Reading the Flop, Suited Connectors

This article is the third and final article that relates starting hands to the flop. This time by looking at how suited connectors combines with different texture of flops. The first article looked at how pocket pairs behaved. The second debated high cards. This will apart from suited connectors also mention something about closely related cards and combination draws.

With suited connectors you are weak before the flop but are trying to get a good match with the board to become strong postflop. Most often you will end up being on a draw and have to read the situation pretty well in order to get a good result. Lets look at how middle suited connecters might fare with a few different structures of the flop.

Pocket Cards


The different flops are ordered from good to bad, for the case when your first two cards are suited connectors.

Flop, Straight(/)Flush


The flop is one card away from being perfect. You already have the nut straight (as of yet no other hole cards can beat you) 9 8 7 6 5 and are on top of that drawing to something better, a flush. That another straight should beat you is unlikely but could happen if for example a seven would come on the board later on. Paradoxically the risk of loosing becomes greater if you improve to a flush. Should another heart fall on the coming streets (fourth street and fifth street in Texas Hold'em refers to the fourth and fifth card dealt face up and the rounds of betting accompanying them) you could face a higher flush. If the 6 comes along then you are unbeatable again.

Flop, Two Pair


Although you do not "intend" to get a two pair when playing suited connectors, you are usually very strong when you hit them by "mistake". With this specific flop your two pair 8 8 7 7 4 is the top two pair. As you are holding one of the sevens and one of the eights, the risk of being up against a set is also lessened. Your biggest fear is competing with another suited connector that has hit as good as you did in the above example, hole cards as 6 5 or something slightly less powerful yet better than you. Of course you could still be lucky enough to be up against those strong opponents and improve to a full house as another seven or eight fills the board.

If the 4 turned into an ace and the flop would have been something like A 8 7, then you would not be as strong since you would no longer hold the top two pair, but the bottom. Holding the top two pair you could afford welcoming one over card as all it would probably do, would be to give someone a decent second best hand. A second best hand such as a pair of queens with an ace kicker that seems good but is in fact inferior to your holding. That way your good cards could get paid off. If that were to happen with a high card already out there on the flop, then you could be faced with a higher two pair than your own. Remember how you felt when you held the overcards.

Flop, Flush Draw


The likely good flop you will get with suited connectors is a draw. In this case a flush draw, K J 8 7 2 is nothing yet but one card away from being the highly ranked flush. Even if this flop is good (nine unseen hearts will give you a flush), you can safely assume that you are behind at the moment as you do not have anything yet. Anyone with a king, jack, or a deuce has a pair and in fact anyone holding a lone nine has you beat by the merits of a higher ranked card. When deciding whether to continue playing in this hand it should come in to the calculations that you are not drawing to the nut flush. It is dangerous finishing the race with a finish that brings you from the back to the "first loser" position.

Flop, Straight Draw


The other likely good draw with suited connectors, utilizes the closeness of the ranks of the cards, it puts you on a straight draw. With 9 8 7 6 A there are eight unseen cards that will give you the straight, four tens and four fives. An advantage of a straight draw as compared with a flush draw is that it will not be as apparent to everyone else if you hit it. The other players may cool down if they see a third suited card, but may not realize what they are up against if a ten is dealt in this example.

Other straight draws that are not as good are drawing to the bottom end or drawing on a gut shot straight. Had the flop been A T 9 then there would still be eight cards that made you a straight, but the straight you would make would no longer necessarily be the best possible straight. With a jack on fourth street you would get a jack high straight but someone holding a king and a queen would get an ace high straight. The person holding that might not have felt that strong before the jack came though as it filled a gut shot straight. Only the jack completed that straight, while you had both the jack and the six to make yours.

Flop, Pair


A poor flop, closely resembling garbage, would be hitting middle pair. There are not many cards that will improve you holding now, 8 8 Q 7 3 is not a much of an improvement to your weak starting hand. Many other factors would have to just right for this hand to be playable.

Related Starting Hands

Deciding whether the flop is good or bad for starting hands that resembles true suited connectors is done in pretty much the same way as for suited connectors. Take suited cards or gapped cards.

Pocket Cards
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You will find your self in the same kind of situations as when playing true suited connectors, just not as often. As was discussed in some detail in Categorization of Starting Hands, the cards with no gap has a bigger potential then the ones with however a small gap. If the cards are not suited it is painfully clear which situations you will not be a part of. Whenever you play such cards anyway - as you could play them for free out of the big blind or whatever the reason - then when the flop is kind enough, your strength can be determined with guidance of the examples above.

Combination draws

Only the apparent and straight forward cases has been discussed in this article. One important issue that has been left out is the power of combination draws. Having two different poor chances can make a hand playable or even good. For example, look at the example where the flop gave you middle pair. Apart from this you actually have sleight chance of getting a flush, even though the flop came down "rainbow". Runner runner hearts give you a flush and an added value to the hand. The subject was implicitly brought up when talking about the strongest form of combination draws, straight/flush draws. The point is, that it does not have to be that obvious.

Say that you had pocket A K on the flop K J 2 discussing flush draws, then you would have an edge over another player holding A K. If it were only the two of you going at each other in that pot, most likely you would end up splitting the pot. But you could never lose, your opponent could. Two spades on the two cards to come, and you win with a flush. That is the power of added value from combination draws.