Thursday 3:19 AM

All but eight cuts adds to this hand. Substancial cuts can make this fourteen to seventeen points. The eight-eight discard could possibly be a big miss compared to five-five. Into the second third of the game not willing to risk the game here. Six lead. dec

   

Thursday 3:21 AM

I missed the nine cut making only the Ace cut a no gainer here. dec

   

Thursday 4:03 AM

As dec says, only the ace cut doesn't help this hand. Willing to give up a pair of eights but not a pair of fives here.

   

Thursday 4:08 AM

Misclick! Toss the 8s for the double run. 58 is about the same as a toss, but we have just 8 points on many cases, which is not enough.

55 will peg best but the toss is suicidal when we can still claw our way back. 88 it is.

Our 5s are millstones in pegging.

Pone likely to respond to 6 with a 9 or X. 9 is nice if we play the 5 for 20 and then pone has another 5 or an X

If we lead the 7, pone should reply with
8 (26% chance he was dealt one) or X. We can play the 6 for 21-3 but pone scores 31-2 or 30-5, or 26-4 and then 4 for us

Pone could have cards such as 8-5-2-x or 9-8-7-6 or 9-8-8-7

With 2 5s in our hand there is only 1/4 chance pone was dealt one, and he may have cribbed them, so the chance of our 5 getting out here doesn't seem good

If we lead the 5, pone is likely to 15-2 and we don't have a route to get to 31

So we lead the 6 and then

6-9-5 and probably no 4 from pone here and we may get last
Also 6-x-7
Here with the score at 23 if pone has a hand like xxx5, the 5 must come out and scores only 1.
With
6-x-5-x pone is likely to score an immediate 2 points, whereas our 5s may stay dry yet....

   

Thursday 4:25 AM

Tough puzzle Dan-I’m going to play it a bit conservative and throw the 8/8 instead of the 5-5-I don’t think we can win the game on this hand but a couple cuts could certainly push us very far to the losing end of the spectrum-we at least have a 6 and a 7 in our hand that could mitigate some of the damage the 8-8 toss could incur.

   

Thursday 5:15 AM

A sure 12? Why not?

   

Thursday 5:56 AM

There are clearly only three alternatives (5-5)(5-8)(8-8). Given that this is not my crib, the 5-5 alternative is by no means acceptable. If I have no face cards, I have to presume that they were dealt to the dealer. I cannot afford to give the dealer 6 point or probably more in his crib.

The 5-8 is a little more flexible in regards to the crib, but that clearly rips the guts out of the hand.

That leads to the 8-8 discard. The face card or two that the dealer may toss into his own crib will not cause that much damage. The odds that he tossed 8-7 into his crib are more remote but not impossible, since I have one 7 and I gave him 2 eights. The two eights in his crib makes my lead of the 7 a bit safer.

   

Thursday 6:35 AM

In the real-life game I threw the 88, which is the consensus pick so far. My opponent threw 67,and a 7 was cut.I had 16 but of course he had 24. If I threw the 55 those scores would have been reversed. But we know one instance doesn't necessarily make the choice wrong. Also interesting: if I tossed the defensive 58 we both would have had 16. It just highlights how often it seems that both players have most of the middle cards.

   

Thursday 6:53 AM

Hole 43 is 13 holes away, so being able to start with a guaranteed dozen is a blessing.

Only 16 of the unknown 46 are X cards, so 30/46 or roughly 66% chance of avoiding disaster.

   

Thursday 7:28 AM

If Cribbage was measured by speed, time, or quickness, and gave us an added bonus for say winning in a fewer number of deals, then instead of merely trying to prevail, we might also seek to win more quickly.

This element of "I want to WIN and WIN right NOW" is so pervasive in so many other games, and life pursuits, and in our culture, and it is what motivates choices such as Keep (6 7 8 8) and Toss (5 5); for, if the room were on fire, and we couldn't leave until somebody wins, then surely this is the quickest way to get out alive, come Victory or "That Other Thing."

But that is NOT in any way, shape, or form part of the rules of Cribbage! In fact, one of the best tactics in Cribbage, and even in other less serious endeavors we may encounter from day-to-day such as War, and maybe Life Itself, is to 'bide our time' and "slow down" those things that confront us.

For this reason, I like to Keep (5 5 6 7) and Toss (8 8) today. We get some "Negative Delta" when we Toss (8 8), since we were dealt a 7 Card, and we prevent the Dealer (who already leads us by ... gasp! ... Ten Holes!) from getting her/his mitts on either of our 5 Cards. And we *still* retain a wonderful Hand.

It's never good to be "Behind and Not Dealing"; (let us remember, my yet-to-be-written Cribbage Novel has a 'working title' of "Ahead and Dealing," which is quite the opposite of today's nightmare-of-a-puzzle situation).

Therefore, it shall probably help us if we can "slow down" this game. Normally, Toss (8 8) 'over the board' is in no way an attempt to slow down anything, but considering the alternatives, and taking into account the Hand it allows us to retain, this is probably our best hope.

After the quite lovely Trey Cut, let's try leading our 7 Card. Even if it gets PAIRED, we have some consolation in that perhaps the Dealer didn't stuff any 7 Cards into the Crib! And, if the Dealer responds with an 8 Card for (15=2), we can then play our 6 Card for (21-3), and at least get moving.

   

Thursday 7:40 AM

Early enough for me to take the chance on the 8's, since I am holding a 6 and 7. Thought of 5-8, but not worth giving up a prospective dozen with all of the face cards out.

   

Thursday 8:36 AM

Nice puzzle Dan. I Tend to be on the aggressive side here with this positional scenario. Wish that 7 cut came out here like you mentioned above in the live game you were involved in, lol. The crib could get ugly...

   

Thursday 11:03 AM

Choosing off., off., off as need to reach 2nd street CPZ 43-47 for upcoming deal. After seeing starter card,knowing that have a dozen points, a couple of pegs will be helpful. If not willing to to toss 5-5, keep them both as any 10-pointer tallies a dozen. Based on my scant empirical data, holding 5-5-6-7 actually has a higher combined value (pegs, hand score, minus the crib) by nearly 1/2 point. Generally as non-dealer, you would not give up four points in direct hand score and a much greater potential to minimize opponent crib score. Since 5-5 average is 9.086 (58) and scores 8 or more 89.1% of the time, hold 6-7-8-8 and toss the 5-5 if it appears a win is in the balance. That might be the case on third street and often so on 4th street. In this position, you'll actually increase your chances to win by retaining that 5-5. Got to head to town - more later.

   

Thursday 11:34 AM

I wasn’t very sure of myself here but 8 8 seemed the least bad of lots of bad throws!

   

Thursday 5:13 PM

I think it's between 5-5-6-7 (8-8), 6-7-8-8 (5-5) and 5-6-7-8 (5-8):

5-5-6-7: 8pts - 6¾pts (Schell: 6.82) = +1¼pts

6-7-8-8: 10pts - 9½pts (Schell: 9.37) = +½pt

5-6-7-8: 6pts - 6½pts (Schell: 6.30) = -½pt

Potential:

5-5-6-7: Improves with 2222, 3333, 4444, 55, 666, 777, 88, 9999 + 16xXs = 42 cuts = 42/46 = 91.3% up to 12/14/16/17pts with 3333, 4444, 55, 666, 777, 88 + 16xXs = 34 cuts.

6-6-7-8: Improves with AAAA, 2222, 3333, 55, 666, 777, 88, 9999 = 22 cuts = 22/46 = 47.8% up to 14/16/17/20pts with AAAA, 2222, 777, 888, 9999 = 18 cuts.

5-6-7-8: Improves with AAAA, 2222, 3333, 4444, 55, 666, 777, 88, 9999 + 16xXs = 46 cuts = 46/46 = 100.0% up to 9/10/12/14pts with 2222, 4444, 555, 666, 777, 88, 9999 = 23 cuts.

Position:

Dealer is 4pts short of second street positional hole of 44pts and we are way behind so I'll play Offense to try to catch up.

Pegging:

I think all three hands will peg well but probably 5-6-7-8 the best.

Summary:

5-5-6-7 has a starting value ¾pt more than 6-7-8-8 and it has more cuts for improvement. It has a lower maximum at 17pts compared to five cuts for 20pts (777, 88) but 5-5-6-7 has 34 cuts for 12-17pts. 8-8 also has some negative delta as we hold a 7. I think I'll throw the 8-8.

   

Thursday 5:15 PM

At 30-40* playing a Defense strategy for the pegging the dynamic expected averages and Win/Loss %s are:

________________Dlr's
Defense__Hand___Pegs____Crib___Total___W6 %____W7 %
5-5-6-7___12.22+(-3.89)+(-5.58)=2.75____18.5____30.0
6-7-8-8___14.65+(-2.61)+(-9.67)=2.37____24.3____28.8
5-6-7-8____9.43+(-2.91)+(-5.92)=0.60____13.4____24.4

Defense_____L6 %____L7 %
5-5-6-7______37.7____51.5
6-7-8-8______48.5____55.4
5-6-7-8______38.0____58.4

5-5-6-7 is best for expected averages by 0.38pt and although 6-7-8-8 is slightly best for Win %s 5-5-6-7 is very much best for Loss %s. So I'll select 8-8 to discard.

After the 3 cut I'll lead the 7 and play Optimally (cautious offense):

Lead__________Net Pegging Pts.
7_________________(-1.81)
5_________________(-1.29)
6_________________(-2.12)

   

Thursday 10:09 PM

This is always my personal nightmare. But 5,5 is too dangerous with every single X card out there. I'll take my chances with the 8's.