Poker Glossary

A wrap around straight is a straight that has an Ace somewhere in the middle of its structure, for example; QKA23. Wrap around straights are not legal hands according to the classic hand rankings system. However, they may sometimes be allowed in home games and some of the more exotic variants of poker.

Whale is the name given to a very rich but very bad poker player. The meaning of the word whale has broadened to include any extremely bad poker player regardless of the stakes however. So, a very bad player at the lowest stakes cash games online could also be described as a whale even though the term was originally reserved for high stakes players only. The term was borrowed from the financial investment world, where a very rich investor is referred to as a whale.

In poker, the term ‘up the ante’ may refer to the increase in antes that happens on each level of a tournament. In many cases however, ‘up the ante’ is a more general expression which means to increase the stakes or wager. In other words, it’s a term that originated with poker, but has become an expression used in every day speech.

Three pair is an expression used by Omaha players to indicate that three of their hole cards are paired. Of course, three pair is an impossible hand since it would mean we were using 6 cards, so three pair is really a two pair type hand. However, indicating that we hold three pair is relevant, since although the third pair doesn’t count toward our current hand strength, it does increase our odds to make a full house by the river.

Street poker is essentially an unwritten agreement that two players are going to play loose aggressive poker with overly wide ranges. One player could easily counter the other by tightening up significantly, but so long as both players continue to play overly wide ranges, the game can be considered fair.

Welcome to the 888 poker glossary. Find the meaning of the term "steel wheel" in poker along with a description of the hand’s strength.

To steam in poker means to be exceptionally angry or tilted. So angry that we might imagine literal steam coming off the head of the affected player. Steaming is never a great idea since playing while angry can result in some significant strategy errors.

Stab is simply another term for ‘bet’ in poker. It’s especially used in scenarios where lack of interest has been shown in the pot by other players at the table i.e. no-one seemed interested in the pot so we took a stab. It may also refer to a single attempt to pick up the pot without giving much thought to further action. However, usage varies quite widely and players may use the term stab to describe a bet without meeting any of the above criteria.

Splashing the pot refers to spilling chips over the poker table rather than placing them neatly in the middle. When large amount of chips are wagered, it’s considered good etiquette to try and keep the chips in neat piles. Shoving our stack violently towards the centre of the table while watching chips fly everywhere is referred to as splashing the pot and is considered bad poker etiquette. If villain wins our chips, he’ll have to spend the time piling them up neatly again.

Sick is a slang term that originated from outside of the poker world. It generally applies to extreme situations, whether good or bad. For example, the term ‘sick upswing’ would refer to an upswing that was way bigger than average. A ‘sick beat’ would be a bad beat that it significantly worse than normal. Its usage is not especially different in a poker context compared to general slang use in the world outside poker.

Short Handed in poker refers to a poker game with 6 or less players. Games with more than 6 players are generally referred to as “full ring” tables. Short handed also applies to 2 player tables, although the term ‘heads up’ is more commonly used to describe 2-way action.

Sandbagging is another word for ‘slowplaying’ or ‘trapping’ in poker. It refers to playing a strong made hand passively (by checking and/or calling) in an attempt to deceive our opponent into thinking that we don’t hold a strong hand. The hope is that either our opponent tries to run a big bluff, or doesn’t give us credit when we start betting/raising aggressively on the later betting rounds.

The term run in poker refers to how the cards fall over a period of time i.e. the run of the cards. When the cards are favourable for a player it can be described with the term ‘running good’, while non-favourable cards can be referred to as ‘running bad’. The run of cards over an individual hand of poker is often referred as the runout i.e. the board runout.

A river rat is a player who has a history of catching lucky cards on the river to win the pot. Of course, statistically all players will catch the same amount of good river cards in the long run. A river rat is therefore someone who continues past the flop and turn with overly speculative hands, giving the appearance of someone who gets exceptionally lucky when they hit and go on to win the pot.

Re-raise means to make a raise after a previous raise has already been made on the current betting round. It’s therefore at least the third aggressive action in a sequence of bets. Someone bets, someone raises, someone re-raises. Any subsequent raise will also be referred to as a re-raise.