Where Does the Poker Term Suckout Come from?

Watching poker shows, I sometimes hear the term "suckout." Can you explain what it means and where it came from?

In poker, the verb "suck out" refers to drawing a good enough card or cards to enable an underdog poker hand to beat a hand that’s the favorite to win. In other words, it's when a player wins a hand despite having poor odds after all the cards are revealed, usually by hitting one of the few outs he or she needs to make the winning hand.

The noun is commonly spelled "suckout" and means the situation in which the dog hand draws the card or cards to beat the favorite.

Synonyms are "draw out," "outdraw," and "outrun."

An example of a suckout? Player A is holding ace-king and is up against Player B with king-king. Player A sucks out with an ace on the river. This happened in a major tournament we heard about. Player A won a pot of more than two million chips and took the chip lead with only 12 players left. He went on to win the tournament; it goes without saying that the timing was more than opportune for such a suckout.

Whence does the expression originate? We looked far and wide, but could find no reference to its etymology. It’s probably another case, common in all jargon, where someone somewhere sometime came out with it, someone else picked up on it and spread it around, and it came into everyday usage.

The term likely evolved from the frustration and dramatic nature of such events in the game, where a dominant hand gets "sucked out" of the win by an unexpected and improbable turn of events. This vernacular has been popularized and spread through poker literature, television shows, and the internet, becoming a standard in poker terminology.

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David Miller Jun-13-2024

This "term"

  This is the noise you will hear from sore losers. The hand isn't over until all cards are dealt.

Kevin Lewis Jun-13-2024

Suction

I'm not sure because I no longer have a copy of the book, but I think that Doyle Brunson mentioned it in "Super System 2." He said it referred to it appearing as if an underdog had physically sucked the one card he needed out of the deck. Of course, Brunson was referring to a term already widely in use by the time he wrote the book. I doubt that there's a definitive single origin for it.

jay Jun-13-2024

In or Out....

I like to play Texas holdem at home - get a group together, everybody brings $60 play money (20/pot) a 6pack and another $20 for food. Its a known fixed cost, no rake, keeps everyone friendly, and its social, phones get put away. We have a rotating monthly game (take turns hosting). Pots are split 70/30 with the last two players. 

I am probably one of the worst players as I get "sucked in" to playing more bad hands, which leaves me (my money) sucked-out. This is definitely not my jam when I am visiting a casino.

Llew Jun-13-2024

Really?

As one who has experienced suckouts many times - on both the receiving and giving ends - I think the example you gave was  pretty lame.  That kind of thing happens all the time. Try flopped quads losing to runner runner quads, e.g.  Now *that’* a suckout. 

Suckouts are so common that, without them, poker probably wouldn’t exist. 

Suckouts are so common that at Barge (or any of its spinoffs - Atlarge, Fargo, etc), if you tell anyone about how you were sucked out on, you must pay the listener $1. 😁

Question of the Day - 13 June 2024

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