Hand Reading 101 The most important no-limit hold’em skill

Hand reading is the art of deducing the hands that your opponents hold. It’s the single most important no-limit hold’em skill. The better you are at it, the more money you will win. You can get a lot of the other stuff wrong — bet-sizing, preflop play, and so on — and still win if you can read hands better than anyone else.

There are three things you need to do to become a good hand reader. First, you need to learn the hand-reading process. You read hands by using deductive reasoning. If you’ve ever won a game of Clue, you have what it takes to be a good no-limit hand reader.

Second, you need to pay attention. Hand reading is information gathering. The more information you gather, the better your hand reading will be.

Finally, you need experience. The more hands of no-limit you play, the more you’ll know the meaning of each bit of information you gather.

If you want to get good, there’s no substitute for any of these. You need to learn the process, you need to pay attention, and you need experience.

First, you start with all possible hands that your opponent can have. The moment the cards are dealt, it is two random cards. Then, with each new bit of information, you narrow the possibilities down. New information can be a check, call, bet, or raise. It also can be a mannerism or something your opponent says. You maintain an internal list of all of the possible hands that are consistent with every action your opponent has taken.

Here’s how it works: It’s a $2-$5 game in Las Vegas. A tight player five off the button opens for a raise to $20. This player folds most of his hands from early position. And he also often open-limps with marginal hands. Therefore, the open-raise signifies a fairly strong starting hand. He might have a pocket pair of eights or better, two big suited cards (for example, A-10 suited or K-J suited), or perhaps A-K or A-Q offsuit.

A loose player calls, and then a regular in the game calls from the button. The regular will call from the button with a fairly wide array of hands. He could have any pocket pair, suited hands down to about K-5 suited or J-8 suited, and offsuit hands approximately 10-9 offsuit or better. (This is about 30 percent of all possible hands.)

The blinds both fold, so three players go to the flop with a $67 pot.
The flop is K♣ 10♣ 4♠. The tight player checks, the next player checks, and the regular on the button bets $30. The tight player calls, and the next player folds.
First let’s talk about the tight player’s check. He raised preflop, but then checked a king-high flop with two Broadway cards and a possible flush draw. With a hand like A-K or A-A, most players would bet in this situation. It’s the natural thing to do when you hit your hand. Moreover, many players would fear the draws and want to protect their strong but vulnerable pairs.

Even a tight player would also likely bet a royal-flush draw, like the A♣ Q♣ or Q♣ J♣. Therefore, the hands that make the most sense for a preflop raise and then a flop check are good pocket pairs that missed the flop — Q-Q, J-J, 9-9, and 8-8 — and big-card hands that missed top pair or a flush draw — A-Q, A-J, Q-J, A-10, and so forth. We also can’t discount the possibility that he flopped two pair or a set and chose to check it for deception.

The player on the button bet. An aggressive player might bet here with nearly anything, just because both of the other players checked. But let’s assume that you know this player well enough to suspect that he’s caught at least a draw or a pair. He might bet 7-7 or A-J, but likely not 7-6 or A-2. What can he have?
He can have any pocket pair. He can have any king (at least down to K-5 suited or so). He can have roughly 10-9 offsuit and 10-8 suited or better. He can have A-4 or 5-4 or 6-4 suited. He can have A-Q, A-J, Q-J, Q-9, J-9, or a club draw.

That’s a lot of possible hands. We have to allow for many possible hands because we don’t have that much information on the button yet. He called preflop in a situation where people call with a lot of hands. Then, he bet the flop in a situation where people bet with a lot of hands.

The tight player calls the flop. Most of the hands that he would play preflop connect with this flop, so his call doesn’t tell us too much. He might even call with 8-8 or A-Q.

We have more information on the preflop raiser. His preflop raise narrowed down his hands a lot, and his flop check was unexpected and narrowed down his holdings even more.

The turn is the 3♣, completing the possible flush draw. Both players check. This doesn’t tell us much about the tight player’s range. There weren’t many flush draws in his range, so the flush card was likely to scare him. The flop bettor’s check tells us a bit more. With a hand like a set or two pair, he likely would have bet the turn despite the club. And while he may have checked a flush, he may have bet it, as well, making a flush somewhat less likely. So, he’s more likely to have the weaker hands in his range: pairs and straight draws.

The river is the A♠, making the final board K♣ 10♣ 4♠ 3♣ A♠. The tight player checks again. The button bets $100 into the $127 pot.

The tight player confirms with his check that he doesn’t have a strong hand. Few players would check two pair or better twice. He could have an unimproved pocket pair or perhaps a rivered pair of aces with A-Q or A-J. Hands like K-J and A-10 aren’t completely consistent, but are still possibilities.

Is the button bluffing? It’s not likely. When he bet the flop, he was likely to have hit the flop with a pair or a draw. On the turn and river, both the flush and straight draws came in. The only consistent hands that don’t have a pair or better on the river are Q-9 and J-9, and most players wouldn’t hazard a bluff on a board like this one. With a pair or two pair, he likely would have checked the river or bet a smaller amount. The large bet suggests that he could have Q-J or a flush that he checked on the turn.

Given this analysis, comparing the tight player’s possible hands to the button’s, the tight player should almost certainly fold.

The hand-reading process may seem a little complicated now, but with practice it becomes second nature. ♠

Ed has authored six poker books and sold more than a quarter million copies. Ed’s newest book, Reading Hands At No-Limit Hold’em, will soon be available for purchase at notedpokerauthority.com. Find him on Facebook at facebook.com/edmillerauthor.