There was a point in the infancy of its popularity that the best hand to be holding in Texas Hold’em was Jack Ten suited, particularly because if it’s two way straight potential and seemingly solid suck-out capabilities when playing to the river.

I find now, during online play that Jack Ten is often played in big pots. Heck, you can even see it being played for big pots in the World Series of Poker, Full Tilt Cash Games, and the World Poker Tour.

Personally in the low limit tournaments I play, I will play Jack ten under certain favourable conditions. Outside of these conditions Jack Ten is merely a group five Sklansky hand and can often be dominated if you are calling raises with it. So for that reason I often toss it like any other group five hand or worse. But sometimes when those certain conditions are met, Jack Ten should be played. In fact NOT playing it, could be a mistake. Let me explain a couple of situations here.

If you have jack-ten and are in late position with several limpers and low blinds to boot, well this is more often than not, an instant call. Let’s say there are three limpers before you and the blinds are 15/30. The 3 limpers have added 90 chips to the pot and there are 45 from the blinds who have yet to act. Assuming the passive small blind is going to call and the mousy big blind checks as well, then it will cost you 30 chips into a pot of 150 giving splendid odds of 5:1. This is a no-brainer really as jack-ten is a hand that plays well against multiple players, and if you straighten out the pot could be enormous.

Jack ten is also a narrow underdog to bigger hands like ace-queen and ace-king and if you are facing pressure from a short stack, then calling an all-in is likely a good move as only an over pair has you far behind, but if your opponent turns over a low pair, it’s nearly even odds, so knowing your odds in poker is helpful.

If you are using a poker calculator, jack ten may always be shown as a playable hand given generous odds situations but don’t get caught up in calling all the time, especially in early stage tournament strategy play. The pots have to be worth it and your implied odds really need to be reasonably figured ahead of time, so as not to be burning chips with low outcome hands.

When I am in a pot with multiple players and the flop come 8d, 9d, Qs, I am extremely wary of draws and redraws out there so even if you are holding pocket kings here, cautious is the play.

Source:http://www.articlesbase.com/