The hand
This is a constructed example hand from a $1/$3 live cash game with $300 stacks. It is not a student's hand and it claims no outcome. It shows how a hand is laid out in a Game Assessment review.
The cutoff raises to $12. You call on the button with J♠ T♠, and both blinds fold. The pot is $28.
| Street | Board | Pot before the bet | Action |
|---|---|---|---|
| Flop | Q♥ 9♣ 4♦ | $28 | He bets $20, you call |
| Turn | Q♥ 9♣ 4♦ 2♥ | $68 | He bets $45, you are deciding |
What you believed at the key decision
"I have an open-ended straight draw. Any of the eight cards, the four eights and the four kings, makes my straight. The rule of 4 says about 32%. He is only betting $45 into $68, so the price is fine. I call."
Nothing in that thought is careless. It uses a real rule on a real draw. That is why the mistake in it is worth finding: it repeats every time a draw shows up.
The assumption worth questioning
The 32% figure is the chance to hit with two cards to come, which is true on the flop. You are on the turn now. One card is left, so the chance is 8 outs in 46 unseen cards, 17.4%. The rule of 2 gives 16% for one card to come, close to the exact figure.
The second assumption is about the price. "He is only betting two thirds of the pot" is true, and a price only means something next to the chance you have to win. The two numbers have to be set side by side before the call is made.
The alternative line, with the numbers
To test the call, give him ace-queen, king-queen, suited queen-jack, suited queen-ten, and sets of queens, nines and fours. After your cards and the board are removed that is 37 specific hands. The site's equity engine counted every remaining card against all of them: 36,630 deals from the flop and 1,628 from the turn.
| Street | Pot before the bet | Bet | Equity the call needs | Your chance to hit | Your equity against his range |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Flop | $28 | $20 | 29.4% | 31.5% | 29.8% |
| Turn | $68 | $45 | 28.5% | 17.4% | 17.4% |
The flop call was fine. It needed 29.4% and the draw has 29.8% against his range, so the price and the chance agree. The turn is a different decision. The call needs 28.5% and you have 17.4%, 11.0 points short.
A call can still be right if you win more when you hit. Here that means about $100 on the river every time the eight or king arrives, with $223 left behind. Without a specific reason to expect that, the better line is to fold the turn and keep the $45.
The price that would make the call work with no extra winnings is a bet of about $18 or less into the $68 pot. At $45 it does not. Hands in his range that are bluffing or weaker would raise your equity, and part of the assignment below is learning to put a number on that.
Your practice assignment
One habit, for the next two weeks of play. Before you call a bet with a draw, say or write down four things: your outs, how many cards are still to come, the chance to hit those two give you, and the equity the call needs. If the chance is lower than the equity needed, write down who pays you and how much when you hit.
Check yourself away from the table with the outs calculator and the pot odds calculator. Then bring three draws to the next session, the ones where the numbers were closest, and we go through them together.
How these numbers were computed
Pot odds: the equity a call needs is the call divided by the pot after the call. On the turn that is $45 divided by $158. The chance to hit counts the cards that finish the draw among the cards not yet seen: 8 of 47 with two cards to come, 8 of 46 with one. The equity against his range is an exact count over every possible remaining card for each of his hands, with no random sampling.
Questions
- Is this a real student hand?
- No. It is a constructed example, built to show the layout of a review. It claims no outcome and quotes no student.
- What does a review of my own hand look like?
- The same layout: what you believed at the key decision, the assumption worth questioning, the alternative line with the numbers, and one practice assignment. In the Game Assessment you send three of your own hands ahead, and we go through them in a 60-minute session on video.