What is Texas Holdem?

Poker is one of the most commonly played card games today. Learning to play poker is almost a ritualistic thing for men, with most of us learning how to play from our fathers.

Texas Holdem Poker has been around for a long time, but has only really started to pick up its main stream popularity in the last 10 years. In the late 90's poker was becoming more and more popular and more people were looking for new games to play, and Texas Holdem started to become the hot new game in casinos and online casino poker rooms.

Texas Holdem has become so popular it has been the subject of several television shows from Celebrity poker shows to having major tournaments shown on ESPN.

Incase you do not know, Texas Holdem Poker in a card game that uses 2 hole cads and 5 communal cards for the players to make the best 5 card hand possible. The hole cards are the 2 cards that each player receives from the dealer. These are the only cards that a player has to differentiate his hand from the other players.

Texas Holdem is played in rounds. Each round has 2 parts. The first part is where the dealer deals or turns over cards and the 2nd half of the round is for betting.

First 2 designated players will post the blinds. The first player will post the small blind which is half the table minimum and the next player places the big blind which is the table minimum. Then the dealer will give each player their hole cards.
After receiving the hole cards players have a chance to place their bets.

The Texas Holdem dealer will now deal 5 cards face down on the table. These are the 5 communal cards. during the first round the dealer will turn over 3 cards at once. In Texas Holdem these cards are called the flop.

The next round only 1 card gets turned over and that is called the Turn, and the last card to be turned over in Texas Holdem Poker is the river.

After all 5 cards have been turned over the players get 1 last chance to raise their bets or fold before the showdown.

The showdown in Texas Holdem Poker is when each player reveals their hands and a winner is declared