Seven Card Stud Tips Articles | Poker

By: Joshua Frost

Most players tend to pay attention to their own hands while playing 7 Card Stud(7CS). It is however profitable to look at your opponents hands too and not only when you get down to 7th street. A lot of information is given to you even before the betting starts. When a loose player is folding for instance a 10 as a up card you can be assured he does not have a 10 in the hole. If you are well aware of the loose style of this player then you can almost also discard him having a 9 and/or Jack in the hole. These kind of hands gets played a lot by loose or novice players. With this information you can gain that extra few % on your opponents in the hand.

Always try to discount cards that would improve your hand, but are almost guaranteed in your opponents hands. This means that if you need a King to make a broadway straight (the highest straight possible) and an opponent is betting into you with a King and a 2 and an 8 shown he almost certainly will have a King in the hole if he bet from the beginning. This gives you only 2 outs left instead of 3. Try to play hands in which it is almost impossible for your opponents to figure out what you have. If you on 5th street had 7-8-9 shown your opponent will most definitely put you on the straight(draw). If you get excellent hole cards and on 5th street your hands reads 6-9-2- then it is a lot harder for your opponent to put you on the same hand as in the previous example. In the first example a player might fold his trips to you in the end, but in the latter you have a good chance of getting paid of with your straight.

If you want to be a profitable player at 7CS then it is important to control the size of the pot. This will ensure that you will not lose a large amount of chips if your opponent hits a card on 7th street, or even if you don't hit your card on 7th street. In a lot of games you will see people bet the pot with flush draws and straight draws, but by making this pot huge in the early stages of the hand you will lose more chips on average then you will gain if you do hit your straight. After all you still need to hit when you bet heavily. And your opponent might have you beat with a flush or a full house in the end.

A very important part of 7Cs is studying. Studying your hand, your outs, your opponents hands and your opponents outs. Count in the pot odds and your Expectation Value and you have a plethora of information to digest all in short amount of time. If you play in a live game you will most of the time be granted some time to think about it, but online you are held by a clock. Do not be ashamed to click on the "time" button to get a few extra seconds. Also do not respond or get agitated by players writing zzZzZzZz in the chat while you think. After all YOU are the one that has to make a decision with YOUR money. So take your time and don't get rushed by your fellow players or the clock.