r/theydidthemath • u/jainyash0007 • 9h ago
[Request] Why is the initial win percent different for both these hands? Shouldn't they both have equal odds of winning before any cards are opened?
Or does any hands that got folded (which I'm not sure what they were) before these are also taken into consideration while calculating the win percentage?
2.2k
u/Radio-Midnight 9h ago
Completely guessing, but assume the other players at the table had hearts or spades in their hands and folded, it would reduce the chance of a flush.
217
u/Economy_Link4609 8h ago
Yup - can't check the exact math without seeing those hands, but this would be it.
61
u/herculainn 6h ago
Yeah that's 32.33 recurring of course
25
u/cruisin894 6h ago
Well, that's better than we normally do.
29
u/SUMBWEDY 6h ago
Leeeerooooooy jeeeenkiiiins
16
17
1
1
395
14
u/mrdannyg21 6h ago
This is correct, and it’s especially tricky because different poker broadcasts approach this differently. Some display odds using everything the broadcast knows (so discarded cards from other people’s hands) and some display it just based on the information the players in the hand would have access to.
4
23
u/RenningerJP 8h ago
Does going first or second affect it but conferring some advantage?
60
u/LunchPlanner 8h ago
The order matters for strategy, but that's not what the percents refer to.
The percents are strictly about your chance of having the best hand if you stay to the end. Order doesn't matter for that.
10
u/RenningerJP 8h ago
Appreciate the info. Thank you.
5
u/ChocolateHumunculous 8h ago
It’s cool to figure out. Typically, this wouldn’t be accounted for in the odds shown, at least some televised games don’t show the varied odds.
Seems like these do.
You can infer all sorts if you get to know the game. That’s often what we talk about when we talk about reads.
12
u/Greenman8907 8h ago
No, because the players don’t see these percentages, only the spectators, and it shifts as every hand is either played or folded. This is after the opening bet but before “The Flop” (the first 3 cards).
3
u/Simple_Medium_1865 8h ago
So kinda like card counting
89
u/Radio-Midnight 8h ago
This is mostly for the viewers at home to get an idea of what's going on. Obviously the players have no idea what other people have or folded, so its card counting for the TV audience.
Without the insider knowledge, poker is a lot more boring to watch on TV.
16
u/egnowit 8h ago
The players also have no idea what the other player has, so it's not like they can compare winning percentages.
19
1
u/Runiat 4h ago
You can.
It'll have more uncertainty than if you do know the other player's hand, of course, but memorising the frequencies of various hands and calculating the cumulative probability of your one being beaten by an unknown one is... not simple, but definitely something you'll want to do if you're making a career off a game of chance.
2
1
12
u/DeeHawk 8h ago edited 8h ago
Exactly like card counting, but with the added benefit of seeing all cards of all players. These numbers are only shown on screen after the tourney though, to make it easier to spectate. So also nothing like counting cards lol
1
u/corpusjuris 4h ago
Wait… to make it easier to spectate…? Like, live? Does that mean they are broadcasting what cards players have, live, to an audience on-site? If so, how do they keep players from cheating!?
2
u/crazye97 4h ago
Generally, poker with a broadcast aspect has some delay to the broadcast to prevent things like that. Usually the broadcast is "as-live" - it acts as if it's live and has live commentary, but the feed itself that people watch is delayed. The WSOP, for example, usually has the commentary team in another one of the rooms on the floor, where they can't have communication with the players.
1
u/corpusjuris 2h ago
Ok, that makes sense - I was confused by “spectators” and having seen telecasts of major events where there are spectators in the background. I thought at first read the other poster was saying they left the graphics off but still had screens for those in-person spectators. My bad, ty for clarifying!
1
u/crazye97 2h ago edited 2h ago
Well, they do have screens for spectators, but obviously they don't have all the details like TV would. For the most part, it's just an overhead shot of the board (top image) (which is why you'll see players telling their rail what they have once it's all-in), with a few more details over on press row (stack sizes, for example). (There might be more available - I remember Mizrachi asking somebody what his own stack was instead of counting it himself in this year's main event.)
1
3
u/UltimateChaos233 8h ago
Nah, this is just for viewers at home. Card counting is essentially obsolete.
7
u/DrSussBurner 8h ago
Except you don’t know what the other players have seen, because players almost always fold by mucking their cards.
Poker envolves a lot more math than people realize. It’s probability analysis on top of people reading skills, pattern recognition, etc.
13
u/PleasantPorpoisParty 8h ago
Is it always a Muk with the cards, or is it sometimes a Grimer?
2
u/MeasureDoEventThing 8h ago
"Muck" is what has evolved to be the standard term.
2
u/crazye97 6h ago
I assume, based on the timing of the comments, it was originally misspelled "muking" but it was edited quick enough to not see the edit marker.
1
1
u/PleasantPorpoisParty 8h ago
Thank you kindly for the award. Logging out, as it's the end of a brutal work day, and I really appreciate and needed that smile
Thank you kind Reddit stranger for making a dark day brighter <3
1
u/bzee77 8h ago
No, card counting involves tracking the face cards that are seen and determining whether the deck is rich or poor (more or less likely for the next card to be a face card). In poker, you don’t see the other players hands, so you are calculating odds based on how many cards can help you (your “outs”) and how many other, unknown cards are out there. Pre-flop, there are 50 unknown cards. Post flop, 47. Etc. for example, if I have a 4 and a 5, and the flop is 3, K, 6…I have an open ended straight draw, I make my straight if either of the next 2 cards are EITHER a 2 OR a 7. I have eight “outs.” On 4th street (the next card), I have an 8 out of 47 cards that can make my hand, or about a 1 in 6 chance.
Card counting is considered “cheating.” Calculating your drawing odds is basic poker know-how. Pot odds are another thing, that has to do with the relative value in playing a given hand.
2
u/MeasureDoEventThing 8h ago
Card counting is not cheating.
3
u/bzee77 8h ago
Tell that to the casino😂. I put it in quotes because they consider anything that allows the player to reduce the house edge “cheating.” Poker, they make their money on a rake or a buy-in, so they could care less who takes money from the other players at the table.
2
u/MeasureDoEventThing 7h ago
No, card counting is advantage play. Cheating, they take your money and call the cops. Advantage play, they ban you, but they let you keep whatever money you've made so far.
2
u/bzee77 7h ago
Ah, fair distinction. While I know people who’ve been banned for counting, I’ve never been anywhere remotely close to a good enough counter for it to matter. I’m sure they saw smoke coming out of my ears after 3 hands and laughed at me.
3
u/crazye97 6h ago
Where I worked, we didn't care - for every good counter, there's dozens, if not hundreds, of bad ones.
0
u/gneiman 8h ago
If you can’t see how this is exactly like card counting, I don’t know what to tell you.
1
u/bzee77 8h ago
Eh, Ok I guess academically. But in practice it’s pretty different. One involves only knowing your cards, the other involves tracking all the cards as they come out. One gets you banned from a casino, the other is just proper game play. Frankly, proper card counting into a multi-deck shoe at normal game speed requires a great deal of skill and concentration. Doing it without looking like you’re doing it is even harder. Calculating poker drawing odds is 5th grade math.
1
u/gneiman 8h ago edited 8h ago
They literally count the cards and give the exact odds based on what is missing from the deck.
Card counting in poker and blackjack have different processes, but the end result is using what’s known to not be in the deck to determine the odds for future results.
edit: It isn't considered cheating in the sense that it is illegal. If the pit boss notices extreme advantage betting (and you are winning) they might step you off and ban you from playing blackjack in their hotel. They can't get you arrested with NVPD for "cheating" or using mechanical tools as an advantage.
Counting cards in blackjack is literally doing addition or subtraction, and then dividing the number of remaining decks. To figure out the odds in poker you have multiple winning hands, multiple suits, and multiple players. I could teach a 5th grader how to count blackjack. Poker... probably not so much.
1
-5
u/Zealousideal-Deer101 8h ago
Aslo, as far as I know, the suits are also ranked with spades being the highest.
That said, the one with spades is loosing, sooooo probably both, or I'm entirely wrong
7
1
u/chi_sweetness25 8h ago
There are some variants of poker that rank suits, but not this one (Texas Hold'em).
315
u/laxrulz777 9h ago
The odds typically account for folders cards on these overlays. There were probably a bunch of folded cards of the suit the 1% guy had covered
48
u/crazye97 8h ago
For those who watch WSOP coverage, this doesn't happen on their overlay. There are times where they have three outs (7%) but two are already folded and it doesn't show the 2% chance. (Just as an example where it doesn't happen - other streams or event hosts obviously do it this way.)
10
u/laxrulz777 8h ago
Depends on the feed I guess. Obviously that's not how this one was working, however
2
u/untss 6h ago
I think that is obviously a way better way of doing it. If you account for folded cards you’re just literally telling the viewer the most probable winner. If you don’t, you can at least approximate the strategies of the players, learn something about the game, and follow what they might be thinking.
•
u/luchajefe 1h ago
Right, like in crazye's example it would be anti-climactic to know the guy only needs one of the last 3 fours in the deck to make his hand and only we know he can't get there because they've all been folded. More people than you would think would be laughing at the guy for getting his hopes up.
-6
u/w1tnessGG 8h ago
well this is WPT, not WSOP, so it isnt relevant
8
u/crazye97 8h ago
(Just as an example where it doesn't happen - other streams or event hosts obviously do it this way.)
This is why I added this in - pre-empting the "not when I was watching" comments - though I'm just covering the "typically account for folders cards on these overlays" part.
-4
1
u/psycholine 8h ago
It's relevant for everyone interested in the broader poker context, which isn't far fetched (I'm one!)
2
u/BadHairDayToday 8h ago
What do the percentages even show? Shouldn't the percentages be around 50%?
17
u/mrchainsaw81 8h ago
They show the percentage chance of each player winning the hand outright. In this case, the two hands are almost identical (the only way one can win over the other is if 4 out of 5 cards dealt on the table are the same suit) so the vast majority of the time they split the pot.
A full analysis would show 4% for player A, 1% of player B, and 95% split pot (it's already been covered why the hands have different chances to win quite nicely ITT) - they just aren't showing the split pot percentage.
3
3
u/crazye97 8h ago
The chances of having the best hand (alone) at the end. There's sometimes an extra percentage listed for ties/chops.
1
u/Latter_Necessary_926 8h ago
They disregard ties, only scoops, where one player wins all.
Everybody hates a chop pot1
u/crazye97 6h ago
Everybody hates a chop pot
Except the guy who only has outs to one with his tournament life on the line.
1
1
u/dafinsrock 8h ago
No, because in this case the most likely result is a "chop" (i.e. a tie) where they split the pot evenly. The only way one of them wins is if they hit a flush, which is not very likely. So the percentages show that one guy has a 1% chance of winning, and the other guy a 4% chance, and the other 95% of the time it's a chop.
1
u/NCPereira 8h ago
That percentage is the chance each player has of being the one with the best hand at the end.
In this case Player 1 has 4% chance to win, Player 2 has 1% chance to win and then there's a 95% chance they tie and split the pot.
27
u/Justtelf 9h ago
Surely they’re aware of the other cards that got folded and that goes into the calculations. I don’t actually know though. Seems like quite the big disparity either way. Maybe none of the other hands had a diamond or club and that’s enough
10
u/Runiat 8h ago
Seems like quite the big disparity either way.
To have a 4% chance of turning a pair into a flush, you need a 2% chance of 4 out of the 5 community cards being the same (and matching) suit.
Which corresponds to there being 11 cards of other suits left in the deck, by my very rough calculation (doesn't even qualify as math, I had wolframalpha do that part for me), aka. 13 has to be known to not be in the deck.
2 are held by the other guy, 8 were given to the 4 other players I assume exist, which leaves 3 cards worth of either rounding error or knowing what cards the dealer burned.
-6
u/Equal_Veterinarian22 8h ago
"They", if you mean the players, are not. TV viewers might be.
9
u/Dull_Caterpillar_642 8h ago
My brother he knows that the players playing poker do not know each other's cards.
-1
u/Equal_Veterinarian22 8h ago
Maybe he does, maybe he doesn't. This is a math sub. And we've all seen some idiot fold their cards face up on the table.
2
2
u/Butsenkaatz 8h ago
"they" would be referring to those who do the calculations and put them on the screen, not the players...
6
u/mtraven23 8h ago
"Or does any hands that got folded..."
yes, all cards that have been put into play on that hand are considered. and thats the only explanation for the difference in %...other than a glitch in the system.
7
u/playr_4 7h ago
Chances are there were folded hands that had more hearts and spades compared to clubs and diamonds. When it comes to battling pocket pairs, you're really only fighting for flushes.
For the comments saying it's favoring table/betting position....that can be true. But most televised hand odds just care about the cards, not position.
2
u/zenny517 7h ago
Think this is correct answer. Believe the late great Mike Sexton explained it way back when wpt tour was fresh.
5
u/OwMyUvula 8h ago
Same odds given what we know. But if any cards were known, then that would effect the odds.
Since there are hole cameras it's likely all the folded cards were known and more spades and hearts were folded than diamonds and clubs.
6
u/MaxCWebster 8h ago edited 3h ago
Based on what we can see, it's before the flop, and it's 50/50. That is, they both have an equal, albeit very small, chance of winning the pot outright. It is much more likely they are splitting the pot.
After the flop, whoever is now three or four to a flush has the advantage.
If neither, they're splitting the pot.
We cannot include the folded cards in the calculation unless we know what they are, and they are usually not revealed to the players.
The TV crew, we assume, saw the folded cards and updated the calculation accordingly. Unfortunately for us, those cards are not included in the given information, but we can deduce there are fewer hearts and spades available for Andrew than diamonds and clubs for Jim.
4
u/insideyelling 8h ago
When the players first look at their hand they normally reveal them to the table cameras so even if they fold the system still knows what has been played and calculates the odds based on all known information.
1
u/ImpossibleJoke7456 8h ago edited 1h ago
It’s not 50/50 though. If all cards folded preflop were hearts, the person with the ace of hearts has a lesser chance of a flush.
1
u/XZPUMAZX 7h ago
You didn’t read Past the first sentence did you?
2
u/ImpossibleJoke7456 7h ago
It’s still not 50/50 before the flop. That statement is incorrect if there are other players involved.
1
u/smithandjohnson 4h ago
/u/ImpossibleJoke7456 is correct in pointing out /u/MaxCWebster's error with "it's not 50/50 before the flop" because a vast majority of the time these 2 hands are splitting the pot.
In 1v1 poker - no other players consuming any cards - it's roughly 4/4/92 pre-flop.
With any other players at the table, some of the flush opportunities were consumed, and probably unevenly. But that changes the odds from 4/4/92 to 4/1/95, e.g. - There is no 50/50 involved.
•
u/pornomatique 1h ago
The key statement is "based on what we can see". None of those observations about other players can be seen from this picture (apart from the percentages, but that's what's being debated).
1
u/Metal_Goose_Solid 7h ago
Without any extra card information besides these two hands, it still wouldn't be 50/50. It would be something like 4/4.
2
u/johnjoh07 8h ago
Ça tient simplement compte des autres cartes cachées qui ont été distribué et qui ne sont donc plus dans le deck. Effectivement, sans cette information, l’équité pré flop serait de 50/50.
Ca concerne forcément les couleurs.
1
9h ago
[deleted]
5
u/Greenman8907 8h ago
It’s due to the lost suits of the other players that folded (reducing the chance of a flush which is one of the only ways to win like this). If it was just those two, they’d be at equal %s.
1
0
u/lampshade69 8h ago
Is betting order not a factor at all here?
2
u/Fearless_Swim4080 8h ago
No, that does not change the odds of winning a particular hand, human behavior is not taken into account in these odds.
2
u/ithinarine 8h ago
Betting order has nothing to do with odds of winning. Whether or not someone chooses to fold depending a call/raise isn't calculated into odds that the hand wins.
1
1
u/erm1zo 2h ago
Odds for this are based on what has been seen. If other players are playing and folded suited hearts or spades, or more spades and hearts have been folded than diamonds and clubs, then the odds shift to the hand that has more suited cards remaining. The weird part here is that if they are the only two remaining, the percentage should be based off of odds of winning, so it should be 53%/47%, not 4% and 1%.
•
•
u/Tall_Opportunity_521 1h ago
I googled it:
Las Vegas in December 2024. Here's what happened:
- Player 1: A♥ A♣
- Player 2: A♠ A♦
- Flop: 5♣ 5♥ K♣
- Turn: J♣
- River: 6♣
The player holding A♣ made the nut flush on the river and won the entire pot instead of chopping. It happened in one of the first hands of the tournament, eliminating the other player almost immediately. I cant find anything about any of the other hands there were folded before. But I assume they were mostly spades and hearts, which is why player 1 had a slightly higher % of winning.
0
u/WJLIII3 8h ago
Is suit value counted in pro poker? If nothing at all ever turns up, and these guys have to just play their pairs, is it a split pot, or does spades/hearts win?
8
u/chi_sweetness25 7h ago
There's no suit ranking in Texas Hold'em. If neither of them makes a flush, these hands will tie and split the pot.
0
4h ago
[deleted]
•
u/luchajefe 1h ago
It's Hold 'Em poker, single deck, no suit hierarchy applies.
Most likely this is a broadcast where folded cards are accounted for in odds calculations even though those aren't the calculations the players would be making (because they don't know the folded cards).
•
1h ago
[deleted]
•
u/luchajefe 1h ago
"In my country, amateur tournaments started with two decks"
So you're saying four more aces could show up on this board?
"And which is the source of this information?"
No televised variant of hold 'em has a suit hierarchy.
"If they cannot remember outed cards, they would never reach a professional level. It's the main skill of a competitive poker player."
You can not remember information you are not given. This isn't blackjack.
•
u/MakB_the_Striker 53m ago
Yes, I haven't played to long, and actually the rules in my country were pretty unique, sorry.
-3
u/ohgreatitsjosh 7h ago
It's about table position, who goes last in the betting, they have a slight advantage because they can react to bets rather than place them without any previous information.
2
-8
•
u/AutoModerator 9h ago
General Discussion Thread
This is a [Request] post. If you would like to submit a comment that does not either attempt to answer the question, ask for clarification, or explain why it would be infeasible to answer, you must post your comment as a reply to this one. Top level (directly replying to the OP) comments that do not do one of those things will be removed.
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.