Gambling House  All Lucky

Dear Mark:
Playing Jacks-or-Better on video poker, should I keep a non-winning pair and draw three cards like I have been doing, or should I be throwing it away and draw one card to fill in a four-card flush, or a four card open ended straight? Bill W.

In certain situations, Bill, a non-winning low pair has a calculable value (the average value of all the wins attainable if the optimum cards are retained and each unique possible draw occurs) and can be worth keeping. But the way you have been playing them, always holding the low pair, is correct some, but not all, of the time. The low pair is worth saving against a four-card straight with no, or only one, high card, but that low pair should be discarded if your four-card straight has two or three high cards, and most definitely when you have a four-card flush.