Avoiding the Second Best Hand

It’s impossible to avoid having the second-best hand in poker – you have no control over that. What you can control is how you play second-best hands and how much money you lose with those hands. Every player receives second-best hands every day but some players lose a lot of money with the second-bet hand while others do a decent job limiting their losses.

Recognizing the Second Best Hand

Recognizing when you have the second best hand is easier said than done. If you could identify every time you receive the second best hand, you would never lose money with it. Realistically, you’ll never know for sure when you have the second best hand. The best you can do is be aware of the possibility and plan your play accordingly.

Unless you have the absolute nuts, there is always some possibility that you have the second best hand. Your job is to decide on how likely it is that you have the second best hand. Sometimes you won’t have anything close to the nuts but can still be fairly certain you have the best hand due to the way your opponent has played his hand so far.

A big part in determining whether or not your hand is best is reading the betting patterns. Your opponent’s betting patterns always tell some sort of story. For example, when an opponent suddenly comes alive after the 3rd flush card hits, it gives evidence that he has a flush. It could also be an attempt to bluff by representing the flush, but you will have to use your own judgment and knowledge of the opponent to determine the likelihood of that being the case. 

Example 1:

Let’s say a tight opponent raises from early position and you call in late position with a pair of 5s. The flop comes 567 with two spades. Your opponent places a continuation bet, you raise and that opponent abruptly goes all-in. You don’t have anything close to the nuts with a set of 5s but you can still be fairly certain you have the best hand.

The best evidence that you have the strongest hand is the fact that your tight opponent raised from early position before the flop. From early position, tight opponents rarely raise with any of the hands that would now have a straight: 89, 34 and 48. It’s also unlikely that your tight opponent raised with any of the pairs that are now beating you: 66 and 77. It’s possible, but not likely.

The most frightening thing is the fact that your opponent is showing absolutely no fear of this flop. He should know that you could have called with a wide range of hands that are now hitting this flop. His willingness to get it all in despite that knowledge is a little disconcerting but it shouldn’t be enough to make you fold your hand.

It’s more likely that your opponent is either overplaying a big pair, has a couple of spade overcards or is making some sort of bad play because he thinks you’re bluffing. Those possibilities plus the fact that he raised preflop should lead you to believe you have the best hand more often than the second-best hand in this situation. You won’t be correct every time, but you will be correct most of the time.

Example 2:

In this example, a tight, unimaginative player open limps in early position and it folds around to you in late position. You look down and see AK and make a preflop raise. The remaining players fold and the tight player calls.

The flop comes 79K rainbow. Your opponent checks to you and you place a standard continuation bet. Your opponent responds with a large check raise. You know a set is always a possibility but decide to call for now and reevaluate on the turn.

On the turn, your opponent throws out a pot-sized bet. You now have a difficult decision on your hands. It’s beginning to look like your opponent wants to play for stacks. You know that this bet will likely be followed by an even larger bet on the river. Do you hang tight to your top pair or let it go?

From the evidence presented so far, I would have to recommend you fold in this situation. Even though the flop looks a lot safer than it did in the previous example, the evidence points strongly to you having the second-best hand.

First of all, you are up against a tight, unimaginative opponent. What type of hands would such a player open-limp with from early position? If he’s tight, you can assume it’s probably not 7-9, K-9 or K-7. Tight players with little imagination play fairly by-the-book poker. These players sometimes limp in with AK but even tight players usually raise with that hand.

His limp suggests a weaker hand but his tight style suggests not anything too fishy. A good possibility would be a small pocket pair. These players love to limp in with low pairs and go set hunting.

Your opponent’s aggressive play after the flop suggests one of two possibilities: he has a strong hand or he’s bluffing. There’s really nothing else in between that would warrant such play. A bluff looks unlikely in this situation because your opponent probably realizes that a king is a bad card to bluff against a preflop raiser. Additionally, your call of the first check raise suggests that you’re not planning on folding. Despite this, your opponent continued the aggression with another large bet on the turn.

Against an aggressive and tricky opponent, it would be conceivable to think you’re facing a bluff. Even though the check raise didn’t make you fold, you showed a little weakness by just calling. Some players would follow up that check raise with one last stab on the turn. But remember, we’re up against a tight, unimaginative opponent. This isn’t a likely scenario.

With the bluff ruled out and preflop play taken into consideration, the only strong hands we can place your opponent on are 77, 99 and AK. AK is a distinct possibility but it’s slightly less likely than the other two hands because he didn’t raise it preflop but then played it so strongly after the flop.

That leaves only the hands 77 and 99. All you have is a big pair. People have a hard time laying down big pairs but you have to remember it’s still just a pair. Think back to all the big pots you’ve won while holding sets. I bet you were up against big pairs in many of those pots. Fold this hand and make a note of it. 

Practice pot Control

You can’t always tell with such accuracy how strong your hand is relative to the opponent’s. In those cases, you can practice pot control to see a showdown without spending a lot of money.

In some cases, all you have to do is check it down and your opponents will make it easy to see a showdown for cheap. In other cases, you can try placing small bets yourself in order to prevent the opponent from placing an even larger bet.

Letting Go

Sometimes you can’t help but lose your stack with a second best hand. Certain situations in poker such as set over set and full house vs. full house are simply unavoidable. Understand that you will lose stacks with strong hands and realize that’s just poker. You can’t win every time.

For example, if you catch three 5s on a 25J flop and lose to three Jacks, there’s nothing you can do about that. The only time you can realistically fold sets are when the board is obviously very bad, such as with flush boards and four-to-a-straight boards. In most other circumstances, you can get your set all-in every time and it will rarely be a true mistake on your part.

The same thing applies to preflop confrontations such as AA vs. KK. Don’t be afraid to get KK all-in preflop every time. Every once in a while you’ll run into AA but it happens rarely. Don’t feel bad if you lose a stack with KK preflop. If you got in the habit of folding KK every time you suspected AA, your win rate would actually suffer because you would be losing out on a lot of money.

Any time you have a question about your play with a second best hand, try discussing that hand with other poker players. Poker forums are a great place to discuss poker hands. Just save a copy of your hand history and post the hand and describe the circumstances under which the hand occurred. You don’t even need to post the results of the hand. Just ask the other players if you played it correctly up to the point where it got all-in.