Hand Calculation

Poker Discussion
1

Original post by:
LVPoker1h

Recently I was in a hand and had AAKJ ds, my opponent, had A2QJ,
I pushed all in, and he called, the board was 2T279, and I lost. There was a discussion as to the luck factor and who had the best hand.
I ran the cards through my poker hand calculator and came up with the following results…

Hand 1 (AAJK)
wins: 3655 (73.1%)
ties: 129 (2.58%)
equity: 74.39%

Hand 2 (A2JQ)
wins: 1216 (24.32%)
ties: 129 (2.58%)
equity: 25.61%

Clearly hand 1 wins this matchup 3 out of 4 times.

I put my chips in with the best hand which is what you are supposed to do and force your opponent to make a mistake and bad call. Which is what happened. But as it goes sometimes, luck plays a roll.
But the players at the table was saying that luck had nothing to do with it, in fact, I was being blasted that I was wrong, and didn’t have the best hand, it was said that there “is no best hand preflop” , which is naive and incorrect. The table experts were defending the player who won, and that’s all. I may not be the most popular player here, but I do know that in poker, it all about hand selection. Maybe in fake money games like the ones that are played here, it don’t matter, it all about if you win the hand or not, even if you play a bad hand.
In the real world of poker, I would play this hand all day, and win most times.

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@LVPoker I was one of the players at that table. And I think this is a very interesting discussion.

A couple of things worth mentioning:

1- Did you tell your poker hand calculator that the game was hi/lo? Even if your AAJK was strong, you only had a chance of winning the high, but not the low. I think this significantly decreases the value of your hand preflop in a game where both the high and the low count.

2- You went all in preflop. You can argue as much as you want that you had the best hand, and you can get all the statistics in the world, but bingo is bingo, and all in preflop before seeing the cards on board is a risk for any hand to get beaten, no matter how strong it appears to be.

Nobody was defending the other player, because he did exactly what you did. He went all in preflop. You both did the same thing and one of you got lucky. I may not be the most popular player here either, and my experience with poker might not be as great as a hand calculator’s, but I can say from personal experience that in a game of Omaha hi/lo at a table of 6 players with each player holding 4 cards, waiting to see the flop before making huge bets is a wiser move than betting all in preflop on a hope.

The statistics on your calculator would have changed dramatically had you included the flop, or even the whole board. I watch poker games and tournaments on TV, and the statistics are always calculated after the flop, never before.

In all cases, you seem convinced that it was the right way to play that hand, and if even losing it couldn’t convince you otherwise, I don’t think my reply will. But I just wanted to clarify what the “table experts” were saying :wink:

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Yes, I will agree that there are a lot of “bingo” players on this site…
Definition (2plus2)
“Bingo Player” a poker player who makes blatantly bad poker plays, and believes in the luck of the cards will determine victory or defeat. It provides a ready-made excuse for the weak poker player. They can blame ‘bad luck’ for their ill fortune but cling to the myth of skill when they win.

And I did run the hand through the calculator as a hi/lo game and the results were 59-41
Short stack, less than 10 bb, I am shoving everytime. That’s my personal experience.

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I agree with you on shoving if you have a short stack. But then I would say I shoved because I had a short stack, not because I had the strongest hand in the world :slight_smile:

So the results changed from 75-25 to 59-41 when you specified hi/lo?

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I run across a lot of “Bingo” players at the Bellagio and Venetian all the time, and “My experience” has shown that they don’t last long at the tables. Why? Because “Luck” can only take you so far. Yes, they may suck out a few hand, but in the long run, they NEVER EVER win.

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Not saying it was the strongest hand in the world, But I am saying it was the best hand between the 2 of us

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Why do you keep misunderstanding me? I never said you were a bingo player! In fact, you’re a very good poker player and I’ve had the chance to play at the same table with you many times, and I know how good you are! You shoved all in preflop that hand, that was a bingo move, but that doesn’t make you a bingo player!

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Look forward to playing with you again

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Same here :slightly_smiling_face:

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I have only been on this site for about 2 months, and have built my stack from 0 to over 500K, I have noticed a lot of other players been here much much longer and have much less. Like in a real poker game, you size up your opponents, get reads, and tells, etc, I do that here and look at what they have and how long they have been here, and determine if I can outplay them post flop, or if they will call preflop, can I bluff them, etc… he was playing pretty tight, and took a chance to steal the blinds. There are a lot of very good players here, but at the same time, there are a lot of very bad players here, The good players I can bluff more, but the others, all I can do is put my money in the pot with what I think is the best hand.

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I agree with you 100% I think its the luck of the cards, you can have the best cards in your mind, and someone will win with rubbish

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Yes, it happens more on free play sites that it does on pay sites and in live poker, because most don’t really care because its all free and not losing anything.

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i definitely agree
you had the better hand
i would have played the same as you did
Luck does play a role in all hands
there are no guarantees
that’s why they call it gambling
its always a thrill when you you win

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In a game of hi/lo, how is a hand that only gives you a shot at the High better than a hand that gives you a shot at both the high and the low? If it was Omaha it would’ve been the better hand. But the game was hi/lo.
Of course it’s a game of luck, and luck plays the most important role in any hand, so I’m not arguing with that part. The part I’m arguing is that it was the “best hand” preflop. It wasn’t.

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Question: in a hi/lo game, which hand is better, AAKQ or AA23 ?

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Did you make your calculation based on you being heads up?. If you were at a 9 seat table there is the potential to have eight players make the call which would have put your equity way down. Unless all the other players have already folded your calculation must allow for some, or possibly all, of them to call.

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Good point @whoeverit. It was a 6 seat table. LVPoker initiated the all in. There was a chance of 5 players calling. Only 1 player ended up calling in the end and the rest of us folded, but there was no way of knowing that because we were all still in when he went all in preflop.

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sorry can not comment about Omaha
not that familiar with Omaha

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IIRC i once read AA23 is the best hand possible in omaha hilo.
but i’m really a big fish in omaha, so i can’t say for sure :slight_smile:

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Hi

I can see both sides here. I found the hand and I think the tournament situation at the time is relevant. It was 6 handed in a tournament where 3 places paid.

Blinds 300/600

Chips stack were LVPoker, 5220, 3 players with about 9,000, one with 10,000 and one with 15,000.

For me, AAxx in LVPokers spot here is an ok push, even at hi/lo. They have enough chips to expect to win the hand by scaring off everyone often. In the event they get called its strong enough to win at least the high half lots of times.
When they get called, it doesn’t have to come a low. Having a competitive hand when you are called and winning always when everyone folds is a situation which is profitable.

@Maya, Folding and trying to cash is an option, but are we guaranteed to get a better hand? It has to came in the next couple of orbits. I did not look through the previous hands to see the dynamics, so maybe there was the possibility to see a few cheap flops, I don’t know.

Whether the call is a bad one is debatable.

Pros:

The caller is calling 4,860 for a 7,020 pot. (11,880 total) Granted there are players behind, but when its Heads Up their hand is better than 4860/11880 (40%) most of the time. Running into AA, although no low in your opponents hand seems like a worse than average situation because your high half expectations are poor.

Cons:

The caller has 10,000 chips and A,2 with two pictures. Is there any need to call off half your stack?
There might be a call ,or worse still a raise from the Big Blind behind putting us to a decision for all our stack

Personally I don’t call here, but I am a nit. It really is not that bad to call though, is it?

Not all situations in poker are absolutes and this is a great situation to dissect, and keeps the game fascinating. Thanks LVPoker for posting it, and I really would like more of the same.

Rob

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