Chances of getting 1 pair beaten by 2 pairs

[Thirdman]

Hi,

I'm finding it frustrating when I think I have the nuts with good pairs such as As, when it gets to the showdown I often find I'm beaten by someone who has 2 pair with a weaker high card than me and a weak second card e.g. I have pair of aces getting beaten by kings and twos, the two coming down on the river. Can anyone tell me what are the changes of getting 1 pair beaten by 2 pair and is a top pair actually a good result or should I play pairs less aggressively?

Cheers

[RobMcB]

Hi, welcome to 2+2.

I can't give you a precise answer about what the chances are of having your TPTK/TPGK (top pair top kicker, top pair good kicker) beaten by 2pair is without seeing the community cards.
Perhaps a more useful approach to this problem is to ask "What are the chances that I have the best hand?" instead of worrying solely about your opponent having two pair. The math for doing this kind of calculation is called 'combinatorics' and it's a little tricky to get the hang of, but once you figure it out it's pretty easy. The fine folks in the 'probability' forum are the masters at this.
I also can't give you a specific answer to your second set of questions about whether top pair is a good result (good hand?) or how you should be playing pairs until you post a hand or several hands that you played. Ideally, provide the reads you had on your opponents at the time.
To post a hand, take the raw hand history, and input it into a hand converter. I like THIS ONE even though you have to register on the site to use it.

[leatangclan]

As RobMcB pointed out, without knowing the situations your were beaten, it's hard to figured what is going on. There are numerous ways to beat a monster pair such as AA/KK/QQ, trips, straights, and flushes, with trips much more common.

But to answer your question specifically, the odds of flopping two pairs with two unpaired hole cards is 2.02%. So the chance of that happening is low. And it's a little under 6% after that.

But was it because your opponents were playing real loose and called your large raises, or was it because you did not raise large enough? The best thing is to post your hand history so people here can have a look at the play and make more informed and appropriate comments.

[Thirdman]

Hi,

The situation was like this:

Me

A(s) J(s)

Opponent

K(c) 2(d)

Flop:

A(h) K(d) 6(c)

Turn:

5 (c)

River:

2 (d)

Everyone folded apart from me and him after the flop so it was head to head, I was raising whenever I could, he was just calling. So I guess he must have been pretty stupid calling raises before he got the 2 on the river with an A on the board. I was wondering what the probability was of getting beaten in situations like this.

[tsearcher]

Sorry, this isn't directly answering your post, but I think you need to understand relative hand strength and how to read the board better. At no point during the hand you posted did you have the nuts.

[Zifadel]

[ QUOTE ]
Hi,

The situation was like this:

Me

A(s) J(s)

Opponent

K(c) 2(d)

Flop:

A(h) K(d) 6(c)

Turn:

5 (c)

River:

2 (d)

Everyone folded apart from me and him after the flop so it was head to head, I was raising whenever I could, he was just calling. So I guess he must have been pretty stupid calling raises before he got the 2 on the river with an A on the board. I was wondering what the probability was of getting beaten in situations like this.

[/ QUOTE ]

What were the size of your bets? Were you min-betting/raising? How big was your raise pre-flop (assuming your raised).

If you raised strong preflop and continued making pot size bets throughout you were either against a terrible player who get lucky, or someone who wanted to gamble.

[RobMcB]

[ QUOTE ]
I was wondering what the probability was of getting beaten in situations like this. <font color="green">Probabilities are in green. I used a program called PokerStove to work out the math quickly. </font>

The situation was like this:
Me
A(s) J(s)
Opponent
K(c) 2(d)
<font color="green"> equity win tie
Hand 0: 67.637% 67.38% 00.26% { AsJs }
Hand 1: 32.363% 32.10% 00.26% { Kc2d } </font>

Flop:
A(h) K(d) 6(c)
<font color="green"> equity win tie
Hand 0: 81.616% 81.62% 00.00% { AsJs }
Hand 1: 18.384% 18.38% 00.00% { Kc2d } </font>
Turn:
5 (c)
<font color="green"> equity win tie
Hand 0: 88.636% 88.64% 00.00% { AsJs }
Hand 1: 11.364% 11.36% 00.00% { Kc2d } </font>
River:
2 (d)
<font color="green">So our equity in the pot was around %68 preflop. It improved to about %82 on the flop, and improved some more on the turn to nearly %89!. Unfortunately, it decreased to 0% on the river [img]/images/graemlins/mad.gif[/img].</font>

he must have been pretty stupid calling raises before he got the 2 on the river with an A on the board. <font color="green"> Maybe. Probably. But we can't say for sure that he's a moron or a gambler until we see how large the amounts you bet were in comparison to the size of the pot. If you were betting very small amounts, it's possible your opponent was calling with the correct odds. </font>

[/ QUOTE ]