slow roll

• slow-roll, slowroll

slow roll (third-person singular simple present slow rolls, present participle slow rolling, simple past and past participle slow rolled)

1. (poker slang) To make a long pause before calling an all-in bet with a strong, usually very strong, hand.
2. (poker slang) To make a long pause before revealing one's winning hand.
3. (transitive, by extension) To obstruct by delaying; to slow-walk.
   • 2018 March 21, Elaina Plott, “Trump Vents His Anger Over Border-Wall Funding”, in The Atlantic‎^[1]:

     The president is upset with congressional leaders for slow-rolling his core campaign promise, and for failing to defund sanctuary cities in their spending bill.

   • 2024 October 24, Keith Foglesong, “Shades of Green” (18:52 from the start), in Star Trek: Lower Decks‎^[2], season 5, episode 2, spoken by Samanthan Rutherford (Eugene Cordero):

     “Aah! What did you do?” “Vulcans do not require as much sleep as humans, so I spent the night fully repairing the shuttle.” “Aw, this is terrible.” “I am failing to find the logic in your dissatisfaction.” “I was trying to slow-roll the repairs.” “Slow-roll?” “Tendi and I used to work on this every day. It was our project. She'll be so sad it's done.” “You are implying that the act of collaboration is more important than the work itself.” “I know, I know, it's silly, but...” “No. My request for your aid in studying was an exaggeration. I was trying to deceive you into socializing as well.”

   • For more quotations using this term, see Citations:slow roll.

slow roll (plural slow rolls)

1. (poker slang) An instance of slow rolling
   • 2007, Irish Mike, “A strange slow roll”, in rec.gambling.poker (Usenet):

     Saw a very strange slow roll last night in a $20/$40 game. A guy raises with KK and another player calls, all-in, with 99. Flop and turn are rainbow rags. Then, for reasons known only to him and God, the dealer decides to get cute with the river card. He peeks at the corner, pauses dramatically, looks at both players, then turns up a 9 on the river. I've seen a lot of players slow roll but it's unusual to see a dealer do it. A lively discussion followed.

2. (aviation) A maneuver in which the aircraft makes a complete rotation around its roll axis while maintaining a straight and level flight path.