Friend and I are both noobs at 2-7 and were debating which card you're supposed to pitch when you start with 2 3 4 5 6?

6. aces are only high for some nonsensical reason in this game.

either way you have the same number of outs to improve, so ditch the 6 to make better end hands.

What was the argument for pitching a differnt card. Fwiw I’ve seen some pretty odd breaks with the striahht 7/8s before. My favorite was when a guy showed me a striahht 7 on the river and says man I pitched the 3 and caught another 3

most likely they think an ace makes a straight. like if the rules where pure ie: 5 card draw but backwards, you could maybe ditch the 5 (tho i still think it's the 6), but for some reason somebody decided to taint the rules with this weird, nonsensical exception.

There's no nonsensical exception in 27 TD. It's pure reverse. The exceptions are in A5 TD.

Here's my interpretation/justification:
Aces are always either a 1 or 14, player's choice. If I have A5432 in 2-7, I'm choosing it's a 14 and not a 1. But in highball I'm happy for it to be a 1. Further supporting this mindset are split pot games where it's both a 1 and 14 in the same hand for the two sides. Or even consider blackjack, where it can be a 1 or 11 and the dealer announces the hand value as such (ex A2 is 3/13).

it's not player's choice tho. say in holdem, if you make a wheel, and the other guy has a pair, the dealer is forced to ship you the pot whether you want the ace to be high or not.
in 2-7 you still don't have a choice to ignore your flushes and straights, and you shouldn't be able to play a2345 as anything but a straight.

Poker is about choosing 5 cards from all the cards you have to make a hand. So if you have a flush or straight in 5 card draw low, you have no other cards to choose to avoid that hand. What you say about hold em is true, but I think it's fair to make some assumption of non-idiocy/self-preservation. At the end of the day, any rule is inherently arbitrary and invented, so it's irrelevant whether we have a justification or not. Do you think 2-7 lowball game should would be better if aces were low? Or are you just saying it's dumb because it doesn't jive with other variants. If the former, what's the advantage? If the latter, then your argument that it's not consistent is just as arbitrary as my argument that it is.

there is no cases in holdem when an ace counts for low except for when you have a wheel. why not for 2-7? everything else is identical.

In 2-7, ace is only high. It is simply a rank above a king.
That makes it only ever be rank 14, never 1. And therefore 14-2-3-4-5 is not a straight.

I'd imagine that TJQKA is not a straight in A-5 draw, either, since A can only ever be rank 1 in that game. But that situation would only ever come up if someone thought they were playing a high game and actually won against someone who paired up.

Straights don't hurt you in A-5, so broadway would be a KQJT-perfect

Dang there's no head smack emoji?

I knew straights didn't count but didn't think of it when coming up with an analog...

Still, in 2-7 where an A always counts as 14, why would it suddenly become a 1 when adjacent to a 2, 3, 4, and 5?
That's why it makes sense to me that A2345 is an ace-smooth rather than a straight.

for the same reason it does in a high only game.
in holdem a2345 beats ak345. therefor, it should lose in 2-7.
you're not trying to make the best low. your trying to make the worst hand.
there's literally no other scenario in which the best holdem hand also wins in 2-7. it's just a stupid exception designed to shark noobs.