Understanding Pot Odds and Expected Value (Day 5 Course Discussion)

[Anders1616]

Very good video, finally I found out about the Pot odds.

 

[Katie Dozier]

Very good video, finally I found out about the Pot Odds.

Great to hear, thanks!

 

[Collin Moshman]

what does software cost witch show you preflop odds ? thanks

Equilab is free software you can Google and download.

 

[morthiman]

Wow, thank you so much for this. I Really knew how to calculate.

But now I Know what to do with it...I think the next step is to mix this with equity...right?

 

[noLatenzy]

Nice!! it helps me a lot

 

[jeanpierre1279]

Pot Odds are very important in Live Games, but don't think for a moment that will work for online poker, not with 70% of the boards hitting an ace or a king by the river, and nearly 80% of the boards pairing, and you can bet your bottom dollar, if the board don't pair, there will be a straight, or a flush 80 to 90% of the time, even though, a Live Game, the board will only pair 43% of the time, and an Ace or a King will hit the board around 52% of the time. and most hands in NLH are usually won by a pair, but you won't see pairs winning most hands online. so leave the math and skill out. you have to go by gut feelings. and that's a sad truth. I just played on Global Poker and watched the board pair 6 hands in a row, the other day on America's Cardroom, it paired 7 times in row. it's almost comical, but one thing that's it's not" is Random"

It's a really complicated situation. Often players question the system precisely because of this.

I have lost countless times with dominant AK-type hands against AJ and beat the villain's J and today I lost AKs against 75th. It's possible? yes of course, but not really as often as necessary at real tables.

I sometimes believe that there is a balance for everyone to earn a little and not give up on depositing applications, especially loosers.

 

[Collin Moshman]

Wow, thank you so much for this. I Really knew how to calculate.

But now I Know what to do with it...I think the next step is to mix this with equity...right?

Yes, you can combine these concepts in deciding whether to call with a draw, for example. More on this to come

It's a really complicated situation. Often players question the system precisely because of this.

I have lost countless times with dominant AK-type hands against AJ and beat the villain's J and today I lost AKs against 75th. It's possible? yes of course, but not really as often as necessary at real tables.

I sometimes believe that there is a balance for everyone to earn a little and not give up on depositing applications, especially loosers.

Definitely Jean-Pierre, continued runbad always feel tough, I think for pros too but recreational players particularly.

 

[dunc1189]

Hi both, just watched this one and interested to know your thoughts on a recent hand I played. I was on the button and 3-bet the HJ with AKo which they called. They check raised me all-in on a flop of J9Q which I proceeded to fold to. After watching the lesson I'm thinking I probably should have called this due to my outs for a straight draw, backdoor flush draw and two over cards that if hit could have also given me the winning hand. This was pretty early on in an MTT. Interested to hear your thoughts, link to the hand below:

https://www.cardschat.com/replayer/124CBSfSb

 

[Lenka65]

Poker

Now I can say for sure that poker math works in 30% of cases, the rest depends on practice and luck. People who rely only on poker mathematics lose much more often than those who play intuitively and pay more attention to the behavior of opponents than to calculating equity.

 

[Tux97]

Hi both, just watched this one and interested to know your thoughts on a recent hand I played. I was on the button and 3-bet the HJ with AKo which they called. They check raised me all-in on a flop of J9Q which I proceeded to fold to. After watching the lesson I'm thinking I probably should have called this due to my outs for a straight draw, backdoor flush draw and two over cards that if hit could have also given me the winning hand. This was pretty early on in an MTT. Interested to hear your thoughts, link to the hand below:

https://www.cardschat.com/replayer/124CBSfSb

If villain was tight then he probably went all-in when he flopped a set or straight. Your best hand would then be a straight which means you had about 16% equity. I wouldn't count outs to a backdoor flush or over pairs since you would be drawing dead. His all-in bet required you to have about 44% equity. So IMHO it was a clear fold and you played it right. Even if he was a bit loose then I would still have folded.

 

[Collin Moshman]

Hi both, just watched this one and interested to know your thoughts on a recent hand I played. I was on the button and 3-bet the HJ with AKo which they called. They check raised me all-in on a flop of J9Q which I proceeded to fold to. After watching the lesson I'm thinking I probably should have called this due to my outs for a straight draw, backdoor flush draw and two over cards that if hit could have also given me the winning hand. This was pretty early on in an MTT. Interested to hear your thoughts, link to the hand below:

https://www.cardschat.com/replayer/124CBSfSb

Tux is right that you shouldn't call this all-in. Good fold!

I would change a couple aspects of your line though. First, reraise a bit more pre-flop. Raising to $900 or so would give your opponent worse odds to take a flop and induce him to make more mistakes.

Also, I would usually check back this flop. It's very coordinated; you have showdown value; and you don't want to face a check-raise. More on this in the c-bet day!

 

[Tux97]

Tux is right that you shouldn't call this all-in. Good fold!

I would change a couple aspects of your line though. First, reraise a bit more pre-flop. Raising to $900 or so would give your opponent worse odds to take a flop and induce him to make more mistakes.

Also, I would usually check back this flop. It's very coordinated; you have showdown value; and you don't want to face a check-raise. More on this in the c-bet day!

Thanks Collin for the explanation. This is a great hand to illustrate a question that I wanted to ask before. If the flop is coordinated but in hero's favour (i.e. hero drawing to straight or flush) rather than the other way around then should the recommendation of not c-betting a coordinated flop take precedence over the recommendation of betting draws aggressively? I know that having a showdown value also means that a passive play is better here but was curious to know if I understood the recommendations of c-betting vs playing draws correctly. Thanks!

 

[dunc1189]

If villain was tight then he probably went all-in when he flopped a set or straight. Your best hand would then be a straight which means you had about 16% equity. I wouldn't count outs to a backdoor flush or over pairs since you would be drawing dead. His all-in bet required you to have about 44% equity. So IMHO it was a clear fold and you played it right. Even if he was a bit loose then I would still have folded.

Tux is right that you shouldn't call this all-in. Good fold!

I would change a couple aspects of your line though. First, reraise a bit more pre-flop. Raising to $900 or so would give your opponent worse odds to take a flop and induce him to make more mistakes.

Also, I would usually check back this flop. It's very coordinated; you have showdown value; and you don't want to face a check-raise. More on this in the c-bet day!

Great, thank you both for your explanations! Good to know I did the right thing in folding. Looking forward to getting to the c-bet day, definitely a weak part of my game, do it it way too much!

 

[acidburnfx]

Call pot on the river maybe at one time or another, depending on the profile can be interesting, even because the math together with good information about the player helps a lot.

 

[makisaa]

Odds are maths in the game and they are very importand. As we play this calculation is getting better and it is also becoming a reflex.

 

[vinnie]

Pot Odds are very important in Live Games, but don't think for a moment that will work for online poker, not with 70% of the boards hitting an ace or a king by the river, and nearly 80% of the boards pairing, and you can bet your bottom dollar, if the board don't pair, there will be a straight, or a flush 80 to 90% of the time, even though, a Live Game, the board will only pair 43% of the time, and an Ace or a King will hit the board around 52% of the time. and most hands in NLH are usually won by a pair, but you won't see pairs winning most hands online. so leave the math and skill out. you have to go by gut feelings. and that's a sad truth. I just played on Global Poker and watched the board pair 6 hands in a row, the other day on America's Cardroom, it paired 7 times in row. it's almost comical, but one thing that's it's not" is Random"

Can we keep the rig-tard nonsense in the bad beats section and out of the section meant for learning? Any sufficiently large database will easily disprove this assertion of yours.

 

[Collin Moshman]

Thanks Collin for the explanation. This is a great hand to illustrate a question that I wanted to ask before. If the flop is coordinated but in hero's favour (i.e. hero drawing to straight or flush) rather than the other way around then should the recommendation of not c-betting a coordinated flop take precedence over the recommendation of betting draws aggressively? I know that having a showdown value also means that a passive play is better here but was curious to know if I understood the recommendations of c-betting vs playing draws correctly. Thanks!

The recommendations for when not to c-bet are more accurately: "When not to c-bet just for the sake of c-betting."

If the flop is coordinated and multiway, but you have a strong made hand or mega-draw, for example, then definitely go ahead and c-bet away

 

[Tux97]

The recommendations for when not to c-bet are more accurately: "When not to c-bet just for the sake of c-betting."

If the flop is coordinated and multiway, but you have a strong made hand or mega-draw, for example, then definitely go ahead and c-bet away

Thanks Collin. Yes, that's what I thought was the correct play.

 

[johnnylawford]

Including your bet in pot odds calculation

I had a question on the example given in this chapter. In the example why don't you include your calling chips in the calculation? In other words, why wouldn't you say "you're paying 6,000 for a chance to win (17,250 pot + 6,000 calling chips) = 23,250 total?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Tux97]

I had a question on the example given in this chapter. In the example why don't you include your calling chips in the calculation? In other words, why wouldn't you say "you're paying 6,000 for a chance to win (17,250 pot + 6,000 calling chips) = 23,250 total?

Thanks in advance!

The way I look at it is that we're risking 6,000 to get a reward of 17,250... so it's a 17,250:6,000 ratio or approximately 3:1. When I calculate the equity that villain's bet requires us to have I use:

risk / (risk + reward)

In our example approximately 1 / (1+3) ≈ 25%

 

[Collin Moshman]

I had a question on the example given in this chapter. In the example why don't you include your calling chips in the calculation? In other words, why wouldn't you say "you're paying 6,000 for a chance to win (17,250 pot + 6,000 calling chips) = 23,250 total?

Thanks in advance!

Good question!

Because you'd be double-counting the 6000 in that case. Relative to folding, a successful call would win the 6000 your opponent bet, but not your calling chips which you would otherwise keep like normal in your stack if you folded.

 

[Debi]

Would love to get more comments on this day's course! Are you guys finding pot odds and expected value difficult?

 

[uri73796]

I never counted the Bank's chances.I play by the map and by my gut. is this a good thing or not

 

[Collin Moshman]

I never counted the Bank's chances.I play by the map and by my gut. is this a good thing or not

Sometimes playing with your gut is all you need. Other times there's a definite mathematical answer, and pot odds are a good example of this.

For example, if someone shoves at the turn for $100 into a $200 pot, and you have a 5-high flush draw with no other ability to improve, your 3:1 pot odds aren't good enough to call with just 9 outs once. So folding is objectively the right decision.

Whereas in lots of other spots, there are different decisions you could make that could all be best with the right reads and reasoning.

 

[hanio75]

Hello, I still do not understood these calculations. I'm going to have searching at other examples. Anyway, I appreciate the opportunity. Anyone who can send me some examples I''ll appreciate. thanks