Knowing Your Texas Hold Em Starting Hands

When speaking of card games, there’s a lot to notice with your starting hands. For the game of Texas hold em, these are the first two cards you are dealt. Your understanding of your Texas hold em starting hands can make or break you in the game. You must know the odds on these first two “hole” cards to decide whether or not you want to make a bet.

Approximately one hand out of every seventeen dealt will be two cards of the same rank, known as a “pocket pair.” Another four out of every seventeen will be “suited” cards and possibly even a Flush. All the rest will typically be “offsuit” pairs, sometimes consisting of ranking cards along with potentially high pairs, such as the Ace of Hearts and the King of Clubs.

For the most part, all different hands have different strengths for you to consider when you play. If there are about nine or ten people playing and you are one of the first to take a turn, you should usually only bet on pocket pairs. Use caution with anything higher – you want the other players to remain curious about the value of the cards you’re holding.

If, however, you are not one of the first players to go, you will have to think even more about both your cards and your position in the game. Say you were the seventh to tenth player with several active bets and raises. You’d probably want to discard a small pair, and make a small bet on “high” suit cards, or hold on to them if the stakes aren’t too high yet.

No matter where you are at a table, the least common “offsuit” hands don’t usually make for good bets. An Ace and a King together are only ranked about twelfth on a table of winning probabilities, and this is one of the highest possible combinations. Aces to Queens are top ranked pocket pairs, followed by Ace King or Ace Queen “suited” cards.

You always need to look at what the other players are doing before you play your own cards. You also need to use your best judgment on the current situation and play based on how you feel. If you have an understanding of how likely it is for your hand to be the winner, you will be able to establish an idea of whether and how you should bet.

Keep in mind that, no matter how good your own reasoning is and no matter how well the odds are in your favor, the community cards could still take away everything you’ve worked towards, especially the river card. Not only must you know when to bet for each hand, you must also know at what point you should stop betting altogether to stay safe.

Finally, you have to know how to bluff and recognize signs that tell you when someone else is doing so. This can help you get a better idea of what others are doing and know what has the best chance of working for your own cards. Knowledge of the best Texas hold em starting hands, while no guarantee, certainly gives a better chance of success in the game.