Implied odds when to use and when not to

Posted by tomfmason 1 year, 2 months ago 8 comments

Today I read another great article by Annie Duke entitled Implied odds bluff. I completely agree with her on the over use of implied odds and have been guilty of this in the past. What got me away from over using implied odds for situations like what she describes was a situation very close to her last example about the small suited connectors. 

I was playing in a 25/50 no limit holdem game in Tunica(was the biggest game around at the time) and had 98s on the button with a raise and a table full of callers. I thought: "Perfect hand for the prefect situation". Anyway, to make a long story short I ended up making a large call on the flop and justified it using implied odds. The real problem with using implied odds on a flush draw is that it is generally obvious to everyone that you have hit it and with a small flush the only action you are likely to see is from someone that has you beat. Well, that and someone drawing at a larger flush.

To make a long story short the original raiser had suited ace rag and turned the nuts. I was about 75% sure I was beat on the turn when the flush hit and the OA(original aggressor) did one of those sneaky type checks. I obviously checked behind and folded to a big river bet. Not before I dumped nearly 15bb into that hand.

The guy showed his ace rag flush and I was obviously very proud of my fold but afterwards, during my post game review, I realized that I had a major flaw in my understanding of implied odds. 

In a nut shell, what I learned from that situation is that implied odds really only come into effect on sneaky type hands that are hard to be beat when they hit. Like small straights, small pp pre flop(set mining) etc. It is almost always going to be a bad idea to justify a call, in a tournament especially, for a flush draw based on implied odds.