Limit Texas Hold'em: Jack Ten Suited vs. King Ten Suited

Question
I've heard people debate this before, and I wanted to see what your opinion is. What's the better Texas hold em hand in a limit game; JTs or KTs?

Answer
Funny you bring this up, as this very question was at the heart of a debate on a poker message board about 5 years ago. As far as I'm concerned these two hands run fairly close in value. I'd probably prefer the KTs in a short pot, and the JTs in a multi-way pot. If the pot has been raised pre-flop the JTs starts looking more attractive, since it's much less likely that you're dominated.

That said, where I'd play one of these hands I'd almost always play the other. They run pretty close, and any difference is likely negligible. Debates of this nature pop up from time to time on message boards, and the reason (IMO) is that it's a slow day for poker theory and nobody has much else to talk about. I call these 'how many angels can sit on a head of a pin' questions, because the answer just isn't very valuable. I've killed my share of hours arguing about issues like this, but in the end I have to concede that great Texas hold em players do not come about after having spent months silently deliberating over these kinds of questions.

Understand, however, that I'm talking about limit. In NL I'll take the JTs absolutely every time. True, it's easier to run into a higher flush with the JTs, but let's face it-- flush over flush doesn't happen every day. And the KTs is a hand that can break you when the flop comes ten high, since it's a hand that very, very hard to get away from on a flop like that. On a king high board you can often get away from it, since it's much more likely you've got a kicker problem. But on a ten high board you've got a hand that can get you into real trouble. Note that the JTs doesn't have this problem, since you can get away from both jack high and ten high flops, as in neither case do you have any kind of kicker to brag about.

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