|
Pot odds are the odds the
pot is giving you for calling a bet. If there is $50 in the pot
and the final bet was $10, you are getting 5-to-1 odds for your
call. It is essential to know pot odds to figure out expectation.
In the example just given, if you figure your chances of winning
are better than 5-to-1, then it is correct to call. If you think
your chances are worse than 5-to-1, you should fold.
Calling on the Basis of Pot
Odds When All the Cards are Out
When all the cards are out, you must decide whether your hand is
worth a call, and that depends upon the odds you are getting from
the pot and what you think of your chances of having the best hand.
It is a judgment problem more than a math problem because there
is no way to calculate your chances of winning precisely. If you
can beat only a bluff, you have to evaluate the chances that your
opponent is bluffing. When you have a decent hand, you must evaluate
the chances that your opponent is betting a worse hand than yours.
Making these evaluations is often not easy, especially when you
have a marginal hand like two pair in seven-card stud. Your ability
to do so depends upon your experience, especially your ability to
read hands and players. Some things can be learned only through
trials by fire at the poker table.
Calling on the Basis of Pot
Odds With More Cards to Come
What about deciding whether to call before the draw in draw poker
and in stud games when there is one card to come? Now the math becomes
important. If you know you have to improve your hand to win, you
have to determine your chances of improving in comparison to your
pot odds. With a flush draw or an open-ended straight draw-we'll
assume the game is five-card draw poker-you would be correct to
call a $10 bet when the pot is $50 since your chance of making the
flush or the straight is better than 5-to1. Specifically, the odds
of making the flush are 4.22-to-1 against and the odds of making
the straight, 4.88-to-1 against.
Figuring the odds for making a hand is done on the basis of the
number of unseen cards and the number among them that will make
the hand. In five-card draw there are 47 unseen cards- the 52 in
the deck minus the five cards in your hand. If you are holding four
of a suit, nine of the 47 unseen cards will give you a flush and
38 won't. Thus, the odds against making the flush are 38-to-9, which
reduces to 4.22-to-1. If you are holding, say then eight of the
47 unseen cards will make the straight four 8s and four kings -while
39 of the cards won't help, which reduces to 4.88-to-l. When a joker
or bug is used, as in public card rooms in California, you have
an additional card to use to make flushes and straights, which improves
the chances of making the flush to 3.8-to-1 and of making the straight
to 4.33-to-1. With a joker in your hand, the chances of making a
straight improve dramatically; instead of having eight or nine cards
to help your hand, you might have 12 or even 16. For example, if
you are holding any 6, 7, jack, or queen makes the straight, reducing
the odds to exactly 2-to-1 against. Sixteen cards make the hand,
and 32 don't.
The smaller the pot odds vis-à-vis the chances of making
your hand, the more reason you have to fold. With only $30 in the
pot instead of $50, calling a $10 bet for a flush draw or a straight
draw (assuming you do not have a joker in your hand) becomes incorrect-
that is, it becomes a wager with negative expectation - unless the
implied odds are very large, as they might be in a no-limit or pot-limit
game.
It is because of the pot odds that people say you need at least
three other players in the pot to make it worth paying to draw to
a flush in draw poker. With the antes in there, the pot odds are
about 4-to-1, and when the bug is used, your chances of making the
flush are 3.8-to-1. Notice, incidentally, the effect of the antes.
The higher they are, the better the pot odds, and the easier it
is to call with a flush draw. On the other hand, with no ante and
three other players in the pot, you'd be getting only 3-to-1 if
you called a bet before the draw, and so you'd have to fold a four-flush.
|
