Tuesday 3:14 AM

The imposing value of the 2-3 is not greater in these positions of keeping nine and losing three overall. If I had gotten a cut of say twelve I might have led a five here now a King. dec

   

Tuesday 3:17 AM

Got to get as close to 95 as possible. Need to chance the second riskiest throw to opponents crib. I'm holding 3 "blockers" of the 16 10-pointers in the deck. Cut leaves me with 90. Lead the 5.

   

Tuesday 3:49 AM

Flying to Grand National today in Milwaukee. Hope to see some of you there.

   

Tuesday 5:04 AM

We had this before, and I had it twice in the same game. This is how I played it, based on the consensus of that CHOD puzzle, over a year ago. It’s what Ras calls a ‘suicide hand’.

Switching to offense now and the K lead, saving the J-Q to hopefully trap an X-Card. And pairing his/her 5. The 5 lead simply because I assume this is the X-Card they most likely put in my crib. But who knows?

   

Tuesday 5:12 AM

I need the points

   

Tuesday 5:16 AM

I'll risk it, 2-3-5-J won't get me far enough.

TTTT,JJJ,QQQ,KKK,555 = 16 really helpful cuts =
(18-2) cuts =
(3*6)-(2*1)=
(3*13%)-(2*2%)=
39%-4%=
35% chance of cutting to beyond hole 95.

Didn't get a useful cut, so I'll lead the 5.

   

Tuesday 5:23 AM

Only if the Dealer were Twenty Holes further down the board would I bust up our Nine Points.

And if that Dealer were on Fourth Street, I might think of Toss 2-K as well as Toss Q-K, since the latter discard could 'burn' us as well.

But from Hole 71, the Dealer is merely "on target" to probably or possibly win with perhaps 51% certainty.

And the best way for us to "chip away" at such a Positional Puzzle is to get our own pegs moving!

I'm not sure whether I will lead a Face Card or the 5 Card today: (maybe I'll do the opposite of whatever Inushtuk1 does ;-)

Actually, after Toss 2-3 we hope the Dealer buried 7-8 or 6-9, so perhaps our 5 Card Lead can 'snag' a matching Face Card reply, which we can safely PAIR.

   

Tuesday 5:53 AM

Not much disagreement today.

   

Tuesday 6:32 AM

As others said, not willing to give up 5 points in this position. Hopefully opponent gets a 2 point crib. Cut doesn't help me, and is not an obvious fit for the crib.

   

Tuesday 6:57 AM

Right now I am a bit short of where I want to be when I deal the next hand. 2-3 is one of the most precarious discards into the dealers crib, but in this situation I will take a chance. The possibilities of a 16 or 17 point hand just cant be ignored. Lead the king and hope for the best.

   

Tuesday 8:38 AM

With dealer in CPZ and us about 5 points short of ours no way am I throwing 2-3. This position calls for defense.

Sure we could hit a good cut and be dealing past 96 but only 12 cuts will accomplish this. Keeping 5-J-Q-K there's a high chance that we will end up at around 90 with dealer moving past 86 thus maintaining his positional advantage. It is better to play off and try to keep our opponent short of 86.

   

Tuesday 2:55 PM

I think its between 5-J-Q-K and 2-3-5-J:

5-J-Q-K: 9pts - 6¾pts (Schell: 7.00) = +2¼pts

2-3-5-J: 4pts - 3½pts (Schell: 3.46) = +½pt

Potential:

5-J-Q-K: Improves with 555 + 13xxs = 16 cuts = 16/46 = 34.8% up to 12/16/17pts with all cuts. Plus 11 spades for 1pt extra for his nob = 11/46 = 0.24pt.

2-3-5-J: Improves with AAAA, 222, 333, 4444, 555, 7777, 8888 + 13xXs = 38 cuts = 38/46 = 82.6% up to 7/8/10pts with AAAA, 222, 333, 4444, 555 + 13xXs = 30 cuts. Plus 11 spades for 1pt extra for his nob = 11/46 = 0.24pt.

Pegging:

2-3-5-J should peg better than 5-J-Q-K.

Position:

Opponent is 1pt past 3rd street positional hole and we're 5pts short of where we need to be. I'll play Offense to try to reach 96pts.

Summary:

5-J-Q-K starts with 1¾pts more than 2-3-5-J and although 2-3-5-J will peg better and has more cuts for improvement and 30 cuts for 7-10pts I don't think it will catch this up. So I'll risk the 2-3.

   

Tuesday 2:57 PM

At 81-71* playing an Offense strategy for the pegging the dynamic expected averages and Win/Loss %s are:

________________Our
Offense___Hand__Pegs__Crib___Total___W3 %____W4 %
5-J-Q-K___11.39+1.22+(-7.05)=5.56____44.5____60.3
2-3-5-J____7.37+1.63+(-4.08)=4.92____27.5____56.2

Offense_______L3 %____L4 %
5-J-Q-K_______18.7____29.9
2-3-5-J_______12.7____32.5

5-J-Q-K is better for expected averages by 0.64pt and is very much better for Win %s. It is worse for Loss %s because of the risk of the 2-3 but even so I'll select this to discard.

After the 9 cut I'll lead the Q and play Offense:

Lead__________Our Pegging Pts.
Q__________________1.25
J__________________1.25
K__________________1.24
5__________________1.22

   

Tuesday 3:10 PM

With a ten point lead and a shot at 16-17 points with a number of cuts, will choose off., off., off., lead the Jack, and take pegs as offered. Am surprised that there is only .03 pegging difference in the lead of any of these four cards (see HaslcribCLX analysis above). I had been shoulder to shoulder with opponent at hole 71, would have played 2-3-5-J with Q-K discard a defense strategy.