Trouble Hands for Beginners

There are a lot of hands that look attractive to poker players.  Obviously hands like A-A through Q-Q will make you fall in love, but even cards like A-Q and J-J can make people think twice about folding - even if they’re beat on the river.  However, people need to learn which hands can be major trouble so that they can avoid falling into certain traps.  This is especially true of beginning players as they can get sucked into thinking something like A-Q is gold.  Here are some hands you need to watch out for when playing poker:

A-Q

I know I mentioned this one a couple times and it was for good reason too.  A-Q looks like a sweet pair of cards, but in reality it’s not that great.  A-Q is easily dominated by premium hands and will also be beaten by A-K (if you don’t count this as premium) on most occasions. 

J-J

Pocket jacks lie in most people’s range of premium cards.  But the problem with these is that they almost always need another jack on the board to win you anything.  After all, a pair of jacks is rarely going to win a hand of Texas Hold’em on a full table so you’re almost better off seeing the flop cheaply here.

A-J

Much like A-Q, A-J looks attractive because there is a top pair chance as well as another face card here.  But if A-Q is a trouble card then A-J is definitely even worse; the only difference is that A-J is a little less valued.  You often need a two pair to win with these cards as just hitting an ace doesn’t always do the job and a pair of jacks definitely won’t do the job unless the board is weak.