120 Fun Facts About Poker

Which British show revealed players' face-down cards with under-the-table cameras?

Late Night Poker let viewers see every player's hidden cards and quickly built a following. American broadcasters adopted the cameras, and the televised poker boom of the 2000s followed.

What term describes a poker player who enters few pots but bets and raises hard when they do?

Tight-aggressive players pass on most hands, then bet and raise with the few they play, which builds the pot when they are ahead and pressures opponents into mistakes. The loose-aggressive style brings the same force to many more hands.

Which poker variant deals four private cards, exactly two of which must be used with three community cards?

Omaha Hold'em gives each player four private cards, but exactly two must play with three from the board. Beginners trip on it: one ace of hearts with four hearts on the table is no flush here, and nobody can simply play the board.

In poker, what is the name for a change in a player's behaviour that gives away the strength of their hand?

A tell can be as small as a twitch of the eye or a change in the voice. Because opponents watch for them, good players sometimes fake one to mislead, which is why most aim for an unreadable poker face.

Once suits are disregarded, how many distinct hand ranks exist in standard five-card poker?

Ignoring suits, the 2,598,960 possible five-card hands collapse into 7,462 distinct values across nine categories; 2,860 of those values are one-pair hands, the most of any category.

What specific two-pair hand is historically known as the 'Dead Man's Hand'?

Aces and eights, both black, make the Dead Man's Hand, the cards Wild Bill Hickok is said to have held when he was shot from behind in a Dakota Territory saloon in 1876. It is lore more than record: no account from the time names his cards.

What poker term describes short-term results swinging away from long-term expected value?

Variance is why even a winning player can lose for weeks: results swing above and below expectation in the short run, so serious players keep a bankroll big enough to ride out the downswings.

What poker concept refers to future bets a player can win if they complete their drawing hand?

Implied odds count the extra bets a player expects to win later if a draw completes, so a flush draw can be worth chasing even when the immediate pot odds look short.

What is the commission fee taken by a cardroom or casino from the pot of a poker cash game?

The rake is the cardroom's cut, usually a few percent of each pot up to a fixed maximum; in tournaments the house keeps part of each entry fee instead. A player has to beat the opponents and the rake to come out ahead.

What is the poker term for losing with a statistically strong hand to an opponent who catches an improbable card?

A bad beat is losing with a hand that was a heavy favourite when the money went in. Some cardrooms soften the blow with a bad beat jackpot, paid out when a monster such as four of a kind is beaten.

What term describes a player's share of the pot, calculated from their probability of winning it?

Equity is a player's share of the pot by the odds of winning it, which is why a hand that is behind can still be worth playing when the bet is small beside the pot.

What is the term for a draw that needs helpful cards on both of the last two streets?

A backdoor draw, also called runner-runner, needs both of the last two cards: a flush comes in that way about once in 24 tries, so players count it as a little extra value on top of a hand, not a plan in itself.

Who was voted the first World Series of Poker Main Event champion in 1970?

Johnny Moss was elected champion by his fellow players at the 1970 event, really a series of cash games among a handful of invited pros at the Horseshoe in downtown Las Vegas; his prize was a silver cup.

Who won the 2003 WSOP Main Event after an $86 online satellite?

Chris Moneymaker turned the $86 entry into $2.5 million in his first live tournament, and the rush of online players that followed became known as the Moneymaker effect.

Which city does the Texas Legislature officially recognise as the birthplace of hold 'em?

Robstown, near Corpus Christi, is where tradition says the first hand was dealt in the early 1900s; a 2007 resolution made it official and has the game travelling north up the sleeves of cardsharps.

In seven-card stud, what name is given to a player's first exposed card?

The door card is each stud player's first face-up card, and it matters at once: whoever shows the lowest one must open the betting with a forced bet called the bring-in.

What term describes a player committing every remaining chip to the pot in one bet?

Going all-in means wagering every remaining chip; under table-stakes rules a player who does so for less than the full bet can only win the portion each opponent matched, the rest forming a side pot.

Who shot Wild Bill Hickok in the back of the head during a poker game in 1876?

Jack McCall shot Hickok from behind at Nuttal & Mann's Saloon No. 10 on 2 August 1876; acquitted by an impromptu miners' court, he was retried in Yankton and hanged in 1877.

In hold 'em, what are the forced bets made left of the dealer before cards are dealt called?

The blinds are forced bets from the two players left of the dealer, there so every hand starts with money to fight for: without them a player could sit out for free until premium cards arrived.

What is the title of Doyle Brunson's influential, originally self-published 1978 poker book?

Super/System, self-published in 1978 as How I Made Over $1,000,000 Playing Poker, was among the first books to spell out how professionals actually won, and it schooled generations of players.

What is the term for discarding your hand and forfeiting any claim to the pot?

To fold is to surrender your cards and any claim to the pot; in stud games it is signalled by flipping your face-up cards over, and chips already committed stay in the pot.

Which structure plays like a big-bet game up to a per-player maximum, after which the rest is dealt with no betting?

A cap sets a per-player maximum for the hand, after which the remaining cards are simply dealt out; high-stakes games use it to keep big-bet action without anyone risking a whole stack on one hand.

What is the poker betting stage after private cards are dealt but before any community cards?

Preflop is the only betting round fought on private cards alone; in hold 'em it opens with the player left of the two forced bets, while every later round starts left of the dealer.

What is the term for the top card of the deck being discarded face down before community cards are dealt?

The burn card is the top card dealt face down into the discards before each community-card deal, so a marked or glimpsed top card cannot be exploited.

In poker, what does the term 'Bullets' commonly refer to?

Bullets means a pair of aces, the best starting hand in hold 'em but no certainty: it turns up about once in 221 deals and can still be outdrawn once the community cards arrive.

What is the optional bet posted before the deal, usually twice the largest forced bet, that earns last action before the flop?

A straddle is made without seeing a card, and its whole point is to act last before the flop; in effect it adds a third forced bet and raises the stakes for that hand.

Who created the Poker Hall of Fame in 1979 as a tourist attraction for his Horseshoe Casino?

Benny Binion launched the Hall in 1979 to pull visitors into his Horseshoe; its first class reached back a century to enshrine Wild Bill Hickok, killed at a card table in 1876.

A Texas Legislature resolution says hold 'em was first played in Las Vegas at which downtown casino?

Golden Nugget is where the 2007 resolution has the game first played in Las Vegas, in 1967, brought by Texan gamblers such as Doyle Brunson.

Which hold 'em betting structure, as in a $2/$4 game, doubles the bet size for the final two betting rounds?

Fixed-limit play sets every bet and raise in advance: in a $2/$4 hold 'em game each bet is $2 on the first two rounds and $4 after that, which is why limit players count in small bets and big bets.

In which 1998 film does a law student lose his $30,000 bankroll to a Russian mobster called Teddy KGB?

Rounders stars Matt Damon as Mike McDermott, who loses the lot in the opening minutes and goes back to the tables to clear a debt run up by his friend Worm, played by Edward Norton.

Which player is said to be 'under the gun' in a hold 'em hand?

Under the gun is the seat that is first to act before the flop, immediately left of the big blind, so that player must commit with no clue to what anyone else intends.

Bookmakers Terry Rogers and Liam Flood brought hold 'em to which continent in the 1980s?

Europe got the game after Irish bookmaker Terry Rogers saw it in Las Vegas; back in Dublin he launched the Irish Open in 1980, now the continent's longest-running hold 'em tournament.

In which country did poker first become widely popular during the early 19th century?

Poker took hold in the United States in the early 1800s, spreading from New Orleans up the Mississippi on riverboats; the French game Poque, played in Louisiana, is its likeliest direct ancestor.

Which player holds the record for the most World Series of Poker bracelets, with 17 as of 2025?

Phil Hellmuth won his 17th bracelet in 2023, far ahead of any rival; his first was the 1989 Main Event, where at 24 he stopped Johnny Chan winning a third title in a row.

What is the highest possible hand in standard poker?

A royal flush, ten through ace in one suit, tops the standard rankings; only five of a kind, which needs wild cards, can outrank it.

What is the term for the forced bet placed by all players before cards are dealt in some poker games?

An ante is a small forced bet every player posts before the deal; antes are standard in draw and stud games and are added in later tournament levels to punish overly tight play.

Which former Hollywood talent agent won a then-record $12 million at the 2006 WSOP Main Event?

Jamie Gold talked and raised his way through a field of 8,773; his $12 million stayed the Main Event's biggest first prize until Daniel Weinman's $12.1 million in 2023.

Which hand consists of five cards of sequential rank, all of the same suit, but not topped by an ace?

A straight flush is five consecutive cards of one suit, ranked by its top card; the ace may sit at the bottom of a five-high run, but it cannot link king and two.

What is a bet or raise made with a weak hand to make opponents give up better ones?

A bluff wins only if every better hand gives up; a semi-bluff, made with a hand that could still improve, can also win by hitting its card.

What is the name of the marker used to indicate the player who is currently in the dealer position?

The button marks the nominal dealer and moves one seat clockwise each hand; an earlier marker, the buck, gave English the phrase 'pass the buck'.

What is the nickname for a five-high straight, 5-4-3-2-A?

The wheel is the lowest straight there is, yet in ace-to-five lowball, where straights do not count against a hand, it is the best hand possible.

In Texas hold 'em poker, the river card is also known as which street?

Fifth street is the river, the fifth and last community card; in seven-card stud the same name goes to each player's fifth card, when two more are still to come.

Which player is one of only two people to have won the WSOP Main Event three times?

Stu Ungar won the Main Event in 1980, 1981 and, after years of drug addiction, again in 1997; his 1980 victory came in his first major hold 'em tournament.

What poker term describes a player who is considered inexperienced or unskilled?

A fish is a weak, inexperienced player who tends to lose money; the old table warning runs that if you can't spot the fish in your first half-hour, you are the fish.

Which of these hands is typically considered the lowest ranking in standard poker?

High card, bluntly known as 'nothing', ranks below every pair, yet it is the likeliest hand of all: just over half of all five-card deals hold no pair, straight or flush.

What action involves matching the current highest bet to stay in the hand?

To call is to match the current highest bet and stay in the hand; a player without enough chips to match the full amount can put in what remains instead.

Who was the first player to win three WSOP bracelets in a single year, in 1973?

Puggy Pearson took three titles at the 1973 series, capped by a winner-take-all Main Event that CBS filmed for a documentary; nobody matched the treble until two players did in 1993.

When hands are revealed after betting on the final round, which player must show first?

The last to bet or raise on the final round must show first; players after that may throw a beaten hand away unseen, which is exactly why nobody volunteers to go first.

In which frontier town was Wild Bill Hickok killed at a poker table in 1876?

Deadwood, a gold-rush camp in Dakota Territory, is where Hickok broke his own habit: with no seat against the wall free, he sat with his back to the saloon entrance.

What is the common nickname for a pair of kings as a starting hand?

Cowboys, a pair of kings, is among the very best starting hands in hold 'em; its classic undoing is an ace on the flop, when any opponent holding a single ace moves ahead.

In poker, if nobody has bet yet, what is declining to bet while keeping your hand called?

A check declines to bet while keeping your hand; a tap on the table with knuckles or a finger is the customary signal, and if everyone checks the round ends with a free card.

In Casino Royale (2006), Bond's poker game against Le Chiffre takes place in which country?

The game is set at the Casino Royale in Montenegro, though the scenes were filmed in the Czech Republic; Le Chiffre, banker to terrorists, has lost a client's fortune shorting an aerospace company.

What is the poker hand consisting of three cards of one rank and two cards of a different rank?

A full house, nicknamed a boat, is ranked by its three of a kind first, so three threes with two fours beats three twos with two aces.

In a poker tournament, what term describes the stage when a player is one step away from the prize money?

The bubble is the stage just before the prize money, when one more elimination puts everyone else in the money; play slows to a crawl as short stacks avoid every risk.

What poker term refers to what is dealt face down to each player, seen only by them?

Hole cards are the private cards dealt face down to each player; a hold 'em player may use both, one or neither of them in the final five-card hand.

Which 18th-century figure was among the Poker Hall of Fame's first inductees, despite dying before poker existed?

Edmond Hoyle wrote the standard guide to whist and died in 1769, decades before poker appeared; his name became shorthand for the rules, which is why card-game rule books are still called Hoyles.

What is the name for the single fourth community card dealt after the flop in Texas Hold'em?

The turn is a single card, unlike the three-card flop, and in some games it is the point where the bet size doubles.

What is the term for a card, often a community card, that appears to help nobody's hand?

A blank completes no draws and helps no one, so the hand that was ahead before it fell is usually still ahead.

When two players hold the same pair, what usually breaks the tie?

The next highest side card, called the kicker, decides it; suits carry no rank when hands are compared, so hands that differ only by suit are equal and split the pot.

In PLO, what is the most a player may bet or raise at any point?

In pot-limit Omaha no bet or raise may exceed the current size of the pot, and the chips a raiser must first put in to stay level count towards it, so a full raise is always bigger than the pot on the table looks.

What poker term refers to remaining players revealing their hands after the final betting round?

The showdown is where the players left after the final betting round show and compare their hands; many pots never reach one, because when everyone else gives up the winner need not show a card.

Canadian poker star Daniel Negreanu is known by which nickname?

Kid Poker stuck after Negreanu won his first World Series title at 23, at the time the youngest winner the series had seen.

Cash games where the forced bets are at least $200/$400 are known by what slang name?

Nosebleed stakes are the very highest cash games, by convention $200/$400 and up; the name borrows the stadium joke about seats so high they are supposed to make a nose bleed.

Which Persian game did R. F. Foster's 1937 rule book say early American poker 'undoubtedly' was?

As-Nas was long taught as poker's parent, but historian David Parlett found the theory rests on resemblance alone: the earliest descriptions of As-Nas date only from the 1890s.

Poker is thought to have taken shape in the gambling saloons of which American city?

New Orleans, French-speaking and newly American after the Louisiana Purchase, is the likeliest cradle; the earliest known game dealt a whole 20-card pack to four players, and Mississippi steamboats carried it north.

Which English actor recorded an early description of poker played on a steamboat in 1829?

Joe Cowell, an English comic actor touring America, described a poker game aboard a Mississippi steamboat in 1829 in his 1844 memoir Thirty Years Passed Among the Players in England and America.

Which actress played poker-game host Molly Bloom in the 2017 film Molly's Game?

Jessica Chastain played Molly Bloom, a former competitive skier whose private games drew film stars and tycoons until federal agents arrested her in 2013.

Which 16th-century card game, played at the Tudor court, is often named among the ancestors of poker?

Primero, the game Shakespeare shows Henry VIII playing, is often called a forerunner of poker, though historian David Parlett judges it has little bearing on the game.

Which University of Alberta bot 'essentially weakly solved' heads-up limit hold 'em, per a 2015 Science paper?

Cepheus plays so close to perfectly that a human could face it for a lifetime, some 60 million hands, and never be able to prove a profit, which is what 'essentially solved' means.

Heads-up no-limit hold 'em has roughly how many decision points?

10 to the power of 160 is far more than the atoms in the observable universe, so the game has never been solved outright, even though programs now beat top professionals at it.

Cassius Coolidge's poker paintings, commissioned to advertise cigars, show which animals at the card table?

Dogs appear in all eighteen canvases of the series. In A Friend in Need, a bulldog slips an ace under the table to the dog sitting beside him.

Which future US president helped pay for his first congressional campaign with poker winnings from his time in the Navy?

Richard Nixon became a very good five-card stud player while serving as a Navy officer, and the money he won went toward his first run for Congress.

Henry Orenstein, inventor of televised poker's hidden-card camera, persuaded Hasbro to launch which famous toy line?

Transformers exist because Orenstein, a Holocaust survivor with more than 100 patents, convinced Hasbro to buy the Diaclone and Micro Change toys and rebrand them.

Which stock-market term for a large, dependable company was borrowed from the poker table?

Blue chip is credited in Dow Jones folklore to staffer Oliver Gingold in the 1920s. In a simple white, red and blue poker set, American tradition makes the blues worth the most.

Which Paul Newman prison film takes its title from a nickname the hero earns by winning a poker pot holding nothing?

Cool Hand Luke earns the name after bluffing his way to a poker pot with a worthless hand. Fellow convict Dragline, who points out what he was holding, christens him on the spot.

Which phrase for dodging responsibility is said to come from the marker showing whose deal it was in frontier poker?

Passing the buck is said to recall a knife with a buckhorn handle, the sort of counter frontier card players used to mark the next person due to deal.

Which poker term for playing badly through frustration comes from the warning on a shaken pinball machine?

Tilt comes from pinball, where shoving the machine makes it flash TILT and freeze the flippers. A tilted poker player usually drops sound strategy and forces the action.

Which country singer had a crossover hit with The Gambler, a song about card-table advice from a stranger on a train?

Kenny Rogers took the song to No. 1 on the country chart after its writer, Don Schlitz, had spent two years shopping it around Nashville with little luck.

Video poker machines, which let a player discard and replace cards once, are based on which classic form of poker?

Five-card draw is the model: the machine deals five cards and swaps any the player throws away. The format took off when Si Redd's company launched Draw Poker in 1979.

Which actor played card sharp Bret Maverick in the 1994 Western comedy about a poker tournament on a paddle steamer?

Mel Gibson took the role opposite James Garner, who had played the same smooth-talking gambler in the original television series more than thirty years earlier.

The 2006 film Casino Royale has James Bond play Texas hold 'em, replacing which card game from Ian Fleming's novel?

Baccarat was the game in the original book. When the film reached China, extra dialogue was added to the poker scene to explain hold 'em, which was less familiar there.

In which country are slot machines popularly known as pokies, short for poker machines?

Australia calls them pokies, a nickname that stuck in everyday speech even though officials there term them gaming machines.

When one poker player has every chip in the middle but two opponents keep betting, the extra money goes into what?

A side pot holds the overage, and only the players who paid into it can win it. The player with nothing left to wager competes for the main pot alone.

Michael Lewis named his Wall Street memoir after which bar game played with the serial numbers on dollar bills?

Liar's Poker was a pastime of Salomon Brothers traders, and Lewis recounts chief executive John Gutfreund challenging John Meriwether to a game for a million dollars.

Which standard poker rule means a player can only wager the money already in front of them when a deal begins?

Table stakes rules stop anyone reaching into a wallet mid-deal. They also forbid 'going south', quietly taking part of a stack out of play after a big win.

What is the poker nickname for a passive opponent who pays to see bet after bet through but hardly ever raises?

Calling station is a put-down for someone who matches bets whatever the strength of the cards. The usual counter is to play strong hands strongly, with no deception.

Which breach of poker etiquette involves deliberately taking your time to reveal a hand you know is the winner?

A slow roll means delaying or avoiding turning over the winning cards once the betting is finished, and it is widely regarded as poor form at the table.

In a public cardroom, matching a bet in one motion and then adding a raise in a second is barred as what?

A string bet is prohibited in public cardrooms because raising in two stages causes confusion over the amount wagered.

What is the poker term for revealing, after a hand has ended, the cards that would have been dealt next?

Rabbit hunting is usually prohibited in casinos, because it slows the game and may give away information about the hands players chose to keep hidden.

What two-word poker phrase describes chasing a card that would complete your hand yet cannot win the pot?

Drawing dead means the hand will lose even if the hoped-for card arrives, because an opponent already holds something the finished hand could never beat.

Chris Moneymaker reached the 2003 World Series of Poker through an online satellite on which poker site?

PokerStars produced the first world champion to qualify online, and the poker boom his win helped set off became known as the Moneymaker effect.

Which pioneering card room dealt the internet's first real-money hand, a $3–$6 hold 'em game, on 1 January 1998?

Planet Poker opened the era of online card rooms. Within weeks one of its games ran through the night and into the next evening as customers rotated in and out.

Which poker AI from Facebook and Carnegie Mellon was the first bot to beat professionals at a six-player table?

Pluribus took on five professionals at once and won about $1,000 an hour. Multiplayer games had been seen as the main remaining milestone for poker programs.

Which author, once employed by an actuarial firm, wrote The Theory of Poker and set out its 'fundamental theorem'?

David Sklansky passed multiple actuarial exams by the age of 20 before turning to cards, and went on to win three World Series of Poker titles.

Which Steve McQueen film follows a five-card stud player challenging an old master in 1930s New Orleans?

The Cincinnati Kid pits McQueen against Edward G. Robinson. The script was Ring Lardner Jr.'s first major studio work since his 1947 blacklisting as one of the Hollywood Ten.

What is the famous buy-in for the Main Event, the hold 'em tournament that crowns each World Series of Poker?

$10,000 is the price of a Main Event seat, and since 2004 the field has numbered in the thousands, swelling the prize pool far beyond any single entry fee.

Si Redd's Coin Machines, the firm that established video poker in 1979, evolved into which slot-machine giant?

IGT, short for International Game Technology, grew out of the firm, which traded as SIRCOMA when its 1979 machine made video poker a casino fixture.

In hold 'em, which seat sits immediately to the dealer's right and acts next to last after the flop?

The cutoff is one seat to the right of the dealer's position, and the seat on its own right is known as the hijack.

What is the poker term for entering a pot by just matching the minimum bet before the flop instead of raising?

Limping in means paying only the minimum to stay. A player who limps and then raises once somebody else has raised in the same round is making a limp-reraise.

In short-deck hold 'em, played with only 36 cards, which hand is promoted to rank above a full house?

A flush moves up because stripping every card below a six from the deck leaves fewer cards in each suit, making flushes harder and full houses easier to hit.

Which is the best hand a player can hold in standard poker without all five cards sharing a suit?

Four of a kind, also known as quads, is made up of four cards of one rank plus a single unmatched card, which is called the kicker.

With all seven cards available in Texas hold 'em, which final hand is a player most likely to end up holding?

One pair is the outcome about 44% of the time. Two pair follows at roughly 23%, while finishing with no pair at all happens in only about 17% of seven-card hands.

In hold 'em slang, what name is given to the strongest possible hand anyone could hold on a given board?

The nuts is the hand nothing else can beat on that board, and the runners-up are counted off as the second nuts, the third nuts and so on.

In hold 'em slang, what is three of a kind called when a pocket pair matches one card on the board?

A set usually means the concealed version, with two of the three cards hidden in the player's hand. Three of a kind in general also goes by the name trips.

Which New York street gives its name to the highest possible straight in poker, running from ten up to the ace?

Broadway is the ten-to-ace straight. Nothing can sit above it, because an ace cannot rank high and low at once, so Q-K-A-2-3 is no straight at all.

Five of a kind outranks every natural poker hand, but it can only be made when a game includes what?

Wild cards are essential because a deck holds only four cards of each rank. Where they are in play, five of a kind tops the entire ranking.

Which two cards make up Big Slick, the famous hold 'em starting hand that teams an ace with another top-ranked card?

Ace and king make Big Slick, which is also dubbed the Anna Kournikova, after its initials and because it 'looks really good but rarely wins'.

Which pocket pair do hold 'em players nickname 'fishhooks' because of the shape printed in each card's corner?

Jacks earn the name because the letter J resembles a hook. Other starting-hand nicknames come from historic events, animal names, alliteration and rhyme.

In standard poker, what happens to the pot when two players' best hands are identical apart from their suits?

It is split equally, because poker gives the four suits no ranking of their own, so hands that differ by suit alone count as exactly level.

Which unlikely hold 'em starting hand is named after Doyle Brunson, who won successive world titles holding it?

Ten-two bears his name because he won the World Series of Poker's biggest event with it two years running, each time coming from behind on the final hand.

Once equivalent suit combinations are merged, how many effectively different starting hands exist in Texas hold 'em?

169 covers 13 pairs, 78 suited hands and 78 unsuited ones. Counting every exact two-card deal separately would give 1,326 combinations instead.

Roughly how many different five-card hands can be dealt from a standard 52-card deck when order is ignored?

About 2.6 million hands are possible, 2,598,960 to be exact. Counting the order in which the cards arrive would push the figure past 311 million.

In Texas hold 'em, what is a player said to do when their best five-card hand uses only the community cards?

To play the board is to use neither private card. The most such a player can do is share the pot, since every opponent left in has those same five cards.

What term describes a hold 'em hand devalued when a new board card duplicates one of the player's own cards?

Counterfeited hands keep their own value but become easier to beat. It crops up most often in high-low split games, where a duplicate can wreck the best possible low.

What one-word term describes a hold 'em flop on which all three cards belong to different suits?

Rainbow flops mean nobody can hold five cards of one suit by the very next card, because three different suits are already showing.

What is the poker slang for a straight draw that is missing one card in the middle, such as 9-8-6-5?

A gutshot, also called a belly buster, can be completed by only four cards in the deck, half as many as a straight draw that is open at both ends.

Which two-word poker term covers starting hands like the queen and jack of hearts, prized for straights and flushes?

Suited connectors share a suit and sit next to each other in rank, so they can grow into both straights and flushes. They gain value when stacks are deep and a well-hidden hand can win a big pot.

In short-deck hold 'em, where no card ranks below a six, which card plays low to complete a 9-8-7-6 straight?

The ace doubles as a five in the stripped deck, so A-6-7-8-9 is the lowest straight, just as an ace can sit below the two in ordinary hold 'em.

In standard poker, when players each show two pair, which of these hands beats the other three?

Aces and threes win, because two pair is ranked by its higher pair first. The lower pair matters only when the top pairs match, and the last card only after that.

What is the poker name for tactics that stay within the rules but are borderline unethical, such as hiding big chips?

Angle shooting also covers acting out of sequence on purpose, a ploy some players use to get a read on opponents before making a real decision.