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7 Card Stud Strategy
2008-11-10 00:30:47
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The hand/situation I want to cover this time is when you have a medium pair hidden in the hole. By medium pair I mean 88 through JJ and sometimes even QQ. Also the following advice is only for those times when both cards to your pair are hidden. Split jacks should usually be played faster and plainer. In fact, it is often correct to reraise a raiser with a higher upcard than you in order to try to get heads up right away. On the following streets you can just check and call unless you improve. Unlike holdem, where it is much harder for a lower pair to beat a higher pair, in stud there are many more ways to catch up and win. Also, by narrowing the field you give yourself as much percentage chance as possible to win. So, let's say you have a pair of jacks in the hole. How you proceed depends on a lot of other things. For starters, what is your upcard and how does it compare in rank to all the other upcards? Also, does your upcard give you any other possibilities for improvement? For instance, any suited 8,9,T,Q,K, or A will offer up some straight and/or flush possibilities for you. And, or course, if there are any jacks among the other upcards you should consider either trying to take the pot down right away, or folding to any raise since your chances of improving go down significantly. If your upcard is a helpful one and there are no upcards out that work against you then you can consider slow playing your hand. This includes flat calling a raise or even just calling the bring in if the pot is unraised to allow more players to get into the pot cheaply. The reason this is sometimes a good play is that you have a lot of ways to improve and some of them look completely innocent. One great feeling in a seven card stud game is when you hit your hidden pair on a later street. Just make sure you keep in mind that trips are not a made hand and with enough opponents it is likely that one of them will hit a straight or a flush or even a hidden full house of their own. More often it is correct to raise and narrow the field, at least a little. This play works very well to further disguise your hand if you have a high upcard too. Many stud players will believe you have a split pair over a pair in the hole. This helps you in a lot of ways because a card that really helps you doesn't look like it improves your hand at all and one that only helps you a little looks very scary. Either way you choose to play it on third street, there is still the matter of what to do on future streets. One play that often can win you the pot right away is when you pair your door card and bet out. You still have made a good hand in two pair, but your opponent will likely give you credit for trips. If you make this play and still get raised then you should tred very lightly as you can't be sure where your opponent is at. A call from your opponent is less threatening and can often mean they simply don't believe that you have made what you are representing. Also, as with any situation in stud, you always need to know what upcards have been seen and what your opponent's boards look like. Use this knowledge as a guide rather than hard and fast rules however, because often the look of a board can be deceiving. But still take these cards into account when deciding how to proceed. Next time I will analyze a different type of stud situation.
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