CardRunners presents Dr Razz and his Razz starting hand system in this poker training video. Here is the official teaser from CardRunners:
Doctor Razz is back! This week, Dan re-introduces his famous Starting Hand Power Rating System and discusses the theory and practice behind using it at the table. He then replays some hands from a recent 8/16 session and explains how certain variables can effect your hand ratings.
Here is some of the dialog from the video’s thread at CardRunners:
Q: What is a Bike card?
A: Ah, that’s the lowball lingo for a card that helps you make a “bicycle” or “wheel”, which is the nut low. In razz, this means an A, 2, 3, 4, or 5 (tho in 2-7 lowball it means, well, 2-7). A “blank” is a card that doesn’t help your hand, which in razz or 8/better games means a 9 and up (of course, blanks can sometimes help your hand in razz but that is only a backup plan!) Sorry if that was unclear in the video.
Q: can you comment on the practical side to the bring-in giving you +3 value for hand ranking? So in what situation would playing such a hand be better than folding?
A: Well if the dead cards don’t hurt you so much, defending your bring-in with paint showing can sometimes be viable when it’s rare to find a good spot to play with paint showing when you’re not. For example, if you have (24)Q in the bring-in your power rating is a 10, and if the dead cards help you it could be an 11 or 12. You still wouldn’t want to play against a premium hand with that holding, but if someone opened with an 8 or 9 door card, or with a lower card but from a steal position, then you can consider calling. If the antes are big, or the bring-in itself is big (so that you don’t have to call more than half a SB), then I’d play it. Still, you have to get used to playing with your hand exposed like that in order to make it profitable.
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