Starting Hands for Hold 'Em

There are 169 different starting hands in Texas Hold 'Em, and most people play to many, or not enough of them, the trick is to know what is right for your style of play ! What I am trying to do with this blog is to sort out what is a reasonable range of starting hands, depending on the animal references that I use to put players on a style of play. Here is a link to the blog explaining them, if you are not familiar with them :

www.railbirds.com/blog/132014/defining-our-styles.html

The Mouse The mouse will generally only play the top 8 or 9 hand choices. They don't like to play a hand that can be dominated on the flop, like #10 KJ suited. If they hit on the flop with a hand like this, they are careful not to call too much, or bet very much for fear of an Ace showing up on the turn or river. If you get into a pot with a Mouse, you must assume they have at the worst, K,Q suited or A,J suited, or they wouldn't be in the hand.

The Lion This player likes to see a flop with any of the top 18 to 20 hands, depending on position. You can expect him/her to come into a pot from UTG with any of the top 12 to 14 choices, and the later the position, the more hands they will play . This player will often try to outplay you when they miss the flop with these starting hands, thinking that if they missed, you must have also ! The thing to consider about a Lion is the fact they may indeed be holding the goods if a flop comes out that would hit a hand like K,9 suited, or 9, 10 suited, and will play it strong hoping to cash in on a hand that they think you wouldn't put them on !

The Jackal This is the guy to watch out for, and play against only if you have the goods, they will play almost any two cards, and you just never know when a rag flop has made their hand a monster ! You can expect that from any position they will play hands as weak as # 65 on the list, 5,4 suited ! It is difficult to know what they can be holding, so just be sure that if a Jackal has entered the pot before it is your turn to act, you have at least one of the top 10 or better starting hands, or you could be in serious danger !

The Elephant This guy/girl plays a lot starting hands, and gets married to a lot of them, especially if they get any piece of the flop !. The Elephant has little patience, and want to play a lot of pots, and will call you down with meager holdings, thus he/she is where you will be getting a lot of your income from, and generally you can loosen up your starting requirements if you get heads up in a pot with them. They can generally be found limping into a pot from any position with any of the top 40 starting hands, (44 and better) and will usually play them to the river.

The Eagle This is the most dangerous person at the table, you can only count on one thing about them, they will change up their starting hand requirements depending on the flow of the table, position they are in, and their read of the player they are against in a hand. Typically you can expect that from early position they have one of the top 6, AQ suited is about as bad as they will enter a pot with there, and will lessen the starting requirements as they get closer to the button.

Because the Eagle can outplay most others post flop, it is not uncommon to see them play something as weak as #21 8,8 from 5th or 6th position at a 9 player table. If they have the button in an unraised pot, then they can be as dangerous as a Jackal in their starting hand requirements, and play them strong figuring that if they can get heads up in the hand, all they really need to be near even in odds against one random hand is # 40 on the list, 8,9 suited .

No matter what style you play, expect the Eagle to play a range of hands he knows will give him a good chance to take your chips from you, so be careful every time you get into a hand with the Eagle, they are the most dangerous player on the felt, simply because they know what your range of starting hands will be, and play accordingly !

This blog is just a starting point to get you a reasonable assumption of what to expect from your opponents, but we all know that poker players are unpredictable ! What we all need to do is try to put our opponents on a range of hands that they might play pre flop from the position they are in, and adjust or narrow it down post flop, to the most likely hands that they may have, based on the information we have observed, or know about them.

Good luck on and off the felts, I wish all of you but 4, Happy Playing ! ........lol........

...........play on ........Tc...............