Anybody who's played with me long enough knows that I can snap a person's head off when they're raising with a nut low. If the hand is head's up, the move is completely idiotic because there's absolutely no chance the nut low will scoop anything. If the hand is 3-handed, then there's a better than average chance that two people have the same nut low because nobody in their right mind will fold in this situation. Thus the move is even more idiotic because there's a better than average chance that you're raising to get quartered. Raising four-handed is just as stupid because of the same reason. Only playing 5-handed or better does raising with a nut low even begin to make sense. So why do so many people do it? The simple answer: because they're idiots who don't understand the game.

In my previous article of this series, I discussed the low probability of raising with A2HH (HH=High card, High card) in your hand. If you learned nothing else from that article, hopefully you learned how much of an idiot you were for raising. If you subtracted the odds of catching a runner-runner low on the flop, turn, and river, then hopefully you realized that you only have a 31% chance of making any low at all -- horrible odds for raising with a bare A2. This article expands your holding to A2LH (A2, Low card, High card) and discusses the odds for making a low. Unlike the A2HH hand, this hand is much more favorable to catching your low.

I see this play far too often: a player in any position on the table raising with an A2HH (HH=High card, High card) in their hand. Many players operate under the false assumption that A2xx is a made hand, and is guaranteed to split 1/2 the pot, if not scoop with it. When the low doesn't come, they don't understand why, and then complain that they had such a good starting hand. Conversely, when the low does come, players often raise with the nut low, only to get themselves quartered or 1/6 the pot. In the former case, they clearly don't understand the math behind chasing the low; and in the latter case, they don't understand the psychology of playing in a split pot game with multiple players in the hand. If you're one of those players who habitually raises with any A2 and then wonder why it's so difficult to make a low, then you need to read this article.

Conventional wisdom holds that you should never play any hand with 3 of a kind in it. In Omaha-Hi, this is certainly true, but in Hi/Lo, there are some situations where you not only might want to play your trips, but might want to even raise with them. But how many of these hands are there, and what do they look like?