POT ODDS
Poker by nature is a game of high variance. The entire game is based around numbers, there are mathematical odds associated with every aspect of it. Odds on how your two cards fare against another two cards, odds on how many outs you have to ‘make' your hand in a given set of circumstances, pot odds, odds on the likelihood of your hole cards improving.
It almost begs the question ‘is luck even a factor in poker' or is it all just a question of maths? When your opponent hits his 12/1 shot did he get lucky or is it simply the pre defined percentages doing what they will always do? After all it stands to rights that if your opponent has 8% to hit his hand he will hit it 8% of the time.
It is a game which would baffle some of the worlds greatest mathematicians at times, indeed if you look at some of the formula used by players such as David Sklansky in The theory of poker (who worked as an Actuary (odds maker)) or Chris Ferguson (who has PHD in computer science) to work out whether a certain situation is +/- EV (Expected Value) they are truly mind blowing and alien to many of us.
Playing a MTT is simply a process of decision making, at every step you have a selection of options available to you and one mistake or one misstep can see an end to your tournament life. The best poker players are the best decision makers and they use maths at every stage of the game to help them make informed choices.
There are some certain basic guidelines you can follow to determine the odds of making your hand and these can be measured against your actual pot odds and your implied pot odds to help you in your decision making process.
They are as follows:
Count the number of cards available in the deck which will allow you to make your hand, multiplying it by a factor of 4 will give you the % of hitting your hand on the flop, and by a factor of 2 on
the turn.
Let's look at a simple example:
We hold A9hh and there are 2 other players in the pot, we have position on the table, we have 7k stack player 1 has 9k and player 2 has 4k. The blinds are 150-300 and the pot contains 1050.
The flop has brought 8h 4h 2s, player 1 has bet 600 and player 2 folds.
Let's keep it simple and make an accurate read on our opponent as holding an 8, Your outs to improve are as follows, three 9s, three Aces and any heart of which there are 7 left giving a total of 13,
multiply by 4 and our odds are 52% to improve (essentially 1 in every 2 occasions). We also have to remember that 9 of those outs (36%) are to the nuts which may influence our decision.
Our direct pot odds can be calculated as follows, 600 to call to win 1650.
1650/600 = 2.75/1
We also have the addition of implied odds; our opponent covers our stack so if we improve to the nuts our implied or potential odds are a full double up. It's not guaranteed but is has to be taken into consideration.
We can see in this example we have very good pot odds to call so we do. The turn brings 8s which now gives our opponent trips, he bets 1600 into a 2250 pot.
Our odds have now been reduced drastically, an Ace or 9 no longer helps us, whereas a heart will still make our hand unless it pairs the board. There are 9 hearts left and the 2 pairs the board so we have 8 outs, multiply by 2 and we have 16%. Or 6.25/1
We need to call 1600 to win a 3850 pot.
3850/1600 = 2.4/1
Our odds of making our hand now far exceed the pot odds we are getting; we are in excess of 6/1 to hit our hand and getting 2.4/1 pot odds. It is now a simple mathematical fold. Calling here is a huge -EV play and will cost u a lot of money in the long run.
This is obviously a very simple example and in reality the game is much more complex, there are too many variables to simplify poker to this extent, but it is a basic example to help you make calculations to allow you to make more informed decisions
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