To show or not to show

By Ladbrokes_Poker
for Thepokerdonk.com

Published: February 16, 2010

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Something I see regularly in my local casino game is players determined to show their hole cards at the end of a hand. They will always show if they have bluffed or they will show that they are folding what they perceive to be a strong hand but my argument is you should very rarely show your hole cards ever.

Poker is a game played with incomplete information and it is how we piece together the little scraps of information that determines whether our reads on a particular player are correct or not. By showing your hole cards at any point during the hand, you are giving away free information to your opponents.

The first piece of information you supply to your observant opponents is what type of hands you play in a particular position at the table. This info is extremely valuable and if you do it often enough a good opponent will be able to deduce if you are positionally aware or not and act accordingly.

Showing you have laid down a strong hand has some merits as it shows you are capable of making big lay-downs and are therefore a solid player but it also shows a decent opponent that you can be bluffed off a strong hand if the situation is correct. A good, adaptable player will then start to attempt to bluff you at every opportunity.

Revealing your cards after a bluff also has some merits in that it can be the catalyst to putting someone on tilt but again a good opponent will reply how you played the hand in their head and start to be aware of how you act when you are running a bluff. Showing a bluff can also help create an image of a crazy player which again has pros an cons. The good thing about this is you will almost certainly get action on your big, made hands but you will get played back at so often that a lot of playable hands will be finding their way to the muck on a regular basis.

Something else I have seen recently is revealing just one of the hole cards whilst the hand is in progress. Whilst it is not allowed in tournament play, it is within the poker cash games rules although the rule differs from casino to casino currently. It adds a new psychological aspect to the game but the above statements also apply to showing just a single hole card.

One Comment on "To show or not to show"

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To show or not to show

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