Poker Glossary

The term donk applies both to a specific poker action and to a specific type of poker player. Donk betting means to make a bet out of position when not the last aggressor on the previous betting round. The term donk is also used to describe a very bad poker. Caution is advised since many may find the term offensive. However, for professional players the word donk has evolved into a standard technical term for describing a soft target at the table.

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”.

Dog in poker is a shortened form of the word underdog and means that we are not a favourite to win in a certain situation. It could apply to us being a dog after the chips go in during a single hand of poker or it could apply to us being a dog in an entire event such as a tournament or a specific cash game limit.

Cap games are a poker format where there is a cap set on the maximum number of big blinds that can be used in a single hand. For example, in a 20bb cap gameonce a player has bet 20bb, he can no longer invest any additional chips into the pot (even if he has additional chips in his stack). The term capped is slightly different and describes a player who can’t have a holding above a certain strength due to the line they took.

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.

A dealer is someone who deals cards for the purposes of a poker game. Poker games in casinos typically involve a designated dealer. In home games, the responsibility for dealing the cards often revolves around the table clockwise along with the dealer button. The term dealer may hence also be user to describe the player who occupies the button position at the table.

A dark bet or bet in the dark is a bet made without looking at all or any of the cards involved in a hand. For example, the player first to act on the flop in Hold’em, might make his flop betting decision before the flop cards have even been dealt. Naturally, betting in the dark is not an advisable strategy. It’s often used by players looking to gain a psychological advantage over their opponents or for entertainment value in the case of live TV.

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.

Counterfeit essentially means that a relatively strong hand gets significantly weakened after an additional card is dealt. A common example in Hold’em might be where we hold two-pair on the flop but the turn card pairs damaging the value of our hand. Imagine we hold 89 on the T98 board and the turn card comes a Ten. Our eight becomes irrelevant because we now hold Tens and Nines. Furthermore, any player with a Ten or strong 9x (such as A9) has now improved to beat us. We say that our two-pair has been counterfeited. Counterfeiting applies to a range of additional scenarios and also features strongly in games with low hand ranking systems such as Omaha hi/lo.

Find the meaning of the term "blocker bet" in poker and learn whether it has any real grounding in poker theory.

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).

Connector means that one card is directly connected to another by rank. For example, in Hold’em, 78s (Seven Eight suited) is referred to as a ‘suited connector’ because the two cards are directly connected by rank.Cards with a gap (such as 79s) may also be referred to as connectors but they are more commonly referred to as one-gappers, two-gappers or three-gappers, depending on the size of the gap.

The meaning of complete depends on the poker variant in question. In poker variants with blinds (such as Hold’em and Omaha), to complete means to limp in the SB. We don’t have to pay the full big blind in this instance since we have already invested a small blind; we simply complete our bet by investing the remaining chips. The second meaning involves Stud games on third street (the first betting round). The first player to act on third street can either pay the ‘bring-in’ amount or complete by raising to the amount of the small bet.

Community cards are cards that are dealt face up in the centre of the poker table. All players may make use of community cards to make their hand. Variants like Omaha and Hold’em make big use of community cards but not all variants of poker involve community cards. For example, Draw games and Stud games do not use community cards although there is one very specific exception in Stud games where the deck runs out of cards – a lone community card is dealt on the river.

Find the meaning of the term "Combo Draw" in poker. See examples of combo draws and strategy application.