A small sampling of what’s often heard ’round the poker table:
“I’m all in!”
“Is that supposed to be, some kinda position raise or something?”
“What you got under there, man? Big slick? Cowboys?”
“Probably ducks.”
“Oooh, dead man’s hand. Against…what is that shit?”
“This is my favorite hand!”
“Why am I not surprised that a flat tire’s your favorite hand? Fuckin’ donkey. Oh wait, yeah, they’re SUITED!”
“Damn, he just flopped the nuts.”
“Big blind special!”
Yeah. As in, huh..?
Now, you can sit tight at the poker table and try to brazen your way through this and hope that the blank expression on your face is taken for inscrutability instead of total confusion. OR, you can whip out the Punkass Poker Translator(tm) and fake your way to a real poker reputation!
Poker terms tend to describe one of 3 things: the players, the cards, or the situation. We’ll start with the players.
Fish: Someone who does not often bet or raise, but plays pretty much every hand he can afford regardless of how good it is. Identifiable by his cry, “I gotta see the flop!” (note: Flop (flop) n. The first three community cards dealt to the table.)
Rock: Someone who does not often bet or raise, but is religious about playing only good hands. Identifiable by the way the other players flee the table whenever he reaches for his chips to place a bet, as they all know he only does that when he’s got the best hand out there.
Shark: Someone who bets and raises aggressively, but is also very careful about only playing good hands. Identifiable by the way the other players try to impress him and be his friend, partly because they admire his skill and partly because they hope if he likes them he’ll go easy on them.
Maniac: Someone who bets and raises aggressively and plays pretty much every hand he gets regardless of how good it is. Identifiable by the fact that whatever table he’s sitting at fills up last and the glares of the players that end up stuck with him.
Calling station: Someone who, once he has decided to be in a hand, absolutely will not fold his cards, whether the hand is shaping up well or not. He will call every bet any other player makes, regardless of how insanely much or little it is. Identifiably by his cry, “I call!” Often to the point where people begin referring to him as that.
Donkey: Someone who does not know how to play, even after playing for months or even years. Why he is unable to learn is a complete mystery. Identifiable by the fact that other players don’t talk to him if they can possibly help it no matter how hard he tries to get them to do so and the look of agony on their faces when he manages to trap them in a conversation about “strategy.”
On to the cards! There is actually a poker term for every single hand there is…I mean EVERY single hand; for instance, there is actually a phrase for not just a pair of fours, but a pair of fours that specifically consists of a four of clubs and a four of spades. NOBODY except the very strange or unusually obsessed uses 90% of these. There are some in common usage though that you should know.
Ace rag: This is an ace and a second card that is less than a ten. All some players need to see is the ace to get excited. The rest of us know that this is not a great hand, hence the negatively connotated “rag.” A special case of this is the “Dead man’s hand,” which is an ace and an eight; Wild Bill Hikok was supposed to have been shot during a poker game while holding this hand.
Big slick: This is an ace and a king.
Bullets or Rockets: This is a pair of aces.
Suited: This is two cards of the same suit (hearts, clubs, diamonds or spades)
Connectors: This is two cards in numerical sequence (such as a 6 and a 7 or a jack and a queen)
Doyle Brunson: This is a ten and a two. Why would something so totally useless have a name like that? Doyle Brunson, who wrote the arguably most popular poker strategy book out there, won the biggest poker tournament in the world two years in a row with that hand.
Ducks: This is a pair of twos.
Cowboys: This is a pair of kings.
Ladies: This is a pair of queens.
Finally, the situations!
All in: When a player bets all his remaining poker chips on a hand.
Bad beat: When a player has a really, really good hand, the kind you don’t often get statistically speaking, but somebody else happens to have an even better one.
Pot: The pile of chips in the middle of the table that everyone’s bets and calls have gone into making.
Small and big blinds: The two people to the left of the dealer have to ante up before even the two pocket (also called “hole”) cards are dealt to everyone. The small blind is half the amount of the big blind. The dealer position moves one player to the left every hand. In poker tournaments, these increase every so often. In cash games, they usually don’t.
Under the gun: Being the first person to have to bet or fold after the hole cards are dealt; this is the person to the left of the big blind.
Big blind special: Because the big blind already had to place the minimum bet out before the hand started, if nobody raises the bet amount before the dealer deals the community cards (also called the “flop”), nobody has any idea if he has good cards or not. He often doesn’t have good cards, but once in a while the flop cards will make his hole cards a very nice hand. This is called getting a “big blind special.”
Drawing dead: Sometimes somebody’s hand is so good after the flop that no matter what the remainder of the community cards end up being, they won’t make a hand that can beat it. So all the other players are “drawing dead” after that point.
Double up: When you go “all in,” somebody calls your bet, and they lose. Then you end up with double the amount of chips you had before.
Flush draw: When between the community cards and your hole cards, you have four cards in the same suit. (You need five to have a flush.)
Gutshot and open-ended straight draws: When you have four cards that only need a fifth card to make a straight, or five cards in numerical sequence. A gutshot straight draw is when the card you need is in the middle of the sequence. An open-ended straight draw is when you need a card either at the beginning of the sequence or the end.
Heads up: When there are only two players left in the hand.
Limp in: When you don’t raise the initial bet from the minimum blinds posted before the community cards come out.
Muck: This can refer to either folding your cards (a verb) or the pile of folded cards in the middle of the table (a noun).
Nut: When you have the best hand possible that could be made with the community cards out there.
Short stack: When you barely have enough chips to cover the minimum required bets.
Slow play: When you have the best hand on the table but pretend you don’t in order to trick people into giving up more chips to you.
Sucker straight: When you share a straight with somebody else at the table, only they have the straight ending in a higher number card than you do. Ouch!
Suck out: When you are heads up with someone and your cards are so much worse than theirs that you shouldn’t win, but you luck out big time and do anyway.
Tilt: (Often happens after someone sucks out on you.) You lose emotional perspective and control over your play and do some really stupid shit strategy-wise that other people will mock you for months and even years later.
Now you are ready…to take on ANYBODY.