Simply put, Hand Odds are the odds that you will complete your hand. Remember that just because you complete your hand, it does not guarantee that it will be a winning hand. In order to calculate your hand odds, you must be able to correctly count your outs. An out is any card that will complete your hand.
Example:
Your hand is:
as your hole cards. The board is:
You have four cards to a straight. Any Five or Ten will complete your hand. There are four unseen fives and there are four unseen tens left the deck. Thus, you have eight outs (cards that will complete your straight).
Some of you might be thinking, "But what if one of my opponents folded a ten?" Perhaps two of them were folded. That is a good question. When counting outs, you always count unseen cards. You cannot be sure that somebody folded a ten (unless one was accidentally exposed). However, you cannot rule out the possibility that somebody did NOT fold a ten either. The fact of the matter is that you simply do not know. So, when calculating outs, you always count UNSEEN cards.
The more outs you have, the better your odds of making your hand become.
There are two scenarios for calculating hand odds.
1) If you are trying to figure out what your odds are after the flop and hanging on to the river (i.e. Two cards to come).
2) If you are trying to figure out what you odds are after the flop to the turn, or from the turn to the river (i.e. One card to come).
As you might expect, the odds from the flop to the river area about double (but not quite) because you have two chances to hit your card.
In order to calculate your odds, simply multiply your outs times 4 if you are calculating from the flop to the river, and multiply your outs by two if you are calculating from the turn to the river. This number will give you an approximate percentage of the time you will hit your hand.
Example
You have 4 cards to a flush after the flop. What are your chances of making the flush by the river?
9 outs x 4 = 36
You will make your flush about 36% of the time.
Do you call your opponent's bet? In order to answer that question, you must compare pot odds to hand odds. We have the percentage of time that you will make your hand, but we must convert that percentage to odds. To do that, we know that the percentage of times that you make the hand and the percentage of times you do not make the hand must add up to 100%. Since you will make the flush 36% of the time, it follows that you will NOT make the flush 64% of the time. Expressed as odds, we have:
64% : 36% or about
1.8 : 1
This means for every 2 times you miss your flush, you will make it once. If you compare that ratio to the pot odds you are getting, you will be able to determine if you should call your opponent's bet. If the pot has $40 in it and your lone opponents bets $10, your Pot Odds are 5:1. The chance of you making your hand is 2:1 and you should call the bet. Lets look at how this works out with real money:
We know that you will miss your hand two out of three times. In two times you miss, you will lose $10 each for a total loss of $20. However, on the third time, you make your flush, and you will win $50. Your net result after three hands is a gain of $30 ($50 in winnings minus $20 in losses). Therefore as long as your Pot Odds are greater than your hand odds, you should make the call. Over the long haul, you MUST win money in this situation.
What if your opponent bets $100. Should you make the call? Here is the math: There is now $140 in the pot, you must call $100 to continue.
Your pot odds are 140:100 or 7:5, which is 1.4 : 1.
Here is how the money looks over three hands:
Twice you will lose $100, for a $200 loss. On the third time, you will hit your flush and win $140. Your net is a loss of $60 ($200 in losses plus $140 in winnings). If you continue to make this call, you will eventually go broke.
In summary, in order to decide if you should call a bet when you have a draw, you must follow the following steps:
1) Calculate your Pot Odds
2) Count your Outs
3) Calculate the percent of time you will make your hand (multiply outs by 2 or 4)
4) Convert the percent to odds
5) Compare the hand odds to the pot odds
6) If the pot odds are greater than the hands odds, then make the call.
7) If the pot odds are less than the hand odds, then FOLD
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