Blackjack Lingo: “Soft 17″

A soft 17 occurs when the dealer shows an Ace, and a 6 after two cards. This way of adding up to 17 is considered ’soft’ because, since the Ace can be valued at one or eleven, this hand could also be considered a 7. The dealer must hit a soft 17, so this gives the players the ability to improve if the dealer catches a bad card, or be crushed if the dealer “catches good” (a 4 for example).