Small pocket pairs can be tricky

Small pocket pairs are among the trickiest hands to play in no-limit hold ’em. They’re strong, disguised hands when they flop a set, but if they don’t connect with the board, it can be difficult to gauge how they match up against our opponent’s holdings.

This hand comes from a sit-and-go in a local home game.

At a nine-handed table with 500-1,000 blinds and a big blind ante of 1,000, a player in middle position raised to 2,200. Action folded to me on the button. I looked down at 4c 4s and called. Everyone else folded, and we went heads-up to the flop.

The flop came 10d 2c 3s. The initial raiser checked, I bet 2,500, and he called.

The Ah landed on the turn, and we both checked. The river brought the 5c, and my opponent bet 4,400. I raised enough to put him all in, and he folded.

At a glance, this hand seems fairly standard. By the river, I’ve made a straight, which can be considered the “nuts” since it’s highly unlikely my opponent could have 6-4. If we look at this hand in depth, the play on the flop is what’s most interesting and telling.

When our opponent raises preflop and checks a 10-2-3 rainbow board, it’s unlikely he’s hit the flop or holds a valuable hand. There’s a chance he checked a pair such as 5-5 or 9-9, and a smaller chance he checked a strong pair like jacks or better. I like betting in our spot because there’s only one overcard to our pair, we can protect our hand (if we think we have the best of it), and we take control of the betting going into the turn.

The ace on the turn is a card that hits our opponent’s range better than it does ours. Hands such as A-K or A-Q might check-call the flop. There’s a chance that some overcards such as Q-J suited or K-Q suited would just call the flop to hit a good turn card. Luckily for us, the player checked the turn since we took control of the betting on the flop. There’s no need for us to bet the turn as a bluff since the turn favors our opponent and we can still beat some of the hands in his range. We’ve also picked up a straight draw. If we felt our opponent’s range was weighted toward middle pairs and overpairs, then this would be a good card for us to continue barreling off into.

On the river, we make a straight and our adversary bets. Great! He could have been betting the river as a bluff, or thinking his hand is good since we checked the turn. It seems unlikely we would check the turn if we had a strong hand.

The best bet for us on the river is all in.

This way we can win the maximum, or apply the most pressure if we were bluffing. On a scary board like a four-liner, our opponent might not believe we have a four in our hand and could hero-call with an ace.

Playing small pocket pairs is difficult, but if we’re able to play in position and gauge where we stand against our opponent’s hands, we can comfortably enter pots with these marginal holdings. You need to be cautious, but you must also realize how the value of your hand (and your opponent’s hand) changes with every community card that comes.