Poker Glossary

The river is the name given the final betting round in the majority of poker variants. As an example, the betting rounds in Texas Hold’em are preflop, flop, turn and river. Since the river is the final betting round, any players remaining in the hand must reveal the strength of their hand after the river action is complete (known as showdown).

Reverse Implied Odds are an adjusted pot odds calculation that take into account the fact that we may lose money on the later streets when holding a mid-strength made hand or draw. This is due to the fact that our draw is not to the nuts and may still end up dominated even after hitting. Mid-strength made hands may appear to get the direct pot odds on the current street, but must account for the fact that they will possibly face more betting action on subsequent streets. When our hand is dominated in nature (and there are chips left for the later betting rounds), reverse implied odds will give a more accurate picture than pot odds. It’s the opposite concept to implied odds.

Find about the poker variant named “Razz” along with all of the associated rules and beginner guidelines on strategy.

Raise in poker means to increase the size of the existing bet on the current street. When facing our raise, the other players at the table must either, call, fold or re-raise. If no-one has placed any chips into the middle on the current betting round, the first bet in the sequence is typically referred to as a bet rather than a raise although it’s not uncommon for these terms to get mixed up in normal speech, especially amongst recreational players.

Range advantage occurs when one player’s range of possible holdings is stronger than his opponent’s. While “stronger” in this context may often apply to raw pot equity, this is not the only thing considered when deciding which player has a range advantage. Play ability of the range, vulnerability of the range, and the distribution of equity are all considered when analysing range advantage.

Rainbow means “all of different suits” in poker. It’s commonly used to describe board textures in Hold’em and Omahabut can be used in any situation where no two cards are of the same suit. A rainbow flop texture is one where all three cards are of different suits. A rainbow starting hand in Omaha is one where all four cards are of different suits.

Ragged in poker implies little to no connectivity between cards. It’s commonly used to describe a very dry flop texture in Hold’em and Omaha. An example of a ragged flop texture might be Q62 rainbow. There are no possible flush draws, and straight draws are somewhat unlikely. The term rag may also be used to describe any additional unconnected card that is dealt, similar to the term brick.An offsuitAx hand in Hold’em might be described as “Ace-rag”.

Qualify in poker means that our hand meet the criteria for making a low hand in split pot games. For example, Omaha Hi/Lo split is often named Omaha 8 or better based on the qualifying rule for low hands. In order for a low hand to be legal, we need to hold five unpaired cards which are 8 or lower. If we don’t meet this requirement, our low hand does not qualify and we can only compete for the high half of the pot. On some board runouts it might be impossible for anyone to qualify(there needs to be at least three cards 8 or lower on the board).

Protection refers to the act of betting a hand specifically to prevent our opponent from being able to see extra cards with 100% frequency. A protection bet is generally made with a hand that is likely to be best but is vulnerable to being outdrawn. Protection is an important part of poker strategy that is commonly misunderstood by the average player.

Traditionally, a probe in poker, is a small bet which is made in order to try and gather information on our opponent’s range. In more recent times, the term probe is slowly changing meaning. Many professional players use the term probe to indicate a “bet vs missed cbet while out of position”. For example, imagine the button open raises in Hold’em and gets one caller. Instead of firing a continuation bet on the flop, the button checks back. If the out of position cold-caller leads the turn, this is referred to as a turn probe bet.

Price in poker means how much we are risking compare to what is already in the middle.The term prices shares many similarities with pot odds.A “good price” typically means we are investing only a small percentage of the total pot with a bet/raise/call while a “bad price” means that our bet/raise/call will a relatively large chunk of the new pot size. Price can also just mean the absolute amount of chips need to make a call when facing a bet.

Pot odds is a way of expressing how much we can potentially win compared to what we are risking.Pot odds are traditionally expressed in a ratio format (eg. 2:1 two to one) but it’s becoming increasingly common for professional players to express pot odds as a percentage. If there is $100 in the middle and our opponent bets $50, we are getting 25% (or 3:1 three to one) pot odds on a call.Pot odds can be compared to our pot equity to determine if we have a profitable call (at least, assuming there is no further action after we make the call. If there is further action, an implied odds calculation is more useful).

Poker table positions dictate the order of play. Learn what each position means and how you can benefit from this article on poker positions explained.

Play the board essentially means to not make use of our hole cards when playing a hand. The first way this occurs is when the 5 community cards on the board make the strongest possible hand for us, so we don’t actually use our hole cards as part of our final hand. Imagine a TJQKA board in Hold’em, with no possible flush. Both players will play the board in this case. The second idea behind playing the board is that a player bases his decisions solely on the board texture and does not take into account his hole cards (presumably because they haven’t connected with the board in any meaningful way).

Overcall is a call made after there has already been a call on the current betting round. This means there has already been a bet or raise on the current street and at least one other player has called that bet or raise.