busted flush
1
9.9
- noun
- Jargon
:
mano fallida
- A busted flush can lead to a quick loss.
Examples
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Even an experienced player can end up holding a busted flush during a tense game.
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He revealed a busted flush during the final round.
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His excitement disappeared as he revealed a busted flush at the showdown.
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She bet heavily, not realizing her cards added up to just a busted flush.
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After seeing the community cards, I realized my hand was just a busted flush and decided to fold instead of betting.
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In the final round of betting, the player discovered he had a busted flush and opted to give up his hand.
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She thought she had a winning hand, but it turned out to be a busted flush with no chance of winning.
Surface Forms
Morphology
A learner who knows 'busted' as 'ruined/failed' and 'flush' as the poker hand can reasonably infer a 'busted flush' is a flush that has been ruined or has failed — the combination is partially compositional. However, the precise technical sense (specifically being one card short and therefore having little value) is poker-specific and not fully predictable from the words alone, so it is only partially transparent to a B1 learner.
Etymology
Busted flush comes from poker: a flush is five cards of the same suit, and when you are one card short the almost complete hand is busted or 'broken'. That's why busted flush means a hand that fails to become a flush and so has 'little or no value'.