Frederico Pereira
's Articles
Domination means that a hand or range is weaker than another hand or range. The term dominated also refers specially to types of hands that are likely to suffer from domination issues. In Hold’em, this includes hands like top-pair weak kicker, baby flushes (especially on paired textures), and the low end of the straight (especially if the flush is possible or the board is paired). We have to be careful in these situations because it ends up being likely that “our opponent has us dominated”.
Deuce is simply a nickname given to a card with the rank of Two. It’s not especially important from a strategic point of view, but we might find ourselves lost in poker conversations if we don’t know that the two is sometimes referred to as the Deuce.
Crack means to improve to beat a strong holding in poker. The most common usage is in Hold’em games where a player pocket Aces gets beaten, but it can be used in any scenario where a strong hand loses.
A cooler is a hand that is clearly too strong to fold but ends up being second best after the chips go in. The most common example of cooler is picking up pocket Kings preflop and our opponent has the Aces. In most situations it would be completely incorrect to fold KK preflop, but we have to accept that sometimes we will be coolered by the AA. Other examples might include ‘set over set’ or losing with a full house against a stronger full house (depending on the exact circumstances).
The term burn means to discard the top card from the deck rather than deal it to the table. For example, in live Hold’em games, it’s common for the dealer to burn cards before dealing on every street. This is done to protect against cheating, or in case the value of the top card had been accidentally revealed to any player at the table.
The bubble is the situation in a poker tournament right before the prize pool is reached. Every player knows that if he busts out of the tournament right now, he’ll walk away with nothing. This creates a dynamic where a large number of the shorter stacks are simply trying to ‘hold on’ until that last player busts. Although the largest bubble is always right before reaching the prize pool, miniature bubbles can be created any time there is a considerable jump in payout.
