Q&A #118: Suited Connectors Vs. Pocket Aces And The Confusion About Limping

Don't miss one article! Subscribe to the Full Feed RSS or get NPA in your inbox.

I wanted to clear up two major no-limit hold’em misunderstandings. They are somewhat related.

The first one is described in a comment by Ben Attenborough on recent post Playing No-Limit With A Plan.

Hey Ed, I would just like to say I think this is a very well written article which goes a long way to explaining why often suited connectors are over valued in NLH. The other night I was playing a live game in a casino and another player said he prefered 67suited to pocket aces. He said he had lost thousands with aces but had won loads with 67suited. I countered by suggesting as this was a live game environment and he wasn’t taking notes he couldn’t produce any evidence to prove his assertion. When I look at my poker tracker stats I find I make most money with aces.
Another friend of mine insists that “the pros say jack ten is a better hand than aces.” I strongly disagree with him but he is completely adamant about it. I understand than in really deepstacked games a player who plays aces really badly (by tipping the strength of his hand pre-flop and then refusing to release it post flop) a player could lose money with aces against a good player with J10 in position. But such a player will also show a loss with J10 (unless it is some bizarre player who plays J10 brilliantly but aces like an idiot). What do you think?

While I suppose that it’s theoretically possible for someone to play pocket aces so badly that they actually perform better with JTs (presumably because they’re far less likely to do something horrendously stupid with JTs), in practice I would highly doubt that any such player exists anywhere in the world.

And even if such a player were to exist, they would have to play almost exclusively in extremely deep-stacked live games (500BB stacks and deeper) to perform the feat of actually performing worse with pocket aces than with JTs.

For anyone who has Poker Tracker and who has played more than five hands of online no-limit, the notion that JTs is better than AA is a laughable claim. Anyone with any decent-sized database of online hands will see that they win far more with AA than with any other hand. I would bet it’s the case for virtually every online player, no matter how good or bad they play.

So my verdict is that Ben’s friends who think suited connectors perform better than pocket aces are severely misinformed.

But I’ve noticed that live game players often do tend to play aces (in particular) very badly. Everyone knows that an obvious way to misplay aces is to hold on to them too long in the face of overwhelming evidence that they’re no good. But I actually don’t see that mistake as often as I see a different one.

The most frequent mistake I see live game players make with aces is to play them far too timidly. “You’ll either win a little or lose a lot with those aces.” That’s the mindset. It’s complete bullshit. Believe me, I usually win my aces hands, and I win plenty of all-in pots with them too.

But when you buy into the “win a little or lose a lot” mindset, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy. You go into damage control mode as soon as the flop comes out. You don’t bet your hand for value. You don’t make money off of players with top pair and drawing hands. You give free cards. You make wimpy bets or check the hand down. You take free showdowns instead of making those ever important river value bets.

But even if your approach to playing aces is all wrong, I still think you’ll make more with them than you will with JTs. The hand is just far stronger. And also most players tend to raise preflop with aces, but limp in with suited connectors. If you raise with aces, but limp in with JTs, I think it’s nearly guaranteed that you’ll win more with the aces.

Which brings me to my second topic. There’s a lot of confusion surrounding the decision about whether to raise preflop or to limp in. In most of my articles and videos, I generally recommend limping in quite rarely and almost always raising preflop if no one has done so already. Yet in my book, No Limit Hold’em: Theory and Practice, co-authored with David Sklansky, we talk a lot about the virtues of limping in. What gives?

Here’s the deal. Raising preflop has a lot going for it. But in some circumstances with certain stack sizes and opponent types, limping in can be good as well. However, in most small and medium stakes cash game situations, I think one simple factor tilts the balance almost always in favor of raising: the bigger the pot, the more money a good player can win.

It’s simple. If you are better than your opponents, then you’ll win more money on average playing pots that start at $50 than pots that start at $10. Just like you’ll win more if there’s more money on the table, and you’ll win more if the blinds go up, you’ll win more if the pots on the flop tend to start out bigger.

Of course there are balancing factors. If the blinds get too big compared to the stacks, your relative edge will shrink. And if you are making huge preflop pots with so-so hands, then your edge will disappear as well. But in games with 100BB stacks and generally passive opponents, I think you’ll almost always perform better by raising preflop rather than limping simply because you’ll be playing for a lot more money.

So that’s my take on two common misconceptions. Yes, pocket aces are way better than any suited connector. If you think you do better with suited connectors, you’re almost certainly wrong. If you doubt me, take a notebook with you and write down how you do on every pot where you have aces, then every pot where you have a suited connector. After a few hundred hours of play, the aces are almost certainly, on a per hand basis, going to be way ahead.

But that doesn’t mean you can’t play your aces better. Yes, do let them go if the board gets scary and that nitty player across the table is bombing the pot. But beyond that, stay aggressive. Aces are a potent weapon, not a fragile liability. When you get aces, attack. Bet them. Get value from players with top pair and draws. You’ll be surprised at how much you can win with them even if you don’t hit a set.

If you’re a good player with an edge on your opponents, you’re almost always better raising preflop rather than limping in. Though there are theoretical tradeoffs for either decision, in most games you’ll do better raising simply because you’re building bigger pots. It’s like raising the stakes on your opponents. Bigger pots mean more money out there to win. In most situations I think the balancing considerations just don’t matter enough to change it up. Build yourself some nice pots and the money will come your way.

If you find this article helpful please support the site to help keep the poker strategy tips coming.

 Print :: Trackback :: Respond ::