By CardSharks Poker Community

Choosing the right starting hands in No Limit Texas Holdem is critical to any winning strategy.

In a fixed-limit game, you'll be trying to push every small edge, knowing that small, repetitive edges, played time after time, is where your profit comes from.

But in a no-limit game, you don't always want to play hands that will give you a small edge. Infact, most of the time you are searching for hands that can grow into monster hands.

A hand such as K-J, which can be played for a raise under the right circumstances in fixed-limit hold'em, is the kind of hand that figures to make top pair with a good side card, and will show a profit in fixed limit games when it does. But in a no-limit game, you're not really looking for hands that make one pair; you want hands that will enable you to go after all of an opponent's chips in one fell swoop. So throw this one away!

Here's an example. A pocket pair of sixes is vulnerable in a fixed-limit game because the flop will almost always contain cards bigger than your pair, and an opponent can easily wind up with a higher pair than yours. While the odds against flopping a set are 7.5-to-1 regardless of whether you're in a fixed- or no-limit game, the pay off in a fixed-limit game is usually not sizeable enough to justify bucking odds that large.

But when you might be able to win an opponent's entire stack if you're lucky enough to flop a set, you can afford to call a small bet before the flop knowing that the cost to see the flop only to fold the vast majority of the time will be more than offset by those occasions when your measly pair of sixes grows into a very big hand.

Texas hold'em is all about implied odds, the money you figure to win if you get lucky and make a big hand. The more you and your opponent each have in front of you, the more you can take a flyer on hands that are likely to be tossed away unceremoniously on the flop, but can grow into hands that will enable you to win a very big pot every now and then.

This is very different than fixed-limit hold'em, where you are looking for small edges in high volume pots. Selecting a hand in a no-limit game is a function of stack size, and that's another way of saying that hand selection in no-limit hold'em is driven by the chips you and your opponent each have available for play and how willing your opponent is to commit all or most of his chips with something less than the best possible hand.

Example:

Your hand: 6-6

flop: A-2-5

Here, even with only one over card to your hand, you would have to think you are beat should someone come out betting. However, if the flop is checked around, you can stay in for a free card, obviously hoping for your set to appear. Remember the saying:"No set, no bet", which basically means, if you don't get your set, then you don't put anymore money in the pot.