You can define the types of hands you receive in poker into several categories, all of which are relative to the situation you're facing. At the top of these categories are the "lock," hands-holdings which are heavily favored to win the pot against all competition. At the bottom rung are the weak hands—holdings which are rarely worth a bet. In between, are the strong hands and the trailing hands, and that's the arena where most of your pots will be played.

In this section, we'll look at the four types of poker hands and the general strategies you would pursue with them. We'll start with the worst poker hand, the weak hand, and work our way up to the strongest grouping, the "lock."

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Poker is a game of relative strengths. A lowly pair of sevens may take a pot in one hand, and a mighty full house may fall prey to a higher full house or even a four-of-a-kind in another. It is unlike video poker machines, where the schedule on the outside of the machines gives you an absolute payout for the poker hands you draw. In live table poker, what is one hand's rose, may be another's barren crop; it is all relative.

The beauty of poker is that while you never really know what opponents hold in the hole, you can make educated guesses based on the way they are betting from the particular position in which they sit. As we discussed earlier, position plays an important role in what hands a player can and cannot call, bet, or raise with. If you evaluate the cards you see, the betting patterns of the table, the positions and actions of the players, and the dynamics of the hand, you can make some reasonable deductions.

Players who bet strong in early positions, for example, are advertising strength. They'll need to weather possible raises after their position. In contrast, players who bet strong in late position against little opposition aren't necessarily playing the strength of their hands. They may just be playing the position.

Of course, while opponents come in a variety of strengths and dispositions, you can narrow them down to "types" and play them accordingly. You'll soon learn which opponents play aggressively and which won't budge with a bet unless they've got a strong hand, which ones stay too long in pots and which players bluff too often or not at all. All this goes into the cauldron of your knowledge to be used in every situation to understand just how strong or weak your hand is at that particular moment.

Bets, calls, and raises are made for particular reasons, and over time, you'll get a better sense of what those reasons are. For example, if two opponents are betting into your four-straight in seven-card stud, and you believe they think you have a straight, you need to factor that into your decision-making. To be successful at poker, you need to know when you're standing strong, when you're weak, when you're a virtual lock with the strength of your hand, and when your hand has possibilities but is trailing in strength to what you perceive your opponents are holding. Again, it's all a game of mutual perception.

Let's now take a look at the types of relative hands you might hold and the general strategy to pursue when you're playing these hands.

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While many players evaluate the possibilities of what their opponents may hold judging by the cards they see and how they are betting, it is equally important to consider what cards your opponent thinks you hold. For example, while his play indicates types of hands he may have, so too does your play indicate some possibilities about what you may be holding. Poker, after all, is a game of logic and assessment. Intelligent players are always evaluating and reevaluating situations according to the actions of their opponents. While you are studying your opponents, they are studying you. What are you representing by your betting—a strong hand, a Weak hand, a lock? Are you bluffing?

As you analyze what you think they think you have, their actions become more understandable, and you'll have more information to draw from in making your decisions. For example, in seven-card stud, if your first three open cards are spades, and you've been betting according to a pattern that would lend credence to a flush, you'll have a lot more information about an opponent when his aggressive opening betting gets much more tentative as the third flush card is revealed.

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There can never be enough said about how important money management is in the winning formula. From betting within one's means to minimizing losses and maximizing gains to emotional control, money management is the key to being a winner. Be sure to read the money mangement chapter carefully and follow its advice.

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Do not fall in love with your cards, no matter how pretty they look. There are no prizes for second best at poker. Only the winner takes the cake. If you have kings over 6s on Fifth Street in seven-card stud, and an opponent gets dealt an open pair of aces, the dirge has begun. If those aces are paired with a second pair, you're chasing with a dead hand.

Aces up beat kings up in poker. Though you may improve, those aces have an equal chance of improving. Unless you have very compelling pot odds, the romantic interlude is over—it's time to fold.

Sometimes you must fold strong hands in the face of heavy betting, even though you suspect an opponent is suspected of bluffing. There's nothing wrong with being bluffed out of pots. That's part of the game. If you are never bluffed out of a pot, that means you're calling too often, and opponents are reaping showdown harvest with this loose play. Good players respect cards and can be bluffed. Only weak players will never give up the ship—until it sinks. Don't worry about trying to scratch out a win in every pot. Just win the ones you can and minimize losses in the ones you can't.

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Becoming a more proficient poker player requires that you pay attention to your opponents' moves and mannerisms during the course of a poker game. Hands and situations repeat themselves over and over again in poker. The wise player benefits from these experiences and can apply the knowledge he gains to future hands.

While learning from mistakes is a great step in improving skills, a smart player also learns from his wins, and from other players' wins and losses. He also learns from mistakes and the strong plays made by opponents. Every deal is a poker class that can provide a lesson, large or small.

The improving poker player examines every situation and hand to see how it could have been played optimally. For example, on a lock-type hand, could an extra bet have been forced out of the losers, or could more players have been kept in the pot with a different betting pattern? Or on a hand that lost, could it have been played more aggressively so that opponents could have been forced out earlier? Should the player have bowed out earlier himself, realizing that maybe the winner's betting suggested a better hand than could be beat?

A lot of poker knowledge is learned by observing. Watch your opponents and see how they react to the different situations that come up in a poker game. The more you learn about your opponents, the better your chances of squeezing extra bets out of them, building bigger pots for yourself when the cards are right, and beating them more consistently.
How well you do in poker is not measured by the actual winning or losing of each hand, but by how well you played that hand. You must always examine your play and ask youself the question, "Did I play the cards optimally?" Just because you won a hand doesn't mean you played it well. Conversely, just because you lost a hand doesn't mean you played it poorly. Perhaps you could have won a bigger pot, or perhaps you should have forced out another player and gotten lucky when he didn't draw out on you. Maybe you stayed in one card too many. Maybe you shouldn't have played the hand at all.

If you constantly stay aware of how the game is being played and keep track of the tendencies of other players, you can't help becoming a better player. And playing better means winning more.

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When you're not sure, give the non-bluffer the benefit of the doubt and fold marginal hands. You save money against this type of player by calling less with questionable hands and by not having your good hands bluffed out by his scare cards. This type of player is predictable, and that gives you a big edge in poker.

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