Starting Hands – Based on Position

The starting hands we’ve shown you are a great grounding in picking the right cards to play. The next step is to apply these picks to the game itself and the most important part of it…your POSITION at the time you get one of the 51 combinations of pocket cards we’ve highlighted.

Whilst the cards themselves are important in the game the MOST important aspect of any hand you play is your position in relation to the dealer at the time the cards are dealt.

As we mentioned earlier the BEST position on the table, for any given hand, is to be the actual dealer. This allows you to see what everyone else has done before you need to decide what YOU want to do.

Let’s assume you hold 66 as your pocket cards and you’re in the dealer position. Everyone else passes or limps in and it’s up to you to now act. What are your options?

Well…you have three. You can FOLD your cards, you can CALL the blinds (as others have done before you) or you can RAISE thereby giving out the impression that you have a strong hand and that it’ll cost other players, still in the hand, a whole heap more money to continue to play in that hand.

Let’s now assume that you still have 66 and that you’re still the dealer. Before the action gets back to you there has been a RAISE and a RERAISE! Now what do you do? Well that’s easy. You FOLD!

That hand cost you no money and you’re free to watch as the players who initially raised and re-raised now go to war safe in the knowledge that you’re probably better off out of it!

Let’s now assume that you’re first to act after the big blind with your 66. Now what do you do? Of course, in theory, you still have the same three options as you did in the first example. You can fold, call or raise. The problem here of course is that you have absolutely NO information about what other players, still to act after yourself, have as their pocket card holding so a fold, in this position, is probably a few chips saved.

You can see from the above examples that playing 66 in ‘late’ position is entirely different from playing it in ‘early’ position. It’s with this in mind we now look at which pocket card holdings operate best from these segmented positions.

Our positional strategy is simple. We segment the table of players into THREE distinct positional values. EARLY, MIDDLE and LATE.

EARLY position is where you are 1st, 2nd or 3rd to act after the dealer has dealt the cards. Given that the blinds make up positions 1 & 2 for the first round of betting EARLY position reverts to seats 1, 2 & 3 immediately to the dealers left after a flop has been seen.

MIDDLE position is where you are 4th, 5th or 6th to act and LATE position is where you are 7th to act or later up to, and including, the button.

Having now segmented our table we can look at the hands that are playable in those positions by way of GROUPINGS. Each grouping contains several hands that can be played and, dependant on your current position in relation to the button, can either be used to FOLD, CALL or RAISE with.

Let’s now re-examine our hand ‘groupings’…

Group 1 hands

AA, KK, QQ, JJ, AKs

These hands are the top 5 ranked starting hands in the game. These hands can be played aggressively from ANY position.

Group 2 hands

TT, AQs, AJs, KQs, AK

These hands, whilst not as powerful as GROUP 1 hands, can be played from ANY position although you may wish to just call with these hands more often than you raise.

Group 3 hands

99, JTs, QJs, KJs, ATs, AQ

These hands can be played aggressively from MIDDLE position and from LATE position. Calling with these hands in EARLY position is ok but you might want to give them up if there is a raise from later position.

Group 4 hands

T9s, KQ, 88, QTs, 98s, J9s, AJ, KTs, A9s, A8s

We start to get to the ‘fun’ hands. These hands are well suited to be played with by CALLING from mid position and RAISING from LATE position.

Group 5 hands

77, 87s, Q9s, T8s, KJ, QJ, JT, 76s, 97s, A7s, A6s, A5s, A4s, A3s, A2s, 65s

These hands should only really be played from LATE position. Providing there has been no raise prior to the action reaching you then go ahead and RAISE yourself. If there has been a single raise then consider calling otherwise FOLD.

Group 6 hands

66, AT, 55, 86s, KT, QT, 54s, K9s, J8s

Our final group of hands and hands that can only be played in LATE position only and even then I’d only recommend calling with them. If the flop suits then go ahead and get busy but these are the most speculative of our 51 playable hands mentions so deserve to be treated as such.

What about the other pairs??

You’ll notice from the above that we’ve totally avoided hands like 44, 33 or 22. Over a period of time these hands are losers. If you do decide to play them then this will be my advice:

  1. Call the blind bet ONLY and hopefully see a cheap flop.
  2. If the flop brings you that magical ‘set’ then aim to eliminate the remaining field down to you plus one other opponent as quickly as possible. Be aggressive where you think you can be. Holding 44 on a 4 5 6 flop might look good but anyone holding a made straight (2 3 or 7 8) or a 3 or a 7 in their hand might not want to leave in a hurry and so is far more likely call your attempts to limit the field with a bet here. Holding 44 on a flop of 4 8 K is a far tastier prospect of success.
  3. If no ‘set’ arrives then get out at the first sign of any other betting. Chances are that the three cards that arrived on the flop are all HIGHER in value than your 4 so it’s unlikely, especially multi-way, that you’re still ahead at this point even if you were before.

The next table shows profitability for each of the 169 starting hands over many thousands of occurrences in a live LIMIT £3/£6 game. This is a comprehensive listing of Texas Hold’Em poker hands based on their EV (expected value). Expected value is the average amount of big bets this hand will make or lose. So for example, AA from the small blind in a £3/£6 game will make on average 2.32 times the big blind, or £13.92 per hand (2.32 * £6). 22 from the button (D or Dealer position) however, will make -0.09 EV, or -£0.54 in a £3/£6 game (6 * -0.09).

These stats are compiled from live table data instead of simulations. One thing to remember is that these poker hands are statistically based and not mathematically based, which means that this data is based from live Texas Hold’Em table results.

Total EV stats ordered by value

Cards
EV
Count
AA
2.32
521,324
KK
1.67
522,652
QQ
1.22
520,663
JJ
0.86
521,866
AK s
0.78
348,364
AQ s
0.59
348,759
TT
0.58
520,705
AK
0.51
1,048,008
AJ s
0.44
348,126
KQ s
0.39
346,772
99
0.38
522,454
AT s
0.32
348,013
AQ
0.31
1,042,962
KJ s
0.29
346,582
88
0.25
521,972
QJ s
0.23
348,870
KT s
0.20
348,774
A9 s
0.19
348,992
AJ
0.19
1,045,857
QT s
0.17
346,115
KQ
0.16
1,045,069
77
0.16
524,345
JT s
0.15
348,235
A8 s
0.10
349,431
K9 s
0.09
348,286
AT
0.08
1,047,289
A5 s
0.08
348,544
A7s
0.08
349,949
KJ
0.08
1,047,098
66
0.07
520,946
T9 s
0.05
348,264
A4 s
0.05
347,862
Q9 s
0.05
348,760
J9 s
0.04
349,965
QJ
0.03
1,044,338
A6 s
0.03
347,677
55
0.02
521,945
A3 s
0.02
347,895
K8 s
0.01
350,401
KT
0.01
1,045,392
98 s
0.00
348,759
T8 s
-0.00
347,443
K7 s
-0.00
348,341
A2 s
0.00
347,318
87 s
-0.02
348,348
QT
-0.02
1,047,827
Q8 s
-0.02
348,381
44
-0.03
523,398
A9
-0.03
1,047,672
J8 s
-0.03
348,046
76 s
-0.03
347,540
JT
-0.03
1,043,812
97 s
-0.04
350,158
K6 s
-0.04
347,029
K5 s
-0.05
349,320
K4 s
-0.05
348,681
T7 s
-0.05
347,638
Cards
EV
Count
Q7 s
-0.06
348,073
K9
-0.07
1,045,630
65 s
-0.07
348,590
T9
-0.07
1,045,306
86 s
-0.07
348,374
A8
-0.07
1,042,209
J7 s
-0.07
345,009
33
-0.07
522,632
54 s
-0.08
348,260
Q6 s
-0.08
349,068
K3 s
-0.08
348,865
Q9
-0.08
1,049,468
75 s
-0.09
349,781
22
-0.09
524,131
J9
-0.09
1,044,150
64 s
-0.09
349,689
Q5 s
-0.09
350,110
K2 s
-0.09
349,276
96 s
-0.09
349,514
Q3 s
-0.10
348,009
J8
-0.10
1,046,506
98
-0.10
1,044,759
T8
-0.10
1,048,779
97
-0.10
1,046,152
A7
-0.10
1,046,587
T7
-0.10
1,044,950
Q4 s
-0.10
348,979
Q8
-0.11
1,048,251
J5 s
-0.11
348,923
T6
-0.11
1,043,014
75
-0.11
1,047,447
J4 s
-0.11
347,508
74 s
-0.11
350,325
K8
-0.11
1,048,167
86
-0.11
1,047,524
53 s
-0.11
346,930
K7
-0.11
1,043,698
63 s
-0.11
346,449
J6 s
-0.11
347,570
85
-0.11
1,048,159
T6 s
-0.11
348,875
76
-0.11
1,046,722
A6
-0.12
1,046,762
T2
-0.12
1,047,032
95 s
-0.12
348,477
84
-0.12
1,046,266
62
-0.12
1,049,495
T5 s
-0.12
348,928
95
-0.12
1,044,601
A5
-0.12
1,046,285
Q7
-0.12
1,046,099
T5
-0.12
1,048,428
87
-0.12
1,044,635
83
-0.12
1,048,550
65
-0.12
1,045,971
Q2 s
-0.12
348,912
94
-0.12
1,047,422
Cards
EV
Count
74
-0.12
1,043,278
54
-0.12
1,046,435
A4
-0.12
1,046,931
T4
-0.12
1,047,976
82
-0.12
1,043,638
64
-0.12
1,043,079
42
-0.12
1,043,357
J7
-0.12
1,046,565
93
-0.12
1,045,989
85 s
-0.12
347,928
73
-0.12
1,047,020
53
-0.12
1,047,022
T3
-0.12
1,043,908
63
-0.12
1,044,818
K6
-0.12
1,045,039
J6
-0.12
1,045,991
96
-0.12
1,047,156
92
-0.12
1,049,342
72
-0.12
1,046,167
52
-0.12
1,049,213
Q4
-0.13
1,045,087
K5
-0.13
1,047,359
J5
-0.13
1,047,697
43 s
-0.13
348,802
Q3
-0.13
1,047,649
43
-0.13
1,047,900
K4
-0.13
1,046,562
J4
-0.13
1,048,129
T4 s
-0.13
350,639
Q6
-0.13
1,046,958
Q2
-0.13
1,046,353
J3 s
-0.13
349,254
J3
-0.13
1,046,204
T3 s
-0.13
349,673
A3
-0.13
1,046,970
Q5
-0.13
1,047,946
J2
-0.13
1,045,715
84 s
-0.13
349,390
82 s
-0.14
348,622
42 s
-0.14
350,591
93 s
-0.14
348,835
73 s
-0.14
349,007
K3
-0.14
1,045,968
J2 s
-0.14
348,259
92 s
-0.14
347,868
52 s
-0.14
348,401
K2
-0.14
1,048,521
T2 s
-0.14
349,612
62 s
-0.14
348,033
32
-0.14
1,044,956
A2
-0.15
1,047,979
83 s
-0.15
349,355
94 s
-0.15
348,259
72 s
-0.15
348,368
32 s
-0.15
349,794

The statistics are based on over 115 million pair of pocket cards dealt real money tables.

Need To Know Block:

  1. Premium hands (GROUP 1) play comfortably from any position at the table. Other hands noted here and outside this group all have their place.
  2. Only 51 hands, out of the 169 available to be dealt, are deemed playable. Any other has is deemed UNPLAYABLE.
  3. The chances of getting AA dealt to you is less than ½%
  4. You’ll get 2 suited cards almost a quarter of the time

Next week’s article is on Pre-Flop Strategy