Texas Hold'em Strategies: Why Getting Face Cards Isn't Always a Good Thing

Seeing face cards in your Texas Hold’em hand would always be a nice thing, especially after getting several crap hands in a row. However, these cards could get you into real trouble, as well as cost you a lot of chips if you choose to play far too fast without thinking.

Take A-10 into consideration as an example. Although this hand looks nice, it really isn’t. If somebody else at your table holds, 10-10, J-J, Q-Q, K-K, A-A, A-J, A-Q or A-K, your hand will lose. Because of this, it would be essential to take your hand’s highest card into consideration, as well as your hand’s lowest card. If you get to make a good pair, you usually also need the greatest kicker before actually winning the pot.

Useful tips

Within situations where your hand is A-10 and somebody else holds an Ace along with a Jack, Queen or King, you would be the underdog of 3 to 1 to win that hand. These odds should never be faced.

But how can you tell if opponents have hands that can dominate you? Well, it would help if you knew your opponents. Loose players might raise with any amount of hands from the beginning, but tighter players will probably have easy hands that can beat yours. If these opponents raise at pre-flop before any action even gets to you, it would be smart to fold your A-10 or A-J.

A lot of hands exist that you can group into this category of troubled hands, such as Q-10, Q-J, K-10 or K-J. Usually, it would be best to stay away from calling raises with such hands; however, if you are already in a late position and close to the button and nobody has joined the pot, you can take raising into consideration to try and win those blinds.

If somebody has raised before you and several people are still playing, you would be better off to call with suited hands like 7-8 in hearts and smaller pocket pairs like 5-5 compared to trouble hands. If the amount of players waiting for the flop is higher, it would be more likely that one of them holds a higher hand than yours.