1. Texas Hold'em Terms And Definitions
2. Texas Hold'em Poker Terms And Definitions
3. Texas Holdem Terms And Definitions

Texas Hold'em This is also the name for Hold'em, the most popular form of poker Third Street In Seven Card Stud and Seven Card Stud 8 or Better, this is the first betting round on the first three cards Thirty Miles Three tens Three of a Kind Three cards of the same number or face value ('trips') Tight A player who doesn't play many pots. Poker Terms - Common Phrases and Acronyms. In poker, there is practically a library of poker terms that are commonly used. For the uninitiated, these terms can sound like a completely different language, when a poker player says, 'I flopped a belly buster on a rainbow board', when they are really saying that they have an inside straight draw, after the dealer dealt the first three cards, all.

Terms

• All In – When a player bets all of his/her remaining chips
• Ante – In No Limit Texas Hold’em Tournament play, the amount of chips charged per hand dealt (above and beyond the blinds) whether or not you decide to participate in the hand. Generally, there is no ante charged at the beginning levels. Charging antes helps play go faster.
• Bad Beat – Traditionally, a bad beat was when a stellar hand got beat by a lousy hand; like pocket Aces being beat by 8 3. The term is now used in other cases. For example, when a player with a great hand is beat by an even better hand. Having a Pr Ks beat by a Pr As is a standard beat but, having 4 of a kind beat by a Royal Flush, or a straight beat by a full house are bad beats. Players experience bad beats when an opponent needs a case card to beat them – and gets it. Another type of bad beat is when you are ahead, then behind, then ahead again, then you lose. Here’s an example of that on video, Marc Podell vs Tiffany Michelle in the 2008 Word Series of Poker. Marc’s starting hand of a pair of Tens is better than Tiffany Michelle’s suited connectors.
• Blank – A blank card is a card that does not help a player’s hand improve
• Blinds– Forced bets to ensure that there are chips in the pot (in case everyone folds). The blinds go into the pot before any cards are dealt. There is a Small blind and a Big blind. Examples are: $1/$2, $25/$50, $2000/$4000, $150,000/$300,000. In tournament play, the blinds are increased every 15, 20, 30, 60, 120 minutes, according to the tournament structure. Increasing the blinds ensures that the tournament will end. Without blinds, a player with only one chip could continue to fold hands indefinitely, and the end of the game could be prolonged for an extensive amount of time.
  • Big Blind – The player sitting two to the left of the button (dealer) traveling clockwise around the table. This player is obligated to put the larger amount of the blinds into the pot before the hole cards are dealt. The Big Blind is the last to act (bet, raise, fold or call) pre-flop, and the second to act post-flop. The amount of the Big Blind is the minimum size bet a player can make.
  • Small Blind – The player sitting to the left of the button (dealer) traveling clockwise around the table. This player is obligated to put the smaller amount of the blinds into the pot before the hole cards are dealt. The Small Blind is the next-to-the-last to act (bet, raise or call ) pre-flop, and the first to act post-flop.

  Learn more about the Blinds.

• Board Person – The employee in the Poker Room who is responsible for maintaining the list of card games and limits in the Poker Room and registering players (collecting their money and seeing that they get chips) for the various games inside the Poker Room.
  
• Boat – see Full House
• Burn – These are the cards that the dealer puts to the side before dealing the flop, turn and river. The cards are “wasted” in order to ensure the no one has seen the top card in the deck.
• Button– A token (usually a white plastic disc) that moves clockwise around the table. The button moves one player to the left after each hand. The token indicates the ‘dealer’ for the current hand in order to place the Big Blind and Small Blind (that are to the left of the button). This happens even when there is an actual dealer, who is not participating in the poker game.

  The Button moves from one player to the next so that the blinds are evenly distributed around the table and players have equal opportunity to play from different positions.

  How is the initial button determined?
  When a table first opens, a card is dealt in front of each player. The player who receives the highest ranking card is the button. If the card values are equal…Learn more about The Button.

• Case ‘card’ – last ‘card of this amount’ in the deck; meaning there is only one (king, deuce, seven, ten) left in the deck and that is the one that a player needs to make a hand.
• Community Cards – the cards dealt face up to the middle of the table. Five cards are dealt to the middle in No Limit Hold’em – 3 for the Flop, 1 for the Turn, and 1 for the River.
• Computer Hand – Hole cards of Q 7
• Connectors – Hole cards of adjacent amounts like 8 9, 3 4, 5 6.
• Cowboys– aka Ace Magnets – Pair of Ks ()
• Cut-Off – The player one to the left of the dealer (button)
• Deuce – a 2
• Doyle Brunson Hand – 10 2
• Drawing Dead – When there are no cards that can come on the board that can improve your hand.
• Family Pot – When everyone at the table plays a round of betting. Somtimes used when “most” of the players at the table are in the hand.
• Flag(s) – $5,000 poker chip(s)
• Flatsaka Flat Calls– Player calls without raising or re-raising
• Fish – A bad player, oftentimes a beginner; an easy target for more experienced poker players
• Fold – Choosing to not play a hand or to discontinue playing a hand
• Flop – The first three community cards dealt face up to the middle of the table. Learn more about the Flop.
• Full House – aka Boat – Three of one card value and a pair of another. Example: In this amazing first hand of a $10K tournament, Sammy Farha gets a full house (Aces full of Tens) and Oliver Hudson gets a full house (Tens full of Aces). Sammy’s full house is better because he has three Aces. Sammy has The Nuts and Oliver ends up with a Bad Beat.
• Highway Patrol – 10 4
• Hole Cards – The two cards dealt to you face down. Learn more about the Hole Cards.
• Hooks – Pair of Js
• Ladies – Queens
• Limp In – Entering the pot by putting in the big blind (and not raising.) Limping in does not give other players any idea of what your hole cards might be. Players with strong hands like AA and KK sometimes ‘limp in’ in order to disguise the strength of their hand. See Slow Playing.
• Kicker – One of your hole cards. When players have a card in common (say you have AQ and another player has QJ), if the community cards do not enhance one of the hands or enhances both hands in the same way, the one with the higher kicker (the uncommon card) wins the hand (AQ).
• Kojac – KJ
• Muck Your Hand – Surrender your cards to the dealer face down and without showing them to other players. Tossing your cards in the middle without showing them.
• The Nuts – The very best 5-card hand that can be made combining a player’s hole cards and the community cards.
• Offsuit – aka Unsuited. Cards of different suits. Offsuit is sometimes designated by “o”, so 53o means a five and a three of different suits. Spoken like 5 (pause) 3 (pause) offsuit. Sometimes the “u” for Unsuited is used instead of the “o”.
• On Tilt – upset – maybe angry, disappointed or disgusted. A player who is emotionally affected by recent play. Players who are on tilt need time to recover because oftentimes when they play a hand while on tilt, they make bad choices.
• Pancake(s) – $25,000 poker chip(s)
• Rag – A weak kicker
• Rake – The dollar amount the Poker Room takes from each tournament entrant, or in cash games, from each hand. It is income to cover expenses of holding the tournament/game.
• River – aka Fifth Street – The fifth (and last) community card dealt. Learn more about the River.
• Rockets – aka Pocket Rockets and American Airlines – Pair As for hole cards
• Royal Flush – A K Q J 10 of the same suit. Two Royal Flush Examples at the WSOP.
• Runner Runner – When a player needs both the Turn and the River to be cards that will complete his/her hand.
• Stack – the amount of chips each player has
• Slow Playing – When a player has a big hand and does not bet nor raise in order to disguise the “strength” of his/her hand.
• Snow men – Pair of 8s
• Suited – Cards of the same suit
• TJ Cloutier hand – J 9 clubs
• Treys – a Pr of 3s
• Turn – aka Fourth Street – The fourth community card dealt. Learn more about the Turn.
• Rainbow – Flop of three different suits
• Under the gun – First to act (bet or call) after the hole cards have been dealt. This player is seated to the left of the Big Blind. Learn more about being Under The Gun.
• Unsuited – See Offsuit.
• Walking sticks – Pair of 7s
• Wheel – A 5-High Straight of mixed suits – 5 4 3 2 A. A wheel with cards all in the same suit is a Straight Flush that is also called a “steel wheel“.
• Worst hand in the deck – 7 2

Sitting down to play Texas Hold’em for the first time can be a bewildering experience, what with players casually talking about spiking a double belly-buster to sink a sucker’s set. Unless you know the lingo, learning the game may be slow going, so take the time to study this comprehensive glossary of common Texas Hold’em terms before you move on to rules and strategy.

All-In – The trademark declaration of No-Limit Texas Hold’em, all-in is the phrase used by a player to signal that they are wagering all of their chips. You may also put an opponent all-in by betting enough to cover their entire stack should they commit to calling. Any hand of Hold’em can instantly become an emotional roller coaster the moment you put yourself all-in.

Ante – In tournament Hold’em, these are an escalating series of forced bets that each player must make before every hand. Typically the ante stage of a tournament begins after six blind levels have passed. Antes increase the size of pots before the cards have even been dealt and give aggressive players a reason to steal the blinds.

Blinds – Every hand of Texas Hold’em begins with two players ponying up forced bets before the cards are dealt. Known as the small and big blinds because you are effectively betting without seeing your cards, these positions on the table rotate after every hand, stimulating future betting by giving players a pot to fight over on every single deal. The small blind is always the seat directly left of the dealer button, while the big blind is the next seat to the left, meaning the players on the blinds act first throughout the hand.

Boat – Another name for a full house.

Broadway – The best straight possible, consisting of the 10-J-Q-K-A. Individually, these five cards are also known as Broadway cards.

Burn Card – Whenever the dealer is ready to reveal the next community card, he or she will first discard the top card in the deck face down on the table. By “burning” a card before the flop, turn and river, the dealer assures the rest of the table that everything is on the level, with no stacking of the deck or marked cards.

Button – Typically a circular disk with “Button” emblazoned on each side, this object is used in Texas Hold’em to denote the dealer position on the table. After every hand the dealer button is moved one seat position to the left, which moves the blinds and facilitates the forced betting fairly.

Call – Deciding to equal a bet made by another player to remain in the hand.

Check – When the action comes to a player and they elect to pass without betting any chips. You may verbally say check, or simply tap the table with your knuckles, to pass the action along without parting with any of your hard earned money.

Check-Raise – A raise which comes after you have checked to your opponent and they have bet into you. The cornerstone of every poker game is deception, and in Texas Hold’em the most basic act of trickery is the check-raise. When you check and passively invite your opponent to bet, only to respond with an immediate raise, the check-raise can chip away at their stack in short order.

Chop – A chop occurs when the action folds all the way around the table leaving only the small and big blinds, and both players elect to take their money back rather than play a paltry pot and surrender half of it to the rake.

Chopped Pot – A draw or tie during the showdown. If the remaining players turn over the same hand, such as a pair of jacks with an ace kicker, the pot is chopped up, or split into even portions and distributed.

Counterfeited – The unfortunate role reversal which can occur when the board cards nullify certain cards in your hand. A common example of a hand being counterfeited is when a player flops bottom two pair, say the 3-5 on a 3-5-10 flop, and the turn or river brings a second Ten to the board. The resulting pair of Tens shared by both players extinguishes the strength of bottom two pair, giving the lead to anybody with a pocket pair in the hole.

Door Card – Also known as the card in the window, this is the first card player’s see as the dealer is spreading the flop. Most casino dealers reveal the flop with a flourish, pausing with the door card tantalizingly exposed before rapidly flashing the rest of the flop across the table.

Double Belly-Buster – A straight draw in which you need to hit any of two unconnected cards to complete your hand. If you have 7-8 in the hole and the flop has fallen 4-6-10, you now need any 5 or Ten to make a straight, thus you hold a double belly-buster straight draw.

Flat(call) – A modern take on a classic idiom, the word flat is used by younger poker players to denote a smooth call. The term is a bit superfluous, as there is no other way to call but to flat call, but you will invariably hear players mention that they “flatted” on the flop when recounting a recent hand.

Flop – The first three community cards revealed to the table simultaneously. The flop comes after the opening betting round and allows players to convert their two hole cards into a five-card poker hand of varying strength.

Fourth and Fifth Street – The fourth and fifth community cards used by all players to form a hand, these are more commonly known as the Turn and River.

Gutshot – A straight draw in which you need to hit precisely one card to complete your hand. If you have 7-8 in the hole and the flop has fallen 4-5-K, you now need any 6 to make a straight, thus you hold a gutshot straight draw.

Hole Cards – Every hand of Texas Hold’em begins with the dealer distributing two cards face down to each player. The cards you hold “in the hole” are yours and yours alone, which means you should always protect them from prying eyes. Hole cards can form a total of 169 nonequivalent starting hands, ranging from the lowly 2♥ 7♣ offsuit to the almighty A♠A♦, or pocket aces, and knowing which of these to hold and which to fold forms the foundation of Texas Hold’em strategy.

Kicker – The tiebreaker used to determine a winner when players in a showdown hold the same pair. For example, if I have the Ace-King and you have the King-Jack, and a King is on board giving us both top pair, my Ace kicker bests your Jack kicker and the pot is shipped in my direction.

Muck – This term can be used as both a noun and a verb. Folding your hand is also known as mucking, while the pile of folded hands that accumulates during every hand is called the muck. A hand can be declared dead the moment it touches the muck, which is why most players use card protectors to keep their cards safe and sound.

On the Come – Betting in a situation where you are still drawing to make a hand. When you need the right card to come in order to complete a straight, flush or full house, and still decide to push the envelope with a bet or raise, you’re doing so on the come.

Open-Ended – A straight draw in which you have four consecutive cards and need to hit either end to complete your hand. If you have 7-8 in the hole and the flop has fallen 9-10-A, you now need any 6 or any Jack to make a straight, thus you hold an open-ended straight draw.

Paint – A descriptive term for any face card, from Jack through King, which stems from the distinctive portrait-like appearance of these cards in most decks.

Pot – Used as a verb, as in “I’ll pot it,” this word is a fixture of Pot-Limit Hold’em, a game in which the maximum allowable bet is the current size of the pot.

Preflop – Any action that occurs before the flop has been dealt. Basically, the betting and folding to take place after you receive your hole cards, but before you see the flop, is known as the preflop stage of a hand.

Nuts – The best possible cards at any given moment in a hand. Pocket Aces is the nuts preflop, while the 10♥J♥Q♥K♥A♥ Royal Flush is the ultimate nuts. The ace-high flush is the nut flush, the Broadway straight is the nut straight, and the simple ace-high is sarcastically called the nut nothing.

Rake – The house fee taken from each cash game pot or tournament buy-in by the casino staff or home game operator. Because every single hand results in a few chips being pocketed by the casino cage, grizzled poker vets know that it takes talent just to beat the rake.

Texas Hold'em Terms And Definitions

Rags – A derisive epithet for any traditionally inferior starting hand consisting of unconnected, low cards.

River – The fifth and final community card to be revealed. Fortunes can be won and lost on the river, as this conclusive card completes the board and leaves players with their final hand before the showdown.

Set – Fortuitously forming three of a kind while holding a pocket pair is known in Texas Hold’em as hitting your set. A set of deuces is much stronger than a pair of aces, and anytime you spike a set it’s a cause for celebration, but the hand’s real strength comes from its propensity for turning into a powerful full house.

Showdown – When the flop, turn and river have been exposed and the final betting round has occurred, the players still holding cards confront one another to determine the pot’s winner. All hands are not always turned over at the showdown, as a losing player may elect to muck his meek holding rather than let the competition see the goods.

Texas Hold'em Poker Terms And Definitions

Suckout – Anytime the statistically inferior hand catches up to best a made hand. Players will complain like clockwork about the brutal suckouts they suffer through, and you will soon learn to dread suckout artists who seem to catch every card they need.

Suited – Whenever you hold two hole cards of the same suit, your hand is said to be suited. Suited hands like 6♣7♣ are perceived to be slightly more valuable than their unsuited counterparts, because the possibility of making a flush is improved.

Texas Holdem Terms And Definitions

Turn – The fourth community card to be revealed. The turn card comes after the flop and before the river, meaning it can be a pivotal point in any hand.