A "Heads -Up" Proposition

[PokerBabe(aka)]

I read this post on another poker forum site, and thought I would share it.

You are going to play heads-up hold'em against a player who plays as well as you do. He offers you a proposition. You get to look at your hand and if you do not like it, you can throw it away face up and get a different hand dealt from the deck. If you throw away the first hand, you must accept the second hand, and you must complete hand selection before the button acts.

In return for allowing you to get this choice, your opponent would like to be the button every hand (this is limit hold'em). The small blind - half the big
blind - is on the button, and acts first before the flop. (You would have the big blind). So you get two hands (sort of),and he gets position after the flop.

Would you take this deal? If not, how could I modify it so you would take it?.

Thanks.

LGPG,

Babe /images/graemlins/heart.gif

[leon]

Here's a quick take. Didn't think too hard about this one.

You can't take the proposition in its present form. Consider these scenarios-
a) you have a playable hand. You keep the first deal. Opponent realizes this and acts accordingly with position throughout the hand, including whether or not to even enter the pot in the first place.

b) you don't have a playable hand. So you take a new one. Opponent is now faced with not knowing what you have, only that they are two random cards. Notice that this is exactly the same scenario he would be faced with anyway in a normal HU situation. He now has position on you and acts accordingly.

So you have essentially no advantage and a prepetual positional disadvantage. That is not "mad cool".

For me to accept the proposition, it might take something like him having to act, THEN I choose whether to keep the 1st hand or go for a second, and THEN I can respond to his action. Ie, if he raises my BB, I can discard, THEN I can call, raise, or fold. Now the opponent would actually be faced with the disadvantage of me having "two shots" at a decent hand. This should somewhat nullify positional disadvantages.

Interesting post Robyn.

Leon

[Mark Heide]

PokerBabe(aka),

It does not make a difference what hand you take because they are both random hands. The small blind will always have the advantage. The small blind is getting 3-to-1 to call and 1-to-1 to raise. How can you beat that?

Good Luck

Mark

[ALL1N]

[ QUOTE ]

It does not make a difference what hand you take because they are both random hands.


[/ QUOTE ]

This is actually incorrect.

Assume a homologous ordering to the set of all possible hands. Not taking into account the knowledge your opponent gains from your action, your optimal play will be to discard your lower 50% of hands. Then your average starting hand will be between 50% and 100% for the half the time you keep your first hand, and 0% to 100% for the times you discard it.

.5 x (100-50)/2 + .5 x (100-0)/2 = 62.5%

Hence your average starting hand is better than 62.5% of other starting hands.

In response to Babe, I don't think this is sufficient to warrant posting the BB and playing our of position every time.

ALL1N