likely you’re just bleeding cash.

Second, all the extra hands make it very difficult to play the turn and river. Do you often have trouble playing the later streets? Do you feel like too often you’re stuck with a hand that’s not quite good enough? Do you feel like you won’t have an answer if your opponent decides to toss a big bet at you?

There’s no way to eliminate these problems completely. But if you play too many hands preflop, you guarantee yourself problems on the turn and river.

Here’s why. On the late streets, your hand falls into one of four categories.

1. The nuts or a strong value hand that you’re happy to bet.
2. A good hand to bluff with.
3. A hand with showdown value that will make you want to puke if your opponent bets big.
4. Total junk.

The size of the first category is relatively fixed. On any given board, there are only so many hands that are strong and worth betting. As you add more hands preflop, this category grows — a little bit. For instance, say the board is K 9 4 10 4. If you are very loose preflop, you might play 9 4, which obviously is very strong on this board and worth betting.

But if you play tight preflop, you still grab a lot of the strong hands. Suited heart aces. Pocket kings, tens, and nines. Pocket aces. A-K. Q-J suited. Even 5-4 or A-4 suited.

For a given board, as you add loose hands preflop, you grow the number of category one hands, but only by a few extra hands at a time.

The number of category two hands, the bluffing hands, depends directly on the number of category one hands. You can only bluff so many hands. You need the threat that you “have it” to be real. You can add bluffs only as fast as you add real value hands. Therefore, this category doesn’t grow fast either.

When you add preflop hands, you’re really ballooning the size of categories three and four. You’re adding mostly marginal holdings and worthless junk. These are the hands you don’t want to be stuck with at the end. And yet, as you add extra hands preflop, you condemn yourself to showing up with too much garbage at the river.

Most people just fold all this extra junk on the flop and turn. The problem with that, again, is that folding on the flop or turn isn’t free. Every time you see a turn and fold, you’re out a healthy chunk of cash.

What Percentage Of Hands Should I Win In Poker

What’s the bottom line? When you play too many hands preflop, you are locking in losses after the flop. It’s not worth it.

What Percentage Of Hands Should You Play In Poker 2020

What To Fold

I’ll focus on the first five seats in a nine-handed game. That’s everyone except the cutoff, the button, and the blinds. If you have any doubt whatsoever, in these five early seats you should fold it. Dealt 9 7? Fold it. Dealt A 10? Fold it. Dealt 4 4? Fold it. Dealt K 8? Fold it. Dealt K J? Fold it.

Fold. Fold. Fold. In these five seats, you fold it.

In a typical $5-$10 (or $2-$5) live game, when I am under the gun, the worst hands I play are 7-7, 10-9 suited, and A-Q offsuit. Four seats from there, I stretch it to 4-4, 5-4 suited, 10-8 suited, K-9 suited, and K-Q offsuit.

I open all these hands for a raise, and I raise against limpers.

What Percentage Of Hands Should You Play In Poker

Both of these ranges make me the tightest preflop player at nearly every table. But when I do all this folding preflop, I don’t need to fold that often after the flop. I get to value bet and bluff with a large percentage of my range. This makes playing pots with me difficult, because when I do play a hand, I rarely go away easily.

Since I know I’m playing against players who will have too much junk by the river, I like to wait hands out. I’ll call flops and turns light, knowing that my opponents will be forced to give up much of the time. Their preflop looseness dooms them when it counts the most.

What Percentage Of Hands Should You Play In Poker Chart

I recommend giving my ranges a try next time you play. It may feel boring at first doing all that folding, but I think you’ll get used to it. And it makes postflop play a whole lot more fun, since you get to put the screws to your opponents much more often. ♠

What Percentage Of Hands Should You Play In Poker Calculator

Ed’s brand new book, Poker’s 1%: The One Big Secret That Keeps Elite Players On Top, is on sale now at notedpokerauthority.com. Find Ed on Facebook at facebook.com/edmillerauthor and on Twitter @EdMillerPoker.