What are SB and BB (small blind and big blind) in online poker?

In most of the variations of poker there is a rule stating that the first and the second in clockwise direction after the dealer must put defined sum of money in the pot no matter if they want to or not. The First player after the dealer-guy should post the Big blind and depending on the specific rules of the table you are sitting on it may be $10 or $15 or $50, but usually it is a small amount of money and its purpose is to keep every deal alive no matter what cards are dealt to the players.

After the big blind comes the small blind which is exactly the half of the BB and also must be put on the table, but from the second opponent right after the big blind poster. As you can guess this way after the blinds have been already bet it is 100% sure that there will be a winner of the deal who will take at least the sum of BB + SB. Another thing important is that after all the other poker players on the table decide whether to respond (check) on the blinds or not it is considered that the SB player should decide whether to post the other half of the Big blind in order to continue playing the deal.

As you may predict the name of those demanded bets comes from the fact that those who have to place them are considered betters without depending on the cards they hold or in other words blind-players after the first betting round.


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