Ok, so I’m swapping emails with a buddy trying to help him tighten up his game a bit and he makes some statement about playing 45s on the button with several other callers in. I started thinking about it and the only thing I could think of was, what the hell kind of flop are you looking for with that hand?
Let’s say it’s your typical online loose/passive or loose/aggressive game and you’ve got 6+ callers seeing the flop. You flush draw is probably no good because it’s highly doubtful anybody has two suited cards smaller than 45s. You certainly don’t want the flop to come 678 because there are plenty of people who will play 9T and anybody with a 9 or T is going to try and suck out on that flop. That only leaves:
236
A23
44x
55x
45x
445
554
Granted, if you hit 23x, 26x, or 36x you might have the odds to keep drawing to the straight so you don’t need to to flop it (26x only gives you an inside straight draw though so you may not have the odds to continue). Unless the flop is very kind, a 4 or a 5 is unlikey to be anything but bottom pair which can’t make you like this hand very much and there’s almost no way in hell you’re going to push everybody off this pot with a 4 or 5 high flop.
Also, the odds against making a straight on the flop are 76:1 so there’s no way you’re going to make back 76BB every time you hit.
All in all it just seems like a hand that’s -EV. Does anybody out there have a different opinion? Because, I see this type of hand being marked a playable hand in late position with no raise and several callers by nearly every starting hands chart. Personally, I hate playing these sorts of hands even if I get a free ride in the BB.
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Hi, my name is Bill Rini and this is my poker blog. I've been blogging about poker and the poker industry since around 2003-ish. Like most people I started out playing poker as entertainment in home games whenever we wanted to sit around and smoke cigars, drink beer, and eat pizza, and needed a good excuse. I started playing online shortly after the first online card rooms opened and it wasn't long before I was playing 20, 30, or even 40 hours a week or more. One day I received a phone call about a program manager position at Tiltware which was the company that consulted to Full Tilt Poker on software development and marketing. After Tiltware I spent about 2.5 years working at Party Poker where I was the poker room manager.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Playing 45s could be a good hand to play in late position to switch gears at a table of tight players. You pretty much know they are playing a solid hand so a flop like 45K or 44A would be interesting for you… an automatic trap hand if you know they are playing anything aside from AA, KK or A4, A5 or K4, K5.
Yep, that seems like a good use for it but then again 72o might be just as good for that purpose. :-)
I guess the issue is more about it being included in many starting hand charts for beginning players. The person asking me about it was a newer player and thought I was crazy to say I wouldn’t play that hand in a low limit game. That’s somewhat how the question of what type of flop are you hoping for came to mind. It’s a weak hand and you either need to be able to play post-flop really well or you’re using it to change up your game. Both are not things beginning players do very well.
One of the reasons someone usually wants to change up their game is to keep other players guessing. In a mid or high limit game if you’re a rock and come in with a raise UTG everybody knows you have a strong hand. If you do the same move and show down 45s the next time you come in they might not put you on the big hand. But the key is that it happens in a mid or higher limit game where people are paying attention to what you play. In the $1/$2 or $2/$4 world, not only are they not paying attention but in the rare case that they are . . . they actually think 45s is a good hand because it’s suited. :-)
Small suited connectors are terrible in tight games. You nailed it- only playable in late position with no raise and lots of limpers. Simulations have shown that the medium suited connectors are very overrated, but they do very well under the right conditions (loose-passive games with big multiway pots).
If you throw away this hand in these type of situations you are giving up a lot of EV. You gotta get in there and gamble in those loose-passive games.