Razz Poker Strategy

Low games are always games of patience. Tight play, particularly at the outset, is rewarded. Poor players play loosely and wind up betting hands that they should have folded. Every once in a while it is possible to steal the antes, but the principal strategy recommendation is to sit back and wait for a really good hand to appear or develop.

What is a good starting hand? As in seven-card stud, the "hand" consists of the two hole cards and the door card. If all three are five or under (counting an ace as low), then that is a great hand, assuming no pairs. It would be a mistake not to bet and raise with such a deal. If there is a six in there, well, be careful, especially if other players are active. If the hand has as much as one seven in it, it can still be played, but slowly, in hopes of hitting Fourth Street cheaply. If one of the cards is as high as an eight, the hand is marginal. It might be a candidate for a semi-bluff, but it is a weak hand and probably does not, of itself, have a positive expectation to win.

If your starting hand contains one or more cards higher than an eight, or a pair or better, throw it away.

How good is your starting hand? This depends on the door cards of the other players. If there are some really low ones out there, your hand has to be really good to justify going forward. If your competitors are suffering with high door cards, and playing them, then this gives you more of a margin to be flexible and hope for improvement later. For example, an eight low hand is marginal, but if all the other doors are higher than eight, this marginal hand is the best of show.

As play continues, keep an eye on the board cards of the other players to be sure no one is having a reversal of bad fortune. When you know you have "the best of it," bet aggressively.

Razz, like all stud games, requires attention to "live" or "dead" cards. A "dead" card is one that you could have used, but it wound up on someone else's porch (or board). Since Razz is a low game, it is desirable to see your cards dead on the board. This reduces the chances for an inconvenient pair at the last minute. This is "stud-thinking" but in reverse.

Fast playing is the rule in Razz, as playable hands should be played aggressively and unplayable hands should be thrown away. There is not a lot of room in the middle for semi-bluffable hands, though this option does arise. The thinking is to build the pot on third street if the hand is strong, so that if a bad card shows up on Fourth Street, there will be enough in the pot to justify a call to get to Fifth Street and hope to overcome it.

The discipline not to play bad hands is one of the best winning strategies in Razz. This is a reflection of the "patience" mantra. There is a tendency for bad hands not to improve on the board. If a good hand goes bad, let it go. Don't hope for reform. The odds of receiving a deuce through 5 in Razz are the same as receiving a Jack through Ace in regular seven-card stud. The odds of receiving a pair are the same, and very undesirable in Razz. Since good players know to play "tight" in Razz, calling bluffs is probably not a money-making activity.

Larceny of antes is still something a player should be alert to. If the bring-in is to your left (so you are last) and there are folds up to you, it's worth a full bet just to see if the bring-in will fold as well and let you carry off the antes. If you have the lowest door card showing and there is folding all around, it may be worth the investment to make a bet. Even the second lowest door card can be played this way in late position. Back off if someone responds aggressively. Be aware that if the pot is puny (as in low-limit games), the reward may not justify the risk, even if it is slight.

Some experienced players say that poor players play more poorly in Razz than in other games. Partly this is because tighter play is more profitable in Razz, and poor players tend to play too loosely anyway, calling when the should be folding, or even raising when calling would do.

Another way to put it is that some poker errors involve misperceiving the cards of the other players, and some poker errors are just miscalculation of odds. Good players may make the first kind of mistake from time to time, but they can expect never to make a goof like calling when they should be folding, or raising when they should be calling. When a poor player, who is inclined to make mistakes with the card odds or the pot odds, plays Razz, such mistakes seem to increase because the change of focus from high cards to low cards must be a little disorienting.

This is an opportunity for a reasonably good player to win by playing tight and betting aggressively when he or she "has the best of it." The first sign would be a player with a door of 9 or higher who calls on the opening round. That mistake is blatant. By the time Fourth Street or Fifth Street comes along, it should be obvious if a player "has the worst of it." For example, a player's hand could look like the following:

You know that since only two cards can be disregarded to make up a low hand, and there is a nine and a Queen on the board, the player's lowest possible hand is an eight high, with two cards to come. The chances are half decent that the player is hiding a card higher than an eight in the hole, too. The chances of being dealt a a nine or higher in the hole cards are 48% and the chances of having both cards be nines or higher are 30%, including pairs. This player should have folded on Third Street. If instead he calls or bets, an aggressive attack should bring him down. This player's opponent just about has the hand beaten on the board already, assuming that he knew enough to fold before Fourth Street if he had any shocking cards in the hole.

An example of loose play that might be justifiable, but risky, would be to play a hand thus:

The hand is very strong through Third Street, gets whacked on Fourth, but recovers on Fifth. Sixth Street was a real blow. Now it all comes down to the last card. A conservative player might have fled on Fourth, but if the pot was big enough, and the price to play were low enough, it would be worth trying to catch only one other high card on later streets.

Clearly the hand is in trouble when Sixth Street shows a King. What happens next depends a lot on whether there are any dead low cards on the board, as the chances of catching a pair are almost as high as the probability of a disastrously high Seventh Street card. Suppose it is another ten or a match of the low cards. Then the hand is ten-high or king-high, depending on what happened. If it is another King, the hand is ten high. If it is a Queen, the hand is still ten high. Those are all losing hands. In fact, the only "outs" on Seventh Street would be however many fives and sixes are left in the deck, as nothing much over six would probably win. If the pot were large enough, and the price to pay low on Seventh Street, a loose player might call with such a hand. Any other player should fold after getting the King.