QTo favorite over 2's

[yellowjack]

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Hi. If I had to be in a preflop race to the river with one of these hands, I would take the pair of twos with NO hesitation! On coinflip type races I would always prefer the one currently in the lead preflop. I agree that the odds favor the QTo very slightly. But that QTo (no matter how imposing it looks) HAS to improve to win...and the pair can do the job on its own. (This assumes that the board does not produce 4 of a kind.) Have a nice day!

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This is an incorrect way of thing. You need to re-evaluate it, as it is 100% certain to be wrong. The other forumer's example with the T[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] 9[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] illustrates why this is the case. I personally cannot think of another example.

The board could produce 4 of a kind to render the 22 useless, but a much more common situation is the board double pairing (e.g. 55996) where the overcards' kicker comes into play.

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This is a huge error in thinking. Do you also prefer the 22 against 9 T with a board of 7 8 K because the 9T still has to catch?

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Hi. No. I was referring to a preflop situation. Have a great day! [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[LetYouDown]

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but it's arguable that 51/49 and 50/50 are not too different.

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Most casinos would tend to disagree with you [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img].

[Komodo]

I think the WPT computer count the folded hands in the calculations.

It doesn't matter preflop or not. He is saying your chances to win with 89s on that flop are greater than 22 even if you still have to improve. Which is the EXACT same thing as Q10 vs 22 PF

[fnord_too]

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This is a huge error in thinking. Do you also prefer the 22 against 9 T with a board of 7 8 K because the 9T still has to catch?

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Hi. No. I was referring to a preflop situation. Have a great day! [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

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Ok, so do you like 22 over 9Ts preflop? The point is the favorite is the favorite, if you would rather be a dog, however slight, just because you have a made hand, your reasoning is flawed. It is a common error in reasoning that a lot of players have. Anywhere, pre flop or post flop, you want the hand with the highest expectation. In all in situations, that is always the hand favored to win, regardless of whether it is made or not. If you are going against a completely random hand, would you rather have 22 or TJs? What about 22 or TJo against a random hand?

Race situations are rarely exactly even (the only time they are is when both hands are isomorphic). There are a lot of times when it is correct to call an all in with an unmade hand where it isn't correct to call with a small pocket pair. These small percentage plays really add up. Consider STT's, where push or fold and call an all in or fold come up all the time. Over 100 STT's, you will probably see 3000 (guess, but probably pretty close) of these decisions. Of these, maybe 500 (another educated guess) will be relatively close. How you handle these 500 decisions will have a huge impact on your ROI. STTer's live and die by how well they make these decisions. (yes, as you move up the field makes these decisions better, so you need to garner advantage in other stages of the game, but mistakes here cost more than all but the most eggrigious mistakes in the other stages.)

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I think the WPT computer count the folded hands in the calculations.

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thanks, that's a good explanation!!! not something we really have access to, although i suppose number of people folding could give you a slight idea.

[d10]

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I think the WPT computer count the folded hands in the calculations.

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This is the correct answer. If the other 2 deuces were already seen folded, and a bunch of cards not queens or tens were folded, QT could have a significant advantage over 22. Typically you see this going the other way, where a pocket pair becomes something like a 60/40 favorite because some of the overcard outs have been folded already.

i see this all the time in the wsop espn coverage, where a hand like 77 can be anywhere from 57-60% over AKs preflop, depending on aces/kings/suits in the folds.

[fnord_too]

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thanks paul!!!

i can't seem to get the different evaluation engines to agree... i guess i just think it's interesting as to whether you are technically a favorite or not... but it's arguable that 51/49 and 50/50 are not too different.

wonder why these engines don't agree.

and one engine said QJo was worse than QTo against 2's. i don't see that. obviously the fact that the straight is constrained at the higher end, but i'd rather take the open-ended nature of it.

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pokerstove can do the calculations iteratively. QTo is a slight favorite over 22, QJo a slight favorite but a hair less of a favorite. (Iteritively means it goes over all possible combinations, so the answer is exact. Many engines use a monte carlo method to get their results, so they will have a margin of error.)

51/49 is very different than 50/50. It is a bigger edge than the house has for the pass and don't pass lines in craps. In some situations you would make the same decision regardless of whether you are 49%, 50%, or 51% to win a hand, but slight edges matter a lot, and the cummulative effect of always being on the good or bad side of slight edges is huge, but variance really obscures the value of edges in the short run.