Not only do you get to see you five-sevenths, or 71%, of your hand on the flop, the price is only one round of betting, which makes this a relative bargain.  The flip side of this relationship is that there are three remaining betting rounds but only two additional cards that can be used to complete your hand.

The implications of Texas holdem’s front-loaded nature cannot be overlooked.  Because 71% of your hand is formed by the time you see the flop and you can see the majority of your hand for the bargain price of one bet, it makes the rest of the hand expensive by comparison.  As a result, you should consider abandoning your quest for the pot unless you’ve had a big hand to begin with -- one that can survive the flop without any help -- or if the flop helps you by pairing one or both of your big cards, or provides you with a straight or a flush draw.

In fact, if you need to adopt a default position, just release any hand that cannot survive the flop on its own and is not helped by the flop, unless there is some other compelling reason to keep playing.

The relationship between the cost of the flop and the fact that you receive five-sevenths of your hand for that price, especially when compared against the high cost of paying for the remaining twenty-nine percent of your hand, makes holdem the front-loaded game that it is.

One of the hallmarks of poor play is an unwillingness on the part of many players to release a hand on the flop.  They stick around on a hunch and some hope, neither of which grace them often enough to make investing in hopeful hands worthwhile in the long run.  It’s not that drawing a card is such a bad strategic decision in and of itself.  The bad decision is drawing a card at a price that will not be offset by the reward if you get lucky.

In other words, the odds against improving your hand when you go from the flop to the Turn and the Turn to the River

PLAY TEXAS HOLDEM

The relationship between the size of the pot and the odds against completing your hand exists aside and apart from the front-loaded nature of holdem.  It is always present regardless of the form of poker you’re playing.  But the fact that holdem players get to see the majority of their cards early, and for a bargain price too, makes the decision to fold or continue on after the flop one of critical importance.

If you think this concept is important in fixed-limit holdem, wait until you consider pot-limit and no-limit holdem games.  In those games, especially when you and your opponent each have a deep stack of chips, the decision to continue on after the flop is critical.  Big-bet poker is a game of implied odds, and if you can see the flop inexpensively and catch a big hand in the process, you stand a chance of winning each and every one of your opponent’s chips in the process.

But he has a chance to take all your chips too, which makes big-bet, deep-stack poker more of a trapping, cat-and-mouse game than fixed-limit poker, where money is made when skilled players press small edges by betting and raising as often as possible.

But big-bet poker is very different.  If you can see 71 percent of your hand for an inexpensive price, and your opponent flops a good hand while you flop a great one, you can take his entire stack in one, sweet, front-loaded stroke.