[Zetack]

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It is the worst hand unless it is precisely against hands it dominates.

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And even then it sucks unless playing heads up.

Here the odds with a typical range of hands you might be up against and with 7-2 in there dominating 2-3.

Note that 7-2 offsuit wins signicantly less than 2-3 offsuit here even though it has 2-3 offsuit dominated.

Of course the below is flawed, because it shows the likelihood of winning only if all hands make it to the showdown, but its useful for illustrative purposes.

And to OP. See, below, this is why 7-2 offsuit is considered the worse hand. 7 High is good more often than 3 high very rarely, they both have the same chances of making a big hand like two pair, trips, or a boat, but the 23 makes more straights and so is marginally better.


cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
Ks Ac 140254 21.31 512338 77.86 5416 0.82 0.217
Kh Qh 124935 18.99 527657 80.19 5416 0.82 0.194
Td 9d 157245 23.90 500069 76.00 694 0.11 0.239
8c 8h 127912 19.44 529402 80.46 694 0.11 0.195
7s 2d 43133 <font color="blue">6.56 </font> 608954 92.55 5921 0.90 0.070
2c 3h 53886 <font color="blue"> 8.19 </font> 598201 90.91 5921 0.90 0.086

Ok, note however, if you take the pocket pair out of the lineup entirely that 23 off still beats 7-2 off, but if you replace the 8-8 with 5-5, that then 7-2 has a very slight edge over 7-2 (as you might expect with the straight possibilities really killed and the 7-2 with the chance to win by pairing his 7) but not enough to tip the hand better than 2-3 overall.

--Zetack