Pot Odds and Outs..I understand them..but Why?

Lately I've been playing a more sound beginner game taking notice of these two important aspects of the game. However I feel like someone in the military being told not to press the red button..you don't know what the red button does..you just know not to press it.

To be more specific, If I am on a flush draw..and someone bets into me in a way to give me incorrect odds to call. Why should I still not call? (I know enough not to and would generally fold since I haven't got used to implied odds yet)..but again I ask. Why should I fold? It's not as if their raising magically changed the alignment of the deck pushing all my outs to the bottom of the deck? It still doesn't change the fact that I have a good chancing of hitting it?

I'm basically trying to understand why putting someone on bad odds should 'by poker law' cause them to fold if they know whats good for them?

All betting situations are based on odds. If you make a bet where you're receiving odds that are worse than the odds of the event happening, and you get an opportunity to make that bet many times over, over the long run you will lose more money than you win.

So, if a player habitually calls all flush draws without odds, over the long run that player will lose money chasing flush draws.

Notice the emphasis on the long run here - of course, in the short run, a player can get lucky (i.e., hits flushes more often than statistically normal).

P.S. I'm ignoring implied odds and semi-bluffing here to keep things simple.

Exactly. You can't look at poker from hand to hand. You've got to look big picture to get the edge you need. Folding without the right odds pays off in the end. In the same way you can't look at results hand to hand you've got to look big picture without emotion.

Stix

Honestly, they are extremely overrated.

Yeah ever since paying attention to them, it has provided a nice guideline and so far has kept me from doing really stupid moves that I otherwise wouldn't have noticed and continued to lose my lunch money lol.

Thanks for the replies.

what does implied odds mean?

Implied odds is when you consider not only the money that's already in the pot, but also the money you'll win on later bets if you hit.

Have a proposition for ya.... Let's flip a coin... Heads u win $5, Tails you lose $15. (get the idea?).
OR
okay.... let's flip a coin for $20... not just one flip though... let's make it... mmm.... .say.. ok... you have to win the flip 3x to win the $20... & I have to win the flip 2x << do you want to take that bet?? (get the idea?)

Let's say...
You have $1,000 chips
Villain has $1,000 chips

You: Kh Jh
The villain opens to $100 in the small blind and you call from the big blind.
The flop: Ah 8h 2s
The villain bets $200 into the $200 pot, so it costs you $200 to win the $400 sitting out there. You know that this guy is pretty tight so he almost certainly has the Ace.

Do you call?

You will hit your flush on the turn about 1/5 of the time.
Not only that, but he'll certainly bet again on the turn. With a $600 pot and him with $600 left he'll most certainly shove, so we're basically playing for stacks here.

You make your flush by the river about 1/3 of the time.
2/3 of the time you go broke if you play this through.

In other words...
Let's say there is a bag with two black rocks and one white rock in it.
You are betting $1,000 that you will reach into the bag and pull out the white rock, and the villain is betting $1,000 that you will pull out a black rock.
Who do you think will make the biggest profit on average?

You are correct. Your chances of hitting never change. The thing is that the reward is not equal to the risk. Like, P.O. said, if you play a coin flip game where you win $5 if it's heads and lose $10 if it's tails your odds of winning never change. You will always win half the time, but in the long term you will always lose more than you win so it is a bad play.

You want to get into situations where *they* have poor odds to call.

Some good info there, You have made pot odds alittle bit more understandable.

LOOOL!
I'll take tails and having to win the flip twice plz ...

Why are pot odds (at least, knowledge of) "overrated"?

Very good info and yes that makes it a lot clearer. So then my question becomes: How does one ever get to play a flush draw that isn't a made hand on the flop? It seems whenever I play, unless the table has fell asleep, which never happens for me, that once the flop hits, if some has top pair or cowboys or something with teeth that once they see a flop with 2 cards of the same suit all they have to do is bet in a way to give incorrect odds to for a flush draw. So how do you ever get in unless you ignore the odds? And another question, what's your move if you are leading off? Just check and hope no one bets half the pot on you?

Just seems like for flush draws all the planets have to align right to play post flop for one.

Not all flush draws are equal. If we have 8h7h on a flop of KhJh2s, yeah, we've got a flush draw - but we have zero outs other than the flush draw, and we're dominated by almost any other flush draw. Let's look at 8h7h on a flop of 9h6h3s for contrast - now we've got nine outs for the flush draw, and another 6 outs for a straight, and pricing us out on the flop is very difficult to accomplish. Another example - we have AhKh on a Jh7h2s flop. Now we've got 9 outs for the flush and possibly 6 outs to top pair (depending on what we're up against). Again, it's much harder to price us out of the pot. Finally, Ah5h on a Jh5s2h flop - now we have our 9 outs plus 5 potential outs (2 5's and 3 A's) to likely best hands.

In fact, our equity with those last few hands is so good that we should be considering raising, not calling - the combo draw (straight and flush draw) is actually a favorite on the flop against an overpair.

You win pots either when you show down the best hand or get the other guy to fold before showdown. Aggression is good.

P.S. @docStats - I'm not sure if this is what Kyle meant, but I'm guessing it is.

Oh yeah - you also get to consider implied odds. If you expect that Villain will stack off if you hit your flush draw, that can make up for the insufficient pot odds that you're drawing against.

treasure trove of great info thank you.

dont forget bluff outs and scare cards as well.

I'm still new to the math part of the game (well to the game itself). I keep reading about "pot equity" but I have yet to find an actual definition.

Can someone break that down for me? This seems like the appropriate thread.

Thanks!

Check this out: http://www.cardschat.com/odds-for-dummies.php

Thanks, Sly!

"Honestly, they are extremely overrated.."


I was tipping on sarcasm here, but it might just be me........

Great explanations above sly!!! as always!!

There are several ways to do this.

1) Semi Bluff: With one or two callers who aren't likely to have hit the flop you can open and hope they fold. This is a semi-bluff and disguises your drawing hand. It also builds the pot in case you win.

2) Pot Odds: Sometimes you have pot odds. That is, if there are a lot of people in the pot and it costs you 20 to win a 110 pot you have great odds to draw.

3) Implied Odds: You can play your flush draw with implied odds as well. Let's say you have Kh Jh on a Ah 8h 2s flop again. But this time blinds are tiny (10/20) and everyone has close to a starting stack. There are also three people involved in the pot.
You = Kh Jh with 1,450
V1 = ?/?
V2 = ?/?
V3 = ?/?
V1 min raises, V2 & V3 call, the SB folds and you call in the big blind.
The flop is Ah 9h 2c
V1 bets 100 into the 170 pot
V2 calls
V3 folds
It'll cost you 100 into a 370 pot on the turn. The odds of hitting that card are only 19%.
If both Villains fold if the 3rd heart hits the board you have improper odds to call. But is very very likely that more money will go into the pot if a heart hits. So it is implied that you hit your heart that you will get a lot more of their money.
You call here because even though you don't quite have the proper pot odds to call it is very likely that if the heart hits you get an additional 500 of their money into the pot when you are almost a sure thing to win. So there is an implied pot of 870 (370+500) and it only costs you 100 to play. That's a bargain!

Disclaimer: Keep in minds that these are situation specific. Don't fool yourself into thinking that you always have odds to call with a flush draw. This isn't something you can force.
And chips = power, so if the implied odds are close maybe it's not worth it (in the overall picture) to risk a big chunk of your stack. In close situations, early in a game, I'll fold and wait for situations where I have a bigger advantage.

I like the coin flip explanation. That really puts it in perspective for me. Thanks alot. I sometimes will go for it when i know i am behind and sometimes dont understand why. But maybe i wont do that anymore now that i am thinking bout the coin flip explanation. Thanks alot

As I suspect the OP was being sincere in his/her request for help, I didn't think anyone would really bother with sarcasm.

@sly thanks.

Perhaps "Humor" is a better word, then again, maybe it was just me and my sarcastic mind making this leap. I meant no slight to OP.

odds and outs are a matehmatical way to know what type of percentage you have of hitting a card on the flop,turn or river. it also gives you ad idea of where you are at in the hand opposed to your opponents hand (based on the type of read you have on him) and it gives you and idea of what types of calls you should make and what types of folds you should make