Playing marginal made hands like Ace-King or pocket Jacks can be a make-or-break situation at the poker table. These are strong starting hands, but they can quickly become troublesome if the board doesn’t cooperate. Avoiding a few common but costly blunders with these hands can save you a lot of money and significantly boost your overall performance.
The sources point to three huge mistakes players frequently make with marginal hands. Let’s break them down.
1. Stop Overplaying Marginal Hands Pre-Flop
A primary blunder many players make is committing too much of their stack before the flop is even dealt. While hands like Ace-King, Ace-Queen, pocket Queens, Jacks, and Tens are premium, they are also easily dominated.
- Don’t excessively raise or re-raise. It’s a mistake to think you must always be aggressive with hands like pocket Jacks or pocket Tens.
- Know when to fold to multiple raises. A classic lesson for poker players involves folding pocket Jacks in specific scenarios. For instance, if you raise from an early position, another player re-raises (a three-bet), and a third player re-raises again (a four-bet), folding Jacks is the correct move, especially when playing with deep stacks of 100 big blinds.
- Respect your opponents’ ranges. When you raise with what should be a tight range, and you face a three-bet from an opponent with an equally tight range, a four-bet from a third player signals a super strong hand. In these spots, you must be disciplined enough to fold almost everything to avoid major losses.
2. Stop Playing Marginal Made Hands Aggressively Post-Flop
Many players mistakenly believe that the main goal of poker is to win every pot, which leads them to bet constantly. This aggressive approach with a marginal hand often leads to building a large pot with very little equity. The better strategy is to play passively.
- Check from out of position. When you are out of position in a pot with multiple players and the board shows three cards ten or lower (e.g., a 9-7-5 flop), you should be checking the vast majority of the time. Betting with Ace-King offsuit here is a mistake that can put you in a “miserable” situation if you get called or raised, potentially costing you half your stack.
- Check back with middle pair. When you are in position and have a clear marginal hand like middle pair (for example, holding 8-7 suited on a 9-7-4 board), it’s an excellent opportunity to check it back. Betting here is dangerous because if you face a raise, you are likely crushed by a stronger hand like a set. Middle pair hands want to get to a cheap showdown.
- Keep the pot small and your opponent’s range wide. Passive play keeps the pot manageable. It also keeps your opponent’s range wide, which is good for you because it means they can still hold “garbage” that your marginal hand beats. If you bet, you risk making them fold all their weaker hands, which turns your decent hand into a bad one.
- Realize your equity and induce bluffs. Checking also gives you a chance to improve your hand on a later street (realizing your equity) and encourages your opponent to bluff into what they perceive as a weak check-back range.
3. Stop Getting Married to Your Hand on the River
A hand that was strong before the flop might be weak by the river. You must constantly re-evaluate and re-categorize your hand’s strength as the board develops.
Beware the Sunk Cost Fallacy. Don’t confuse having a lot of money in the pot with being “pot committed”. You are only truly pot committed when you have the correct mathematical equity to call a bet. Many players call large river bets simply because they feel obligated due to the money already invested, which is a classic example of the sunk cost fallacy.
Avoid betting and then folding to a raise. One of the biggest money-losing plays is betting the river and then folding to a raise. If you bet a marginal hand on the river and get raised all-in, you almost always have to fold.
Check back on bad river cards. If the river card is scary—for example, it completes a possible flush or straight—it’s often a great time to check back. This is true even if you believe you have the best hand at the moment.
Don’t make tiny value bets. When you are in position on the river, your smallest bet should generally be about half the pot. Betting a tiny amount extracts very little value and gives your opponent a good price to reopen the action with a raise. If your hand isn’t strong enough for a decently sized value bet, you should just check it back.