DE
Worth 3 points before any premium square, and the 44th lowest-scoring of 96 — tied with 7 others.
DE extends into 9 three-letter words, which is the 43rd least extendable of 96 — tied with 8 others. That is the number worth memorising: a two-letter word is a place to put tiles, but a well-hooked one is a place to put them where the board stays open.
Every hook
- O→ODE
- B→DEB
- E→DEE
- L→DEL
- N→DEN
- V→DEV
- W→DEW
- X→DEX
- Y→DEY
Not all of them are equally reachable, which a bare count of 9 hides. DE hooks on 9 distinct letters, and the ones you are likeliest to be holding are E (60% of opening racks), O (45% of opening racks) and N (36% of opening racks). The rarest is X, at 7%.
How often you can actually play it
Out of an opening rack, 14.18% of the time you hold the letters for DE outright, the 21st likeliest of 96 — tied with 3 others. Counting a blank as whichever letter is missing lifts that to 21.86%, though spending one of the two blanks on a two-letter word is rarely the play. Exact hypergeometrics over the 100-tile bag, not a simulation.
It reverses
DE backwards is ED, which is also good. That is how most of this list is actually learned — 46 of the 96 come in reversible pairs, so knowing one gets you the other free.