AA and JTs

[PolishSwatTeam]

I recently had an arguement with a poker buddy who said that JTs is the best hand in poker. I went on to argue that AA would beat JTs over 50% of the time in heads up, Because a pair is usually enough to win in that situation. It would depend how many people are in the hand and what the situation was, but I still don't agree with him. Is there any validity to what he is saying?

[LetYouDown]

There's no validity in saying it's the best hand in poker. There's some validity to the fact that it's undervalued. J-10 makes more nut straights than any other hand. Played correctly, it can be a very useful weapon. Played incorrectly (not getting away from top pair, for example), it can be a disaster. It plays very well in multi-way pots and is often worth calling a small raise as long as you can play it correctly post flop. Some of the biggest pots I've ever won have been with J-10. Regardless, I'll still take A-A over your J-10 anyday.

[boncher]

Ask him if he wants to play $50 bucks/hand for 100 hands

[Weatherhead03]

Heads up AA will win against J10s a significant amount of the time. The J10s has to either pick up a flush or a straight which is not likely, or it has to hit a J and a 10 or 2 of either. I believe its over 60-40 chances to win HU.

[LetYouDown]

In the best possible scenario for J-10 suited vs. A-A (the Aces are not of your suit), J-10 only wins 21.55% of the time.

[AaronBrown]

LetYouDown gave you two excellent answers. I will enlarge a little on his first point, that J 10s has good playing possibilities that can be underestimated by comparing it to going heads up against pocket aces.

Let's say there are 9 other players and they usually call with A, K or Q in their hands and fold otherwise. I'm not saying they fold a pair of jacks or stay in with Q 2 offsuit, but they do hold a lot more A, K and Q than other cards.

Let's say there are a lot of callers and raisers before the flop. Even with a strong hand, that would give you pause. But it might tell you that there are lots of A, K and Q out there, meaning not a lot to pair up. If the flop comes with J or 10, you probably have a pair that no one else does.

If instead it comes with two of A, K or Q; you have a straight possibility with a lot of callers, holding high pairs or two pairs. You can also make a flush or small straight while other people have good (but not good enough) hands.

AA is a straightforwardly strong hand, that plays best heads up. J 10s is a deceptively good hand, that plays best against lots of opposition.

[pzhon]

[ QUOTE ]
I recently had an arguement with a poker buddy who said that JTs is the best hand in poker. I went on to argue that AA would beat JTs over 50% of the time in heads up, Because a pair is usually enough to win in that situation. It would depend how many people are in the hand and what the situation was, but I still don't agree with him. Is there any validity to what he is saying?

[/ QUOTE ]
JTs is a decent speculative hand. It is not great hand. It is often overrated.

People say JTs does well in multiway pots. People say AKo does not. However, against 1-9 random (http://gocee.com/poker/HE_Val_Sort.htm) opponents, AKo does better than JTs.

AA is a great hand, against one opponent or many. There is a common misconception that AA is not good in a multiway pot, perhaps because it wins a lower percentage of the time (as does every hand). However, the amount returned for every dollar put into the pot increases as the number of random opponents increases.

According to PokerRoom's stats (https://www.pokerroom.com/games/evstats/pairStats.php), in LHE, JTs averages 0.15 BB/hand, averaged over many levels, positions, and numbers of opponents. QTs averages 0.17 BB/hand. KTs averages 0.20 BB/hand. ATs averages 0.33 BB/hand. AKs averages 0.77 BB/hand. AA averages 2.32 BB/hand. If you like money, you should prefer AA over JTs, and it isn't close.

[cocked&locked]

[ QUOTE ]
Ask him if he wants to play $50 bucks/hand for 100 hands

[/ QUOTE ]

Great idea. This is the best way to go. Ask him to pick out a suited JT from the deck and any two Aces for you. Shuffle the rest up and deal a pile of hands for a pile of cash. Only stop when you see tears in his eyes.

It would truly suck if the varience bug decided to hit you during this run, though. You're such a huge favorite that it would be a serious long shot.

[slickpoppa]

[ QUOTE ]
Heads up AA will win against J10s a significant amount of the time. The J10s has to either pick up a flush or a straight which is not likely, or it has to hit a J and a 10 or 2 of either. I believe its over 60-40 chances to win HU.

[/ QUOTE ]

equity (%) win (%) / tie (%)

Hand 1: 78.8395 % [ 00.79 00.00 ] { AA }
Hand 2: 21.1605 % [ 00.21 00.00 ] { JTs }

[operaman]

surely aa is better than j10s but j10s makes up some ground from the fact you can make the correct action a higher % of the time than with aa. J10s with have a higher show down win rate than aa, because, it is hard to lay down aa.

[Nottom]

I think everyone knows that AA is a huge favorite over JTs, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it is always the best hand. (note I'm not trying to prove that its not, just trying to clarify what people are thinking when they say JTs is "better")

For example in a deep stack NL game AA can be a big problem for a weakish player because he will often overvalue it post flop and lose a lot of money when he gets out flopped, JTs is rarelt going to be a hand you lose a lot of money with (maybe a flush over flush, or when you lose to a boat) but will often be getting payed off by that player with AA when he hits the hand he was drawing for. That said, its really no different for JTs than any other suited connectot or small pair except that when JTs makes a straight, its much more likely your opponents hit the flop so they will have somethign to pay you off with.

But in the long run the AA is still going to win more money as long as you understand that most of the time its still just 1 pair and not something you want to put your whole stack behind unless you were lucky enough to get a large % of your money in preflop.