Heads Up With Bill Chen

Seven-Card Stud
Bill Chen is known for his mathematical approach to poker, which is clearly demonstrated in his co-authored book The Mathematics of Poker. He has more than $1 million in lifetime tournament winnings and two World Series of Poker bracelets. He recently sat down with Card Player TV to discuss seven-card stud strategy.

Kristy Arnett: Let’s talk about medium pairs. What goes into your considerations of whether or not to play those hands?

Bill Chen: Seven-card stud is a game of live cards. If your medium pair is duplicated — for example, you have nines and a 9 is out — you’re going to loathe playing it. You would play it only from a steal position. If a higher card completes, you won’t play it. However, if you have split nines with an ace and your cards are live, you’ll typically reraise. It’s very important to have live cards. The same is true if you have 9-9-8 with the 9 8. If your diamonds are live, that’s a consideration.

KA: When you have a drawing hand or a medium pair and don’t improve, on what street are you making the decision about whether or not to continue?

BC: Fifth street is the most important decision point. If you have a made pair and decided to play it, that’s sort of the time to dump it. There are some exceptions. If your opponent catches something really scary, like pairing his doorcard, you can fold on fourth street, especially because he can make the double bet. Even if he doesn’t make the double bet, you frequently should fold on fourth street. That’s one example. But the thing about fourth street is that if you call on third street and you both catch equally, which means that you catch a card that doesn’t help you and he catches a card that doesn’t help him, you have more odds to call on fourth than you did on third. You are also closer to the end of the hand. If you call on third, you generally should always call on fourth. Fifth street is when you decide whether to fold or not. Another important decision that you make on fifth is whether to raise or not. For example, if the high card keeps betting into you, on fifth street you have a lot of possibilities; you can raise with a lot of hands that you are going to continue to play.

KA: In your book, you mention that you need to break even on bluffs. Can you elaborate on that?

BC: Yes. Basically, if the pot has eight big bets in it, you have to win your bluffs one out of nine times. That means that you don’t have to win your bluffs that often. Seven-card stud is an interesting game, in that there are always backdoor draws and draws that you pick up, so you typically are never stone-cold bluffing. You are usually semibluffing, betting with a draw, or betting with a smaller pair with high kickers. You are generally value-betting or semibluffing. It’s not the type of semibluff that you make in no-limit hold’em, where you shove with an ace-high flush draw and hope that your opponent folds. Here, you expect your opponent to call most of the time, but there’s a chance that he’ll fold. You want to do it with hands that are kind of equal to your opponent’s. If you have a small pair, he probably has a big pair, but you have these redeeming features in your hand, and you aren’t losing very much if you bet. The only time that you want to bluff on the river is when you miss a draw. You’ve represented aces all along, and then bet as a bluff. You are saying, “I have aces, and probably aces up.” That’s the time that you want to bluff, when you’ve reraised with an ace and really have a hidden flush draw, but miss. Then, you bluff on the end.

KA: If you could give only one piece of advice to a beginning seven-card stud player, what would it be?

BC: Fold if your opponent pairs his doorcard and it’s not duplicated. I’ve seen so many players lose their money in that situation.