How good is your crystal ball? Can you see into the future? If you can't, you are going to have to make some good guesses as to what the future holds in order to make the best decisions at the poker table.
No, I am not talking about sensing whether the next card off the deck will fill your inside straight. I'm talking about assessing your "implied odds." It is the process of estimating whether or not you will make enough bets in the future to justify a call now when the pot is not offering you the correct current price.
Some people get confused by either this term or the estimation process, and I thought an at-the-table example could help. So, let's take a look at a hand I recently played.
While playing $40-$80 hold'em at The Venetian, I held pocket fours in the big blind. After an early-position player called the blind, a middle-position player raised and was called by two others before it got to me. This was an easy call for me despite the tiny chance that the limper could reraise. The pot was offering 8.5-1 right then, and my chances were better than that to flop a set, not even counting any future profits I might make if I did.
The tiny chance happened, however, and the original limper did reraise. Everyone called back to me, and I made the easy call.
Five of us saw a flop of K
J
8
. I sadly noted that no fours had appeared, and checked. The preflop reraiser bet, the preflop raiser called, and the other two players folded. I was faced with the decision of whether to call or fold.
The case for calling: First, I had to look at the pot odds I was facing. The pot had 17 bets in it, so I was getting 17-1 to call. What were the chances that I would catch a 4 on the next card? I was looking at five cards, leaving 47 that were unknown, two of which were fours. Thus, the chances that I might catch a 4 were 45-2 or 22.5-1.
Since the odds of catching were worse than the odds of calling, the current price indicated a fold. Could I predict enough future bets to justify a call? I would need to make six small bets (three big bets) in the next two rounds to justify a call.
First, I needed to check the suits of my fours. If neither was a spade, I certainly would have to fold, as one of the two fours that I could hit would put a third spade on the board. Even if no one made a flush on that card, any non-pairing spade on the river would doom me. But, sure enough, I did have the 4
in my hand.
Assuming I did catch one of the two fours, how would the betting proceed? I would check, hoping to check-raise, the player on my left would bet, the other guy would probably call, and I would spring my trap. I would get at least one call there and one more on the river, totaling four big bets. That would be one more than I needed for a small overlay. I might even make more than that if everyone called my raise and river bet. On the basis of that quick look, it seemed like the implied odds indicated that I should call.
The case for folding: What could be wrong with my plan? There were several losing possibilities to consider.
First, I could be drawing dead - well, nearly dead. If one of the players already had a set, I was drawing to runner-runner fours.
And someone could easily hold a set. The guy who limp-reraised preflop most likely had aces or kings. Yes, other hands were possible, but those were certainly the most probable. And while he was twice as likely to have aces as kings (he could have six possible combinations of the unseen aces and three possible combinations of the missing kings), a set of kings would be very costly for me. There also was a chance that he could hit an ace on the river if indeed that was his hand. Also, the other opponent could have a set of jacks or eights. While this was nowhere near as probable as the pocket kings, it was at least worth noting.
Second, one of the players could make a flush or straight on the river even if I hit my set on the turn. The caller on the flop had to have something he liked to make that out-of-position call, and hands like the A
Q
and A
10
were among the candidates he might play this way.
Third, my rosy scenario for winning multiple bets after I hit my set might not play out the way I had forecast. For example, if I decided to try for the check-raise to maximize my potential, everyone might check behind me. Perhaps the limp-reraiser was goofing around or held two queens and decided to check the turn. The other player might check, as well, and I might make only one big bet when I bet the river and picked up a crying call.
My decision: I believed it was a close choice, but I had to make a decision in a reasonable amount of time. I concluded that the number of additional bets I might win was marginal, in that winning six bets or more was very remote. Five was very optimistic, and three or four seemed most likely. On the other hand, I might lose considerably more than the one small bet it was going to cost me to make my hand if I made it and still lost. With a small overlay and large possible underlay, even if rare, I concluded that calling was a net loser over a long series of trials. I folded.
Conclusion: People always want to know what happened at the table. After I folded, the turn card was the 4
. The preflop limp-reraiser had aces rather than kings, and nothing bad happened on the river, so I would have won a very nice pot.
Should I have felt bad? I don't think so. Certainly, I knew there were winning scenarios when I folded, and one of them happened.
My estimate took into account not only the good news (the implied odds were sufficient to justify a call if everything went well), but also the bad news (how many ways things could go wrong). If, for example, the flop had been 10
7
2
, I would have had an easy call. The presence of likely oversets and rivered straights and flushes is what tipped the balance toward folding.
Too many players, when doing an at-the-table implied odds exercise, get through only the "good news" part. With great optimism, they work out how many bets they will win if everything goes well, and then make the call. Then they complain about bad beats when things don't go according to plan.
A few others see only the dark side. They contemplate all of the things that could go wrong, and fold too often as a result.
The more things that can go wrong, the more money you need to win when things go right. If the money is marginal and the threats significant, you need to take that into account. If the rewards are great and the downside small, you need to realize that, too.
Forecasting the future can be a tricky business. With no tea leaves or goat entrails to guide you, all you have at the poker table is knowledge of your opponents and a guess as to how the action will go. If you can make accurate estimates of both the potential winnings and losses, you can use implied odds to their greatest advantage.
Barry offers poker lessons tailored to the specific strengths and weaknesses of the individual student. Please visit his web site at www.barrytanenbaum.com or e-mail him at [email protected].
