Returning to raisin' 'n' chasin', in this column we examine your situation when you hit a pair. You will recall our previous column where we raised in late position with the 6d-5d and with three limpers. The Big Blind called, and the three limpers also called (as usual). Of course, with suited connectors you always hope to hit at least a 15-out flop. Dame Fortune doesn't smile so broadly very often: about 26 percent of the time you'll flop a measly pair.
Suppose you raised in late position as described above and the dealer laid these cards on the flop. They all checked to you. What would you do then?
Ah-6s-2c
First, we hope you count your outs. In a low-limit game where everyone keeps an ace no matter what, your chances of winning the pot with a pair of sixes are vanishingly small, so you need to improve. Any of the two sixes would make you trips; any of the three fives would make you two pairs.
Second, in addition to your five outs, you have position and image going for you. If you have a tight-aggressive image, then they'll put you on ace-king and check to you. A loose/aggressive player would raise in late position even with ace-any-suited, and typically they'll "check to the raiser." We hope you would bet.
If you bet, they'll fear that you have an ace with a better kicker and check to you again after the turn. For the price of one small bet, you'll get to see the turn and river cards. Two opportunities to hit a five-outer give you a 20 percent chance to hit two small pairs, an open set (trip sixes) or better. With four opponents and three small bets each you'd have pot odds of 14-to-1. Since the pot odds for you would be larger than the cards odds against you, 4-to-1, you'd happily chase.
Of course, your small open set or two small pairs won't win every time. If they'd win half the time, then you'd be getting the equivalent of 7-to-1 pot odds. That's still a good situation, so bet 'em up! We do.
If the flop came with two or more cards of the same suit, then you'd have only four outs, because the spade five would put three trumps on the table and make a flush possible.
Ah-6s-2c
If someone had a flush, then you'd need to make a full house. (With three trumps on the table the chance that any one was dealt a matching pair in a ten-handed game is about 60 percent. It's OK if you want to count the spade five as 0.4 outs, but we don't.) We'd count four outs with the two trumps on the flop. If the flop were all trumps, then we would abandon any hope of prevailing and dump the hand.
With only four outs, your chance to improve dwindles to 16 percent, about 5-to-1 against. Although not so good a situation, we would still make a continuation bet and hope for a free look at the river card.
This flop yields six outs. The presence of one card of your suit adds an out, because you could also make a backdoor flush. Repeating previous advice, you shouldn't worry too much about losing to a higher flush. The odds are 3-to-1 against anyone having a higher flush when there are exactly three trumps on an unpaired board. In a ten-handed game, your itty-bitty flush will win 75 percent of the time in those cases.
Ad-6s-2c
With six outs your chances of improving grow to 24 percent, about 3-to-1 against. You should make a continuation bet even with only three opponents: your pot odds would be 11-to-1, usually enough to compensate for those times when you make your hand and lose to a better one.
Mr. Burke is the author of Flop: The Art of Winning at Low-Limit Hold 'Em, on sale at amazon.com & kokopellipress.com. E-mail your Hold 'Em questions to richardburke@comcast.net
