Worst Possible Hand In Texas Holdem

4/14/2022by admin

The Situation:

2-8 This gives you the same problem as above, and whether you are using a seven or an eight, this is definitely still a very low high card in Texas hold'em. 3-8, 3-7 When it comes to the ten worst starting hands, these are the two that come tied for third place. In Texas Hold’em a hand where aces, kings and queens pair up preflop is very rare. At a 9 player table this scenario unfolds roughly every 17,000 hands. The odds are 1:16,830 and the probability is 0.006%. Queens does happen every now and then, for example during this hand at the Bike.

You’re playing heads-up $5/$10 No-Limit Texas Hold’em cash with full 100bb stacks. Your opponent is a player who will call a shove with any two cards.

The Question:

What’s the worst possible hand you could jam with in this situation?

(a) 7-2 offsuit
(b) Q-2 offsuit
(c) 3-2 offsuit
(d) Other

Please leave your answer in the comments below before scrolling down and reading the analysis and answer.

Texas Holdem Starting Hands Chart

Done that? Great. Now read on for the analysis and answer…

The Analysis:

Conventional wisdom in poker is that an offsuit 7-2 is the worst possible hand you can open with before the flop. In fact, many popular side bets in poker center around winning with the so-called 7-2 “beer hand.” Against a top 20% hand, for instance, 7-2 is in fact the W.H.I.P., or Worst Hand In Poker….

…ah, but in the specific situation of this quiz, in which your opponent will call a shove with any two cards, regardless of their strength, offsuit 3-2 is actually a slightly worse hand.

To see this, we can run an equity calculator (such as the awesome Poker Cruncher app) and compare the three quiz answer hands against a range comprised of ATC, or Any Two Cards.

7-2o Against ATC:

The Answer:

The Discussion:

There are a few things worth adding to the discussion:

Close Equities. The respective equities of 7-2 and 3-2 against ATC are not very different; they’re both in the low 30% range. And these values actually aren’t terrible. If you were facing an all-in situation with your last $32 and there was $100 in the pot, you’d be justified in making the call with an offsuit trey-deuce.
Calling Ranges Matter. Against a top 20% hand range, 7-2 offsuit slips below 3-2 offsuit in strength, with just 27.7% equity against 29.2%, respectively.
The (Not So) Mighty Q-2. The Q-2 offsuit hand is nearly a coin-flip against an ATC calling range. But against a top 20% hand range, the equity drops significantly to just 31.3%. I.e., against someone who calls with ATC, Q-2 is a fairly strong hand, but against someone more discerning with their calling range, Q-2 ain’t great.
Equity Calculator. If you don’t already have one, I highly recommend getting an equity calculator and learning to use it. For Mac users (like me) and iOS and Android users, I highly recommend Poker Cruncher. And if you’re on a Windows machine, the industry standard is Flopzilla. Both programs are powerful and easy use.
Other WHIPs. Finally, what was amusing to me when I first posted this question was the number of non-standard responses I received from readers, including AQ, AK, KK, and JJ. The question these folks were actually answering was not “What is the worst preflop starting hand heads-up against ATC,” but rather “What hands do they lose the most money with and/or have the most trouble with?” These are very different kettles of fish altogether…

The Bottom Line:

Always carefully read a hand situation closely before jumping in with the answer/decision to make. Like everything in poker, the answer usually depends. Against a heads-up opponent who will call with any two cards, 3-2 offsuit is the WHIP. But against a stronger calling range, 7-2 offsuit is the WHIP. And if you move beyond the flop… well, all bets are off. Pocket Kings just may in fact be your own personal worst hand in poker!

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One of the basics of Texas Hold’em is understanding card strength

One of the key aspects of winning a game of poker is to be able to make the most correct decisions as often as possible; therefore, selecting the hands you will go to war with is among the first steps. Making the decision whether to move forward with the hand you got is one of the most frequent ones to make during a game of Texas Hold’em. To succeed at this is not only important to know what hands to play or to fold, but also to know why it is done so, when you face a complex situation, you have a solid base to make the best decision. The first step would be to know the best and worst hands you could get.

Worst Possible Hand In Texas Holdem Tournament

The best hands typically include the highest possible pairs like A-A, K-K, Q-Q, or J-J, which are already good so the pressure of improving their value down the road is not that much. These are made hands already and there is less chance of one of your opponents holding a higher pocket pair. Besides pairs, the next best thing will be to have suited A-K or A-Q, which have a good chance to become pairs once the community cards are there. They also have the potential to become high straights and the fact that they are suited gives you the possibility of getting the best possible flushes.

On the other hand, there are some hands to stay away from. These are hands that are worthless unless something else happens on the board – they’re not even worth showdown value on the river.
Hands like 7-2, 8-2, 7-3 and 8-3 off-suit won’t really lead you to something great easily. It can, for instance, become a low pair. Having a low card with a high card also puts you at a disadvantage. When competing for the pot when both you and your opponent have pairs, a low pair won’t give any added value.

Worst Possible Hand In Texas Holdem Tournaments

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