Do You Want One Poker Opponent or Many?

When playing poker do you want one poker opponent in the hand with you or many?  This is the question you have to ask for every hand. You might only want one player in the pot with you if you have a hand like pocket 8’s. You might want many people in the hand with a 9-10 suited. The problem in this previous example with the two eights is that even when you are actually winning, far too many problems are out there for your hand if a lot of people see the flop.

While it is true before the flop that the pair of 8’s is behind only six hands, after the flop if any over cards shows, the 8’s are in trouble.  This hand plays much better against a single opponent where you would be a favorite over typical hands like AK, AQ, AJ, A10, KQ, QJ, etc.  You are not a large favorite, but you do have the edge.

If more than one player sees the flop though, you are in trouble.  The situation gets worse if you have more players seeing the flop because they could be holding hands with a 9 or a 10 in them and your odds get even worse. When you are playing pocket pairs you normally want to drive people out of the pot.  This is much harder to do in Limit Holdem than it is in No-Limit.

People are more likely to call in Limit than they are in No-Limit where you can raise a decent amount.  That is why pocket pairs are much stronger in No-Limit than they are in Limit.  The one time that the pocket pairs are a good hand in Limit is if you flop the set.  Then you can win some pots.  The other times you are far more likely to run into a bigger hand.

The times that you do want a lot of people in the pot are hands like suited connectors, small pocket pairs where you can hit a set, Jack-10 where you can hit a straight, etc.  With these hands you have nothing before the flop, but can hit something after the flop that gives you power over a pocket pair.  Those are the times you want a lot of callers so you drive up the value of the pot.

In poker sometimes you want a lot of opponents, other times you do not.  Be aware of the times where you need to drive people out with a raise to narrow the field.  Also be aware of the times where you want a lot of opponents as you hope to hit something on the flop.  Poker is a multi-faceted game with many intriguing parts, and choosing how many opponents you want to face is just one of them.