Tuesday, May 01, 2007

Set over set

In the March 28 issue of Card Player, Phil Hellmuth discusses a hand featuring set over set. In a sidebar entitled Poker Odds, presumably written by CP staff, the following is stated:

In a 10-handed game in which two players have been dealt pocket pairs, the chance of both players flopping sets is less than 0.1 percent.

I have no desire in calculating this probability and will accept their 0.1 percent. What I do find particularly funny is the redundant pre-condition of "in a 10-handed game". It doesn't matter if it's 10-handed, 5-handed or heads-up; if two players have been dealt pocket pairs, the chance of both players flopping sets is the same.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Wouldn't you factor in more unseen cards in larger games as respect to the probablity of set over set and not just those who are in the hand?

Mr Subliminal said...

For the purpose of this type of calculation, dealt hands that are not pairs are treated the same as unseen cards. So in essence, all that is relevant is our two pairs (4 cards) and the remaining 48 cards.

MattQ said...

Thanks for the response, I'll let you know how it pans out.

MattQ said...

p.s. you've been tagged. Check my last post.