How do you play nine eight suited?

Nine eight suited is a suited connector you open from most seats, valued for the straights, flushes, and combo draws it flops rather than for top pair.

Nine Eight Suited

Speculative

50.8%

Equity vs a random hand

4

Combos (of 1,326)

4/5

Seats that open it

Open it from the hijack onward, and only rarely under the gun, and call raises in position with deep stacks. It flops straight draws and flushes that get paid off by overpairs and top pairs, which is where the money comes from. Out of position and in small pots it is much weaker, because it cannot reliably realize all that drawing equity.

In the GTO solver's 6-max ranges this hand opens for a raise from the hijack, the cutoff, the button and the small blind, and sometimes from UTG.

Common mistake: Treating a middle pair as a reason to build a big pot. The whole point of the hand is the draws, not pairing the nine or the eight.

Quick tip: Implied odds are the whole game. Deep stacks and position, or fold.