88

How to play it before the flop

The fundamentals charts open it from UTG (first position) for 2.5bb, and from MP (middle position), the cutoff and the button as well. If the button opens and you are in the big blind, the chart says call.

Medium pairs make their money by flopping a set, not by holding up as a pair. Against the button range they show 58.5%, which flatters them: that equity assumes all five cards, and in practice you are paying bets without knowing whether your 88 is still good. Open them from late position and call with them when stacks are deep enough to get paid on the set.

What this hand makes

You flop a set 11.8% of the time — once every 8.5 flops — and 86.7% of flops bring at least one card higher than your pair. Going to the river every time, the hand ends up as two pair 39.5% of the time.

Where it ends up if you see all five cards

Exact enumeration, no sampling: the flop events run through all 19,600 possible flops and the final distribution through all 2,118,760 five-card boards. The distribution assumes you always reach the river, so it describes the hand’s potential rather than a real session, where most hands are folded earlier. Open-ended includes double gutshots (two distinct ranks complete it).

Against the reference ranges

Equity if the hand goes to the river against an opponent holding exactly that range. 120,000-hand Monte Carlo with a fixed seed, computed by our engine.

Hand versus hand

These are not estimates: they are the exact enumeration of all 1,712,304 possible boards for each matchup. Suited hands are matched up in different suits.