Implied Odds: A powerful tool that can help you make poker decisions

 Implied Odds: A powerful tool that can help you make poker decisions

Unit 3 taught you about the "expressed" version of pot odds. This is the current pot odds. We will be looking at Implied Pot Odds in this lesson. This calculation takes future bets into account.

What are Implied Odds

This is only a brief introduction to the topic. While it is important to know this, you should not use this technique until you have more experience. This is because you will need to be accurate in predicting future events.

You are familiar with the Expressed Pot Odds. However, this calculation doesn't take into account the amount of money that will be offered to the pot after betting is over. This is called the "Implied" odds.

Implied odds are based on the principle that there can be two outcomes to a drawing hand.

Miss your hand: If you fail to make your hand, the pot will be lost. You won't need any additional money, and you can fold at the next round.

Hit your hand. If you hit your hand, then you win the pot. Your opponent may also put more money into it on the next round.

Example

If you are in late position and hold Kdiamonds Jdiamonds then the Flop and Turn are now 5diamonds9clubs Adiamonds2spades. Now you're in a nut flush draw.

The pot is set at $15. After the turn, your opponent places a $5 bet.

According to the poker maths, there are 9 ways to get our flush. That's approximately 18% chance after the turn. The odds of winning a pot are 20 to $5 or 4:1, which is 20% break even.

We should therefore fold this hand based on the math above and using only expressed pot odds as these odds are not enough to call.

We can go further and say that if our hand is Flush, then we expect our opponent to call another $5 on the river. Now, our Implied odds calculations show that we can win $25 with a $5 wager if we have a Flush. This is a break-even percentage of 17%.

We now have the correct odds to make the call based upon the implied odds.

Notice: We don't take into consideration the additional bets we would have on the river to earn the $5 extra because if our hand was not in the right place, we wouldn’t be required to make that bet.

Imperfect art

However, don't get too excited. Your opponent may call an extra bet on river. Don't use implied odds to call calls that aren't right for you. You are just as likely to lose if your calls go against the odds.

Implied odds are a complicated and imperfect art. Because you don't know exactly what your opponent will do at the next round, it is difficult to predict. Your best guess is based on what you see of the player, his behavior, the hand you think he holds, and whether it is strong enough for you to place a value bet.

Before you become more proficient at reading your opponents, it is important to be aware of implied chances. When the odds on calling or not are slightly lower than necessary, then you need to consider whether implied odds might just tip the balance in your favor and allow you to make the call.

After you become more familiar with your strategy and have had lots of practice reading your opponents, you can begin to see the benefits. pot odds and implied odds for new poker player